Korean Job Discussion Forums

[dulouz]

Yea, so I'm back in Laos and the big reason why I am back is to have a good craft making experience with bamboo. There's plenty to think about from the tradition to commerce to craft to botany and on and on. Whats important to me is to learn as I go. I want to make a hydroponic unit from bamboo but that might involve floating construction, wind and hydro power and plumbing pipe use.

You can get a bundle of 12 15-foot long pieces for $2. This material will be narrow. Thicker bamboo costs more. These peices will allow your fist to enter an end.

I thought bamboo was free until I met a French expat resort owner who cussed me and cursed me for thinking about stealing bamboo. Later that day I found a riverside resort that invited me to cut as much as I wanted as long as I stay at their resort at $3 a day. You can cut your own, its kind of fun but its dirty work. Once is enough just for the experience.

Bamboo grows in clumps, the clump can be as intimidating as a large redwood. The healthy branches grow tall and start leaning heavily at 20 feet. I've seen branches at 45 feet long. The clumps are populated by health branches and the remains of old dead branches. You can pick out a favorite branch to cut down but its likely at the center causing you to hack many branches to get at said branch or you can trim at the top of the clump.

I surveyed the branches I bought. I refer to "knuckles" "shanks" and "pipes". Knuckles are the knots every foot or so. These are seperated by "septums". After cutting out the bad pieces, you are often left water tight sections and pipes. Pipes are the sections cut from the branch that do not have knuckles each end. "Highballs" are pieces cut with only one knuckle end. Shanks are pipes with or without knuckles.

I wanted to make some war machinery like a big bow or catapult but the bamboo broke easily. I lodged a few stiff pieces in a tight fulcrum and they snapped almost immediately after I leaned on it. Almost every branch has one rotten section that is much much weaker that then other sections and that one gives always.

I did float the water tight pieces and the pipes and the WT's floated at 90% and the pipes sank at 90%. I held the WT's underwater and no air escaped. I floated a WT all night and it still floated at 90% in the morning.

After cutting my pieces, I wanted to either make war with my new pieces due to the numchuck characteristics or juggle. I juggled more. the pieces are very balanced and large enough to make juggling easy.

You can get a good woodsman knife here for $2. The passerbys gave me advice on how to cut and chop. Good cutting involves rotating the shaft, good chopping involves - ? I'm not certain yet but think its about using a big knife that can use its weight. Learing to split was not hard, its much like splitting regular wood. I set a few experiment pieces up to hack to death. They all went to the firepit but I did learn the difference between old and new bamboo.

There are 1600 different species/types of bamboo. I don't know which one I am using. Sometimes its green and thick, sometimes its yellow and fragile. Iwas very surprised at how narrow the inside diameter can be and how imprortant is to choosethe stock carefully.

Different types of stock have different properties. Narrow walled stock floats better as long as its WT, thick walled stock is just like wood. Guess wghich one you would use for pipes and which one you use for construction?

Mo later.

[dulouz]

Yea, this worked out well. I made two hydro units and one went very well. The first was bad, it was more landscaping than building and I couldn't recognize it but the second one went very fast and in a few hours we had a functioning unit. Add a sewer pipe for a fish tank and I have a unit that could produce all the food a person needs for a year. Laos has a few native species that haven't been tamed yet either. I'd like to try that.

It was fun, Laos is French heavy. I got to say Bonjure Madomoiselle and au revoir etc. French women can still be beautiful if they want to be.

Next its off to The UN volunteer agency for some grant money.