Pour the Core, A Solid Foundation

I mentioned Faswall block in an earlier post. made in Philomath, about an hour south of Portland. It's a post World War II invention-of-necessity from Austria, when there was not enough concrete to go around, and wood chips were neutralized of sugars, etc. and used as the filler, along with a binder, like cement, for structural blocks.
With an insulation insert tests suggest an r-20 or so for the blocks, and unlike typical ICF's (insulated concrete forms,) that are made of expanded polystyrene, these can be parged with stucco-type products and called good.
The blue "Smurf tubes" you see are electrical conduit as Jason and Cameron dry stack the block prior to pouring the cores full of concrete. The re-bar is to further strengthen the shear strength, in the event of a catastrophic siesmic event.


And then begins the pour. In Portland everyone seems to be addicted to concrete pumping trucks, rather than the wheel barrows and buckets of my youth. Kinda like 'em, really.
As we continue to fill the cores of the uphill (retaining) wall of the detached studio, this photograph shows the main house in the background, with an extraordinary amount of bracing and additional wall support. We used the plywood that is destined for the main floor decking to help us hold together the tiers of blocks.

In spite of the support, we did have two almost wall failures. Cameron drills a 4" hole through a ruptured support plank to "drain" the concrete therein, allowing us to push the wall back into place and re-fill. We were well-staffed, so no time was lost as a team stayed back on this and another repair while the pumper moved on. The decision was made to only fill half the wall today, or about 6 of the 13 courses, rather than a complete fill. "The better part of valor" as my New Orleans-bred mother would say, and we'll live, along with some better support on the upper tiers, to pour again. (Tuesday)

Here's a response I sent to Paul Wood, the block manufacturer, and a classic New Hamsha- type fellow: (Paul had emailed YET AGAIN last night wishing us well on our pour and again expressing concern that we would have blowout and wicked wall failures if we were to try to fill the entire thing in one day.)

paul, i have a few questions in regards to your concerns:

1) do you know how to pray?

1a) if you don't know how to pray, do you know a good bookie?

2) if we succeed, do we get written up in your hall of fame?

3) if we succeed, do you promise NOT to tell anyone what my cell phone number is, or my home address? you know how i hate so much attention.

4) if we DON'T succeed, do you think there is any chance in hell that we'll admit it to you?

Dang, I bet Paul is going to know now, for sure. Kidding aside, NEXT time, we'll get 'er, all in one day.
There's always something to be said about the relationship between goals and obstacles.