I overheard a conversation where a guy was trying to fill a block wall
cavity just at the bottom next to the floor, and he only had access at
the bottom. He said it's hard to get the mortar to fill the holes in
less than 3 attempts since it tends to run out even thought it has less
water than he normally uses for mortar. He was told to add some dish
soap (detergent) to the mortar and it will either get sticky or maybe
just very thick? Ever hear of anything like that? I googled it and
found nothing.

Sort of related, I once bought some dish detergent at a $1 store and I
normally water it down a bit. This stuff from the $1 store got thicker
as I added water! WTF? Sounds like a way to make people think their
soap is really concentrated?

On Feb 24, 5:19*pm, Tony wrote:
I overheard a conversation where a guy was trying to fill a block wall
cavity just at the bottom next to the floor, and he only had access at
the bottom. *He said it's hard to get the mortar to fill the holes in
less than 3 attempts since it tends to run out even thought it has less
water than he normally uses for mortar. *He was told to add some dish
soap (detergent) to the mortar and it will either get sticky or maybe
just very thick? *Ever hear of anything like that? *I googled it and
found nothing.

Sort of related, I once bought some dish detergent at a $1 store and I
normally water it down a bit. *This stuff from the $1 store got thicker
as I added water! *WTF? *Sounds like a way to make people think their
soap is really concentrated?

Adding detergent to morter is an old trick to make the morter more
plastic, ie squishier to make bricklaying easier.. You can buy pukka
plasticiser for the job.
You don't need much to have a hell of an effect. It works by
entrapping air bubbles in the morter as you mix it. It also weakens
the morter.

harry wrote:
On Feb 24, 5:19 pm, Tony wrote:
I overheard a conversation where a guy was trying to fill a block
wall cavity just at the bottom next to the floor, and he only had
access at the bottom. He said it's hard to get the mortar to fill
the holes in less than 3 attempts since it tends to run out even
thought it has less water than he normally uses for mortar. He was
told to add some dish soap (detergent) to the mortar and it will
either get sticky or maybe just very thick? Ever hear of anything
like that? I googled it and found nothing.

Sort of related, I once bought some dish detergent at a $1 store and
I normally water it down a bit. This stuff from the $1 store got
thicker as I added water! WTF? Sounds like a way to make people
think their soap is really concentrated?

Adding detergent to morter is an old trick to make the morter more
plastic, ie squishier to make bricklaying easier.. You can buy pukka
plasticiser for the job.
You don't need much to have a hell of an effect. It works by
entrapping air bubbles in the morter as you mix it. It also weakens
the morter.

Sounds like a "poor man's" way to get modified.

Jon

On Wed, 24 Feb 2010 12:19:36 -0500, Tony
wrote:


Sort of related, I once bought some dish detergent at a $1 store and I
normally water it down a bit. This stuff from the $1 store got thicker
as I added water! WTF? Sounds like a way to make people think their
soap is really concentrated?

Well, how many loads did the soap do, and how does that compare to
other soap?

mm wrote:
On Wed, 24 Feb 2010 12:19:36 -0500, Tony
wrote:

Sort of related, I once bought some dish detergent at a $1 store
and I normally water it down a bit. This stuff from the $1 store
got thicker as I added water! WTF? Sounds like a way to make
people think their soap is really concentrated?

Well, how many loads did the soap do, and how does that compare to
other soap?

Adding the water without a doubt made the detergent less effective even
though it was more viscous. Of course there was a point were adding
water to the soap started loosing it's viscosity. It was not worth the
$1 I paid for it.