Monocrete is a building

construction Construction is a general term meaning the art and science to form objects, systems, or organizations,"Construction" def. 1.a. 1.b. and 1.c. ''Oxford English Dictionary'' Second Edition on CD-ROM (v. 4.0) Oxford University Press 2009 and ...

method utilising modular bolt-together pre-cast

concrete Concrete is a composite material composed of fine and coarse aggregate bonded together with a fluid cement (cement paste) that hardens (cures) over time. Concrete is the second-most-used substance in the world after water, and is the most wid ...

wall panels. Monocrete construction was widely used in the construction of government housing in the 1940s and 1950s in

Canberra Canberra ( ) is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The ci ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...

. The expansion of the new

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was exceeding the ability of the Government to build houses, so alternative construction methods were investigated. The Canberra monocrete homes are built on brick piers and surrounding brick footing. All of the walls are of monocrete construction including interior ones. They are precast with steel windows and door frames set directly into the concrete. Steel plates in the ceiling space bolt the individual wall panels together. The floor and roof are of normal construction - wood and tile respectively. The gaps between the wall panels are filled with a flexible gap-filling compound and covered with tape on the interior. It has been suggested that the panels tend to move separately to one another, opening up cracks in between them, and that the houses also tend to be susceptible to condensation build up and mold growth on the inside of the walls. A similar technique is used in the construction of some modern commercial buildings.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Monocrete Construction Building engineering Building materials Prefabricated houses