A Guide to Masonry Skills: Mixing and Using Cement

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The best way to learn about any skill is to do it, and working mud is no exception.
The best way to learn about any skill is to do it, and working mud is no exception.
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Diagram 1: A pointing trowel.
Diagram 1: A pointing trowel.
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Diagram 2: A homemade mortar box.
Diagram 2: A homemade mortar box.
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Diagram 4: Leveling a small form.
Diagram 4: Leveling a small form.
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Diagram 3: Squaring a post.
Diagram 3: Squaring a post.
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Diagram 6: Floating a finished surface.
Diagram 6: Floating a finished surface.
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Diagram 5: Screeding with a strike board.
Diagram 5: Screeding with a strike board.
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Diagram 8: Using a finished width guide.
Diagram 8: Using a finished width guide.
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Diagram 9: Cutting control joints.
Diagram 9: Cutting control joints.
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Diagram 10: Leveling a trench footing.
Diagram 10: Leveling a trench footing.
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Diagram 7: Measuring slope with a line.
Diagram 7: Measuring slope with a line.
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Diagram 11: Repairing broken corners.
Diagram 11: Repairing broken corners.
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Diagram 13: Repointing mortar joints.
Diagram 13: Repointing mortar joints.
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Diagram 12: Parging with mortar.
Diagram 12: Parging with mortar.

MOTHER’s Handbook: A homeowner’s lesson in masonry provides a helpful guide to mixing and using cement. (See the cement illustrations in the image gallery.)

A Guide to Masonry Skills: Mixing and Using Cement

The world’s strongest foundations, footings and masonry walls are made with concrete or mortar–mud as it’s called here in MOTHER’s neck of the woods. But many newcomers to country life shy away from working the stuff, perhaps because the chemistry of it seems alien to the more natural lifestyle they’re seeking.

It isn’t, really. The cement that is the heart of all mudwork comes from good and natural things like limestone, oyster shells and iron ore, which are fused in a kiln, then ground from hard clinkers into a fine powder. Mixed with varying amounts of sand, gravel or crushed stone aggregate, this forms the dry base for concrete, the plastic mix that hardens into bridges and garden walks, or–with the addition of lime–mortar that’s used to bond brick, stone and precast concrete blocks.

When water is added to the dry base, it combines chemically with the cement in a process called hydration. The resulting paste solidifies within the hour, binding in the aggregates for now and always. Over a period of three days it cures and hardens to nearly half its finished strength, and in a month or more returns to rock.

  • Published on Jul 1, 1988
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