• Eiri@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      10 hours ago

      But like, what’s the structure of the house made out of? I can’t imagine the structural bits can be made out of bricks?

      • mmddmm@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        edit-2
        3 hours ago

        what’s the structure of the house made out of?

        Reinforced concrete. It’s cheap to create, the materials are quite cheap, it’s very strong, and you can make it have any shape.

        I never understood why the US makes strctural bits out of wood. I can understand using it on the walls, but it’s completely unfit for the structure.

        I’d bet most people here claiming their houses are made of bricks have a reinforced concrete structure hidden inside brick molds on the corners.

        • prettybunnys@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          edit-2
          1 hour ago

          We have a lot of wood.

          It’s not completely unfit for structures at all, else we wouldn’t use it.

          concrete is terribly bad for the environment as it turns out.

        • Eiri@lemmy.ca
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          2 hours ago

          What makes wood unfit for structure? I don’t know much about buildings, but it looks pretty strong and flexible to me?

          • prettybunnys@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            3
            ·
            1 hour ago

            Nothing.

            This person is kinda saying nonsense.

            Wood is perfectly sound for structural building.

            There are wooden temples in Japan dating back to the 6th(7th?) century.

            A stone structure would have been shook apart by now.

            Different materials have different use cases.

          • mmddmm@lemm.ee
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            arrow-down
            2
            ·
            edit-2
            2 hours ago

            it looks pretty strong and flexible

            Compared to steel? I would recommend you check your eyesight.

            It’s also labor intensive, and has plenty of durability problems. Also, worst of all, there is a huge amount of problems that can weaken it but are completely invisible once you finish your walls. Problems that happen often, because of that labor intensity.

            • Eiri@lemmy.ca
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              2
              ·
              46 minutes ago

              Well i mean we’re talking houses here, not record-breaking high-rise buildings.

              As for issues with structural wood… Tbh they’re pretty rare. Probably more common than, say, the steel in your walls rusting or something, but still, not to a worrisome degree.

              The main one is insects. Water (leading to mould) is also a thing but water infiltrations are terrible news no matter the material so…

      • SebTorres@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        6 hours ago

        From South America. Our homes are brick and concrete, with a steel structure made of thick wires. If you’ve seen a mall being built, that, but smaller. Allows you to build up, while being resistant to earthquakes

      • ExcessShiv@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        edit-2
        8 hours ago

        Why not? Pretty much everything except the roof structure is made of bricks. My house is entirely bricks; an outer and an inner wall separated by a gap with insulation, with a wooden skeleton for the roof secured to the brick walls. All interior walls are either made of bricks (the originals built with the house in the 60’s) or aerated concrete blocks (added in a refurbishing later in the 00’s).

      • SomeoneSomewhere@lemmy.nz
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        10
        ·
        10 hours ago

        Brick does really badly in earthquakes, at least without major reinforcing. ‘Unreinforced masonry’ can be fatal pretty easily.

        Brick veneer over timber framing can be a thing.