Reusing brick and/or cinderblock

I may have access to quite a large amount of brick that will need to be removed from the exterior of a building.

I"m thinking that if I can, I can use it to build a shop behind my house but I'm concerned with reusing it.

Will I need to remove 100% of the existing mortar from the brick and relay it brick by brick?

If I get a hold of cinderblocks, will it be acceptable to just mortar them together or will I need to run rebar down through the walls and fill them with concrete?

Also, is there an equation or something to give a rough estimate of how many bricks/cinder blocks you'll need for a project?

Depends. From my research (was going to do the same thing to build a chimney) you will need to clean the mortar off and relay it, unless you get lucky and some come stuck together in a useful way... but are still light enough you can pick the chunk up. It's not that hard, get a geologist's hammer or stone mason's hammer and whack the spot right where the mortar meets the brick, it'll probably break pretty cleanly.

Cinder blocks - depends as usual... they're much harder to reuse (they tend to break just as easily as the mortar unless the mortar is severely decayed) and much cheaper per volume, at least around here I can get full 8x8x16 cinderblocks for 97c each and standard size bricks cost about 50c each.

Brick size - well, there are a few sizes, figure out which they are. Figure out what the side dimensions are (length+height), add space for mortar bed (1/4 to 1/2 inch on each dimension), calculate wall area you need, add 5-20% depending on brick condition, divide by area of brick+mortar. Oh, if you're doing a double thick wall, you want to remember to count that into your calculations.

Also remember you're going to need a stronger foundation if you build with brick/cinderblock than if you do stickbuilt.

limited experience here;
but mortar needs to breath, so filling the cinder blocks with cement may not work. and chipping off the left over mortar may not be easy, and could ruin many of them in the process.

the amount of time and effort it takes to clean the bricks may negate wanting to use them, and a proper mortar will not just flake off easily.

how old are the bricks too? if you notice any of them flaking apart I'd skip them.

you may get some help from a local mason, bringing them a sample of what you have and see what they have to say.

Oh yeah... if it's modern brick construction, with good cement/mortar, good luck. Most of the stuff I've helped with reusing was old old old construction with lime cement, thus why we had such an easy time with it.

Basically, we got a new hospital and the old one is being torn down at some point.

Right now, my buddy who is the ReStore manager has access to the inside to pull stuff out. This building is so huge there has got to be enough stuff I can scavenge to build a shop.

Aren't there whole companies based of re selling old construction materials? I even think some people seek out and buy older bricks for the nostalgia.

Unless you can get some neighborhood kids to clean the mortar for $2/hr, I don't think it's worth the trouble. I removed two walls of brick from our house when I did a large addition. Most of it went in the dumpster, but for some reason some didn't, so I threw it under the deck expecting to never see it again.

Then the wife wanted a sunroom, so the deck got torn down. The wife spent quite a few hours knocking mortar off those bricks, just to have enough to do about 27' of the 18" high wall required by code. For a two-car garage sized shop you'd be looking at something like 60-70' of 9-10' wall.

Recycling is good, but for this, I think it's too far from cost effective.

People actually do clean it up and resell it, all sorts of artsy fartsy designer types love the way mixed-up, recycled brick looks. For instance, go to an Uno's Pizzaria and look at the walls...

Cost effective is a strange one. For my personal stuff, I consider my time to be free (since I am salaried at work, I don't make money doing extra hours, I do em if I need to) which results in the economics being way different from someone who would consider their time to be worth something.

My (Parent's) house is made completely of used brick. The bricks were taken from an old racing engine factory that was built in the 30s. Like Kastein said, the bricks were old and had the lime cement I would assume.

Removing the old mortar is not that challenging, just a good chisel and a hammer will do the trick. The problem is that it takes for ever. You are going to need to invest a heck of a lot of time to clean off enough of those bricks to build anything. Me, my old brother, my Dad and two of his friends, plus a skid steer could clean and load a pallet of bricks in a few hours. I think we cleaned about 40 pallets of bricks to have enough for the house.

So 40 pallets x 3 hours x 5 people = 600 man hours.

It was a lot of work, but in the end I am glad I helped my parents save some money and I really like the look of the used bricks. Some have white paint on them, the rest vary in color from a dark red to a light orange.

Ill see if I can find some pics.

CherBear said:

Me, my old brother, my Dad and two of his friends

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Did you get a new brother recently?


look on craigslist, you can find all kinds of extra building material.

Used bricks are actually a saleable item in many areas. They actually go for more than new in many cases. Lots of people like the looks of them. Our house burned down and we salvaged bricks from it and use them to build the fireplace in the new house. It looked cool.

bigalpha said:

I may have access to quite a large amount of brick that will need to be removed from the exterior of a building.

I"m thinking that if I can, I can use it to build a shop behind my house but I'm concerned with reusing it.

Will I need to remove 100% of the existing mortar from the brick and relay it brick by brick?

If I get a hold of cinderblocks, will it be acceptable to just mortar them together or will I need to run rebar down through the walls and fill them with concrete?

Also, is there an equation or something to give a rough estimate of how many bricks/cinder blocks you'll need for a project?

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All walls require structural re-inforcement based on the length/height/load supprt of the wall.Best to contact the AHJ and see what meets the code in your area!

bigalpha said:

..., my buddy who is the ReStore manager has access to the inside to pull stuff out. This building is so huge there has got to be enough stuff I can scavenge to build a shop.

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Can you remove interior curtain walls and/or fixtures?
Metal and wood stud are both reusable.
In a commercial building, the wiring should be MC(metal case) or run in conduit.
Drop in light fixtures in a drop ceiling can be free-hung in a shop.
Tons of cabinet wall and base units can be re-purposed for storage/shelving.

You might save more money salvaging fixtures then building materials.

Yes, you must core fill the CMU (concrete masonry unit, aka cinder block) w/concrete & rebar. Keeps the wall from falling over. Check your local codes for how many to fill, probably every other hole. The core filling makes recovery/reuse of CMUs really difficult. They tend to either break, or come off in large, very heavy sections (often w/cracks).

A grinder will make quick(er), if messy, work of cleaning old mortar off.

Used bricks, yes.

Used blocks, not so much.

This will depend upon your exact location but for the type & size of building you're talking about you will probably need a Building Permit.

Thanks for all the responses.

Yes, I can scavenge basically anything I want. Before I go and get any permits or talk to anyone about building I want to make sure that I can at least get the materials needed for this project.

I'm not limited to building with brick or block so I can do anything I want as long as I get the stuff I need to finish it. If I use metal studs for framing the walls, then I'll need to get stuff to finish the exterior.

My budget is extremely limited, which is why I need to be able to get everything for free or stupid cheap. There are plenty of hardware, wiring, cabinets and stuff in the hospital so that'll be the last thing I pull out assuming I get something built.

The few walls I did tear into had metal studs and I haven't seen any wood studs or anything. That probably makes sense since it's a hospital and all.

What about reusing block and using an surface bonding type system instead of filling?

bigalpha said:

I need to run rebar down through the walls and fill them with concrete

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Along wih building a proper footing with rebar and concrete.

If that building is demo'd and it's made of block there won't be anything useable left over when they are done.

bigalpha said:

The few walls I did tear into had metal studs and I haven't seen any wood studs or anything. That probably makes sense since it's a hospital and all.

What about reusing block and using an surface bonding type system instead of filling?

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The std "galvy/tin" studs are not for load bearing walls(its usually the much heavier gauge "red iron" studs.
Never seen anykind of surface treatment thats structural.

Hmm, then I'll take another look for different types of metal studs.

http://www.drystacked.com/