Benefits of Using Bamboo as Building Material

Colombia

Correspondent: On January the 25th, 1999 an earthquake shook the coffee region of
Columbia killing over 1,000 people and leaving many more homeless.
Most of the dead were trapped in concrete buildings. Surprisingly,
traditional houses made from bamboo remain standing. Despite Bamboo’s
proven resilience it still lack status as a building material. Hands On
discovers that it is in fact the perfect aesthetic new pleasing answer for
countries on a fork line.

Bamboozled

Correspondent: Guadua angustifolio or bamboo grows 13 cm a day 10 meters in 6
months and reaches maturity within 3 years. Once cut it quickly grows.
Columbian Architect Simon Velez has used bamboo for 14 years. He’s a
passionate advocate of the plant as an ideal building material in a region
prone to earthquakes. He has designed an affordable earthquake proof
house. It may look just like concrete but the walls, first floors and the roof
are held together with bamboo.

Simon Velez: Since the earthquake destroyed so much the idea is for people to acquire
the bamboo culture for building because it is flexible material and totally
indifferent to earthquakes. To pull down one of these structures is almost
impossible whatever the strength of the earthquake.

Correspondent: It’s flexible and durable. The ideal earthquake proof material but
one big problem with bamboo is the need to protect it from insect attack
until recently importing materials more expensive than bamboo had to be
used. Now a natural solution has been found.

Simon: The insect attacks the center of the bamboo because that is the part that
holds more starch and sugar and has to be immunized and treated. It use to
be done by chemicals.

Correspondent: The new method involves placing the cut bamboo in a smoking
box fired by smoldering bamboo shavings. These exceed a natural
paralytic acid smoke that protects the cut bamboo against insect attack.

Simon: This bamboo was dried in the sun and when cut this edge freeze because a
bamboo is not very dense. Now let’s see one which is smoked. The
difference of this edge is because of the density that the bamboo has
acquired during the smoking process and we could see that this cut was
slower as it was harder for the saw to cut through.

Correspondent: Simon Velez’s biggest achievement has been to perfect a method
of joining bamboo together to build a huge structure. The bamboo is cut
into hollow sections averaging 6 inches long. To make a joint Velez has
drilled a small hole in a single section filled it with concrete and inserted a
steal pen. The joint is fixed firm not a steel to the bamboo pole next to it
and used to hold together arches or huge roof spans. The cement had
strength but the short plug doesn’t affect the flexibility of the bamboo.

Simon Velez’s idea is being tested out on the very pavilion which contains
3,000 pieces of bamboo and a smaller number of timbers. The foundations
are designed to protect wood from moisture while still allowing flexibility
and the capacity to cope with strong earthquakes. The bamboo poles re
connected to a metal ring in the center of the roof. It’s attached with iron
fittings grafted on to the bamboo poles filled with concrete. Wait for wait
bamboo is stronger than steel and a 60 foot roof span in bamboo can carry
a heavy copper dome.

Simon Velez has no doubt that bamboo is a perfect aesthetically attractive
answer and not only for buildings constructed on the fault line.