Construction

The various causes of providing cavity wall are as follows :-

1. Damp Prevention :- Cavity walls reduces the chance of moisture intrusion from outer leaf to the inner leaf and thus helps in keeping inside of the building free from dampness.

2. Thermal Insulation :- The air in the cavity wall acts as a non-conductor of heat and hence minimizes the transmission of heat from the outer leaf to the internal face of the interior leaf. Thus, cavity walls help in maintaining the thermal insulation of a premise.

3. Sound Insulation :- The air in the cavity acts as a cushion for absorbing sound. By building cavity walls, a premise may work as a sound proof zone as a large quantity of external noise gets absorbed within the cavity.

4. Efflorescence Prevention :- As dampness is not allowed to penetrate the cavity, the inner leaf of the cavity, which is always a load bearing wall, is kept free from efflorescence effects.

5. Economy :- According to ‘W. B. McKay’ (Author of Building Construction), building a 275 mm cavity wall costs less than constructing a 328 mm solid wall (which is of the minimum thickness if dampness has to be mostly avoided). This measuring data may vary from one place to another and on the specific climate of the construction site. One has to calculate the customized details before deciding the measurement of a cavity wall.

AAC is also known as Autoclaved aerated concrete which is a lightweight, precast, foam concrete building material which is suitable for producing concrete masonry unit like blocks.

The advantages of AAC masonry over the conventional brick masonry are as follows :-
– AAC bricks are eco-friendly whereas conventional bricks are not.
– On AAC block dead load on the structure is low which reduces the consumption of cement, steel and water whereas using red clay brick there’s a heavy dead load on the structure.
– AAC blocks emits less heat in the atmosphere due to less use of cement, steel and concrete whereas on the other hand red clay bricks emits high heat to the atmosphere.
– AAC blocks have less material wastage whereas conventional red clay bricks have high material wastage.
– Thus, AAC have high sound insulation properties and red bricks have low insulation property.