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01. Tools - Modern masonry is durable, flexible and attractive. Here's what you should know before starting work.

ANYONE CAN work successfully with masonry materials and have fun doing it. It's true that a good size job can involve considerable labor, but with good planning the job—and the labor --can be stretched out over a period of time. A large concrete slab can be gridded (designed with a pattern of headers) so that the concrete can be mixed and poured in comparatively small batches that won't tax your patience or your strength.

02. Surface - There are many standard surface textures for concrete and X there are a lot more you can "invent". To get an idea of why such possibilities exist it would be helpful to take a look at a cross section of a concrete slab. Correctly poured, spread and finished, the cross section would reveal an almost uniform pattern.

03. Walks + Paths - Attractive walkways around your home add much to its convenience and beauty.

CORRECTLY LOCATED walks and paths direct the traffic to and around your home. They should permit you to walk com­pletely around the house, to and from service areas and from house to garage. Such an arrangement makes living more convenient and housekeeping easier; you don't have to worry about tracking in mud and dirt every time it rains. A good network of paths will protect your landscaping.

04. Casting a Patio - THE PATIO SLAB should be an integral part of the over-all plan for house and grounds. Many things affect decisions con­cerning size, shape and placement. How important is privacy? (Do you occasionally want to use the patio for sunbathing?) How about prevailing winds? A breeze constantly blowing across your favorite outdoor lounging chair can be very annoying.

05. Masonry Walls - SMALL MASONRY WALLS can serve many purposes around the average home. Most of the materials available for the pur­pose fit exceptionally well in outdoor settings. Some materials tend to give a rustic appearance while others lend themselves better to formal construction. Treatment is also a factor.

06. Build Steps - THE NICE PART about building outdoor steps is that you're not limited to the materials you would be forced to use indoors. Blending the steps into the surrounding landscape using materials that are compatible with an adjacent patio, house or garden, is an inviting challenge and one that permits you to give free rein to your imagination and ingenuity.

07. Putting Up Posts - THERE ARE many jobs around a house that involve posts of one kind or another. Posts for a wooden fence are the keystones of the project; weakness here and the fence will eventually lean, sag or just fall. A cover over the patio slab (you will surely want to erect one some day to provide shade) requires sturdy posts for support. You need posts for tetherball, a swing, clotheslines, a volleyball net, a driveway light and so on.

08. Stepping Stones - STEPPING STONES can provide an unobtrusive but very prac­tical walkway. They are used to provide clean footing for occasional traffic and can often be used in place of a solid walk. There are good reasons why this is an excellent project for the amateur mason. Stepping stones can be considered modular units —you can make a few at a time and eliminate the worry involved in one large pour. Stepping stones can be prettier than a solid walk. A pattern of stones is less formidable than a solid walk and may appear more in proportion on a small lot.

09. Concrete Slabs - A CONCRETE SLAB with perimeter footings poured at the same time provides a floor and support foundations for walls. En­tire houses are built this way, often with copper water pipes im­bedded in the slab to provide radiant heating for the home. A base of this type is often used when a room is added to an existing home or when a small extra building or garage is needed. Sometimes the footings are poured first (mostly when the footings must be higher than the floor level), but more frequently footings and slab are poured at the same time.

10. Concrete Blocks - CONCRETE BLOCK has long been recognized as an outstanding structural material and, with the new developments in the field, it is being used more and more. The Besser Company, pro­ducers of Vibrapac masonry units, states that in terms of wall volume, concrete masonry accounts for more than two thirds of all masonry walls built.

11. Brick Veneering - BRICK is pretty much the home handy man's favorite masonry material. It's permanent, strong and easy to handle. Brick­laying, unlike extensive concrete work, can be done in small sections, and you can stop any time you wish. For most jobs you'll want to mix mortar batches in a wheelbarrow—just about the amount an amateur can handle before it starts to set

12. Decorative Masonry - CONCRETE BLOCK has emerged from the past ten or 15 years as a versatile medium that is stimulating architectural imagi­nations from coast to coast. Examples of the adaptability of masonry units can be found almost anywhere there is new construction— commercial or residential.

Pierced blocks made especially for the purpose, and even con­ventional type blocks with the cores used to transmit light and air, make it possible to design interior or exterior walls or screens with a visual lightness and character that is surprising in such a basically rugged and strong material.

13. Flagstone Floors - IF YOU PLAN to build or have already built a room on a concrete Slab, you have the required solid footing for a flagstone floor Most people consider "flags," especially the bulk type that you cut and shape to fit, an outdoor material. While it's true that they fit nicely into most landscaping schemes, they can also be a "glamor'` material for indoor use—a relatively economical and most durable flooring that will give a room a distinctive decorator touch.

14. Masonry Hangers - NOT TOO LONG AGO, the homeowner reached for a "star drill" and a heavy hammer and set himself to quite a few minutes of tedious banging when he wanted to fasten something to a masonry wall. The job can still be done this way, and it's pos­sible that there are some situations where it is the only way, but there are now more modern methods that make this type of ma­sonry work immensely faster and easier.

15. Masonry Touches - ATITLE MORE APT for this chapter might be "Masonry Unlimited" for it takes nothing more than a little imagination to fit natural and manu­factured masonry materials into landscaping and interior decorative schemes. We use the term "masonry" in a very broad sense to include even the rocks and stones that are "carefully-carelessly" placed in a garden to imitate nature's own landscaping techniques.

16. Maintenance - IT MAY BE INACCURATE to apply the term "maintenance" to such permanent installations as masonry projects, but there are times when some touch-up work is in order. The most common fault that will appear in concrete—this, despite the most careful preparation of mix, installation and curing—is a crack. If this is due to a poor subbase the crack can become quite serious, especially if uneven settling causes a portion of the slab to sink below the grade level of adjacent areas.

17. Ornamental Masonry - HICK SLABS, heavy walls and foundations, walks and paths— projects of this type are associated with strong, durable con­crete, but have you ever thought of concrete as a handicraft mate­rial? Once you've experimented with concrete as a hobby, you'll quickly discover what a surprisingly flexible material it really is.

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