Hints to househunters and householders / by Ernest Turner.

  • Turner, Ernest.
Date:
1884
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Hints to househunters and householders / by Ernest Turner. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Hitchins practically utilised in covering the outer walls of the Sanitary and Insanitary houses, which form so important a feature of the Exhibition. This consists of a mixture of fibre and plaster made up into slabs, the material thus formed being very light, of really astonishing strength, and capable of being used in the construction of partitions and ceilings without any lathing. We have next a composition for rendering walls damp-proof. This is the “ Hygeian Rock,” I can speak from personal experience of it, as I am using it with great satisfaction in the construction of a dwelling- house on a clay soil. It is a bituminous substance, and is poured in a liquid form into the cavity of a hollow wall, between the two thicknesses of brick- work, where it sets into an exceedingly hard and tough mass, binding the two thicknesses insepar- ably together, rendering the wall perfectly impervi- ous to damp. An invention, which promises to be of great use to the Architect as a fire and sound- proof pugging, is “ slag wool,” or “ silicate cotton.” As it has already, in the process of manufacture, passed through a smelting furnace, it ought as a fire-proof pugging certainly to answer its purpose. Before my next edition, I shall no doubt have an opportunity of testing it practically. The next thing that strikes us is a really admirable improvement in the “treads” of much frequented staircases. This is the silicon tread of Messrs. Doulton ; it is made of an almost imperish- able material, up and down which whole genera-