Richard Stump

Crushed Wall - Prototype sample of Crushed wall made by pouring concrete against manipulated rubber sheet. Final piece will be 3 metres in height by 25 metres in length. Rubber needs to be manipulated in one large sheet to maintain continuity of crumples but once formed and held rigid needs to be cut into sections to pour concrete. This sample was made to prove the process.

We needed to make a 35 x 4 metre sheet of 6mm thick rubber. The maximum width we could obtain was 1.5 metres. It was therefore necessary to join 24 pieces along their 4 metre edge. We simultaneously planed adjoining edges - a similar process to that of a veneer saw. Again, as with veneer, we taped perdendicularly to tension the joint before applying Loctite 406 from the opposite side to the tape. The joint was lifted from below with a baton to open it and allow access for the glue nozzle. Once the glue was applied and the baton removed the joint was rolled flat during curing. The rubber sheet was rolled onto a custom made spindle that doubled as a method of applying the rubber to the plywood wall using a Merlo telehandler. The total weight of the rubber was approx 1000kg. Despite very rough treatment in manipulating the rubber to the desired form and the huge weight of the concrete, the joints did not fail at any stage of the process.