I was messing around the other day trying to figure out how many bricks I’d need for this little wall project I’ve got in mind. So, I started looking into this thing called a “brick counting calculator.”
First, I tried to get a basic idea of how to figure it out myself. I found some people saying you gotta take the length and height of the wall, multiply them together to get the total area, and then multiply that by 60. That’s supposed to give you a rough number for standard-sized bricks. And they said to add 10% extra for any messed up bricks or mistakes.
Then, I looked for these calculators online. I found a bunch of them, all asking for similar stuff. You gotta put in the size of the bricks – the length, height, and width. Then, how thick the mortar is going to be between the bricks. And of course, the size of the wall you’re building – length, height, and thickness.
- Put in the brick dimensions: I used the measurements for some standard bricks I had lying around.
- Typed in the mortar thickness: I just guessed a number here. I figured it’s pretty thin, right?
- Added the wall measurements: I measured out the space where I wanted the wall.
- Hit “calculate”: The thing did its magic and gave me a number.
Here’s what I did with one of these calculators:
Honestly, it was pretty cool to see it all laid out. I even found out some people can lay like 40 to 60 bricks an hour, but for a newbie like me, it’s probably gonna be more like 20 or 30. These calculators can save a bunch of time and probably some money too, since you don’t end up buying way too many bricks or running out in the middle of the project. It helps get the planning right, so there are no surprises later on, like finding out you are short on bricks or have a mountain of extras.
I played around with a few different calculators, just to see if they gave me similar numbers, and they pretty much did. So yeah, I felt pretty good about using one of these things. It made the whole idea of building a brick wall seem a lot less scary.
Using a brick calculator? Definitely recommend it! It’s easy, and it gives you a good idea of what you’re getting into with your brick project.
