b'SECTIONBUILDING A HOUSEWhere does all the aggregate go?By Kelly ParkerM ostpeoplehavelittle ideajusthowmuch aggregategoesinto buildingahouse,or whatexactlyitsused for. Yet an average single-family dwelling iscomprisedofroughly250tonnes ofaggregate.Thats a lot of aggregate. Which begs the question: how and where is it all applied? And where does it come from?To answer these questions, Avenues spoke toGregSweetnam,vicepresidentof James Dick Construction. Below ishisoverviewonthe many different ways that aggregate is used in the construction of ahome.SITE ACCESS:A construction road needs to be built for vehicles to get to the site and its usually builtoutofoversizedmaterial,which wouldbeatwo-inchclearmaterial,or atwo-inchcrusherrun.Theaggregate materials prevent vehicles from sinking in the mud while theyre accessing or beingwiththeconcretestone used on site. That two-inch screen materialderivedeitherfromasand would be sourced out of a gravel pit. and gravel pit or from a quarry. FRAMING AND VENEER:Similarly, the poured foundation walls areFramingcanbedoneinwood,steel FOUNDATION FOOTING 100 per cent aggregate.AND WALLS: or concrete block, and there is even a Builders put a six-inch pad of compactedmasonry veneer on the outside of the granularinthebaseoftheholeforaWEEPING TILE AND house. For brick, for example, shale is foundation. It is on top of that material thatBASEMENT FLOOR: mined at a shale quarry, then taken it footings are builtbasically the concreteFor the weeping tile, both under the floortoabrickplantwhichprocessesthe structurethatspreadstheloadoftheof the basement and around the perimeterclay bricks through a burning process. weight of the house over a footprint thatof the foundation, a 3/4 or 3/8-inch roundInordertoplacethosemasonryunits can support it. That concrete is made upstonefromagravelpitisused.Roundinto that wall, they need to be bedded of 85 per cent pure aggregates, with theinmortar,whichisbasicallymadeof rest made up of cement powder, and thatstone is used because the round particlesmason sand, which also comes from a powderisproducedbyburningquarriedwill not pack together. They will create thesand and gravel pit. That mason sand is stone. So virtually 100 per cent of the massmaximum air void space to allow for watermixed with cement powder and a little of that concrete comes out of a quarry pit.drainage around those particles. Then a 100bit of lime to make a masonry cement. Plus, the sand that goes into the concreteper cent concrete floor is poured on topOnehundredpercentofthatmortar isderivedfromasandandgravelpit,ofthat. comes from pits andquarries.FALL 2023AVENUES 11'