When is bed reinforcement used in blockwork
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Was it rolls of expanded metal lath, or the narrow ladder reinforcement with horizontal wires?
Expanded metal lath is only really useful as a ground for plastering when the background doesn't provide a good key.
The coils of the stuff we see on building sites have little-to-no tensile strength and so are of little use in 'strengthening' masonry walls.
If the wall you saw looks robust, there shoud be no reason for the addition of EML, which would be pointless.
If a wall is going to be particularly heavily-loaded, or is going to be subject to slight tensile forces (eg over a gap, or in a short cantilevered section) ladder reinforcement should be used.
https://jmdbuildingsupplies.co.uk/product/ancon-amr-s-d3-0-w60-brick-reinforcement-3mm-x-6
The coils of the stuff we see on building sites have little-to-no tensile strength and so are of little use in 'strengthening' masonry walls.
If the wall you saw looks robust, there shoud be no reason for the addition of EML, which would be pointless.
If a wall is going to be particularly heavily-loaded, or is going to be subject to slight tensile forces (eg over a gap, or in a short cantilevered section) ladder reinforcement should be used.
https://jmdbuildingsupplies.co.uk/product/ancon-amr-s-d3-0-w60-brick-reinforcement-3mm-x-6
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The Corporation Architects and Engineers will be spinning in their graves to learn that the reinforced walls they specified on public buildings and schools to protect from bomb or blast damage "were of little use"
And JCB drivers who try to demolish any such walls in bits or sections may also have a different view.
And I don't think imperial mesh was much different to the metric coils we see today.
For extra vertical and horizontal force resistance.
For crack or movement control.
For creating openings later.
The Corporation Architects and Engineers will be spinning in their graves to learn that the reinforced walls they specified on public buildings and schools to protect from bomb or blast damage "were of little use"
And JCB drivers who try to demolish any such walls in bits or sections may also have a different view.
And I don't think imperial mesh was much different to the metric coils we see today.
Apologies; the OP didn't state that the wall he saw being built was designed to be bomb- or blast proof, nor that it was being built with demolition in mind.
As the mesh has a degree of flexibility in both length and width, it can't be used as effective tensile reinforcement.
Apologies accepted.
Presumably the same flexibility principle of steel applies with concrete reinforcement? And that's pointless too?
It can't give horizontal force resistance, such as you would need, for example, when designing a panel for horizontal wind load; the stuff is too flimsy.
May as well use lengths of my grandmother's knitted scarves for the use it is IMO.
10 or 12mm steel rebar is rather less flexible than lengths of streched/cut sheet metal 0.1mm or so thick.
It's still flexible in the context of your example for mesh.
I'd go as far to say that in a push, you could even use mesh to climb up out of deep holes.
I've come across that mesh stuff in walls that I've been demolishing in the past and its a pain in the arse! If you thought the wall might be subject to a vehicle hitting it then I could see why it would be used.
I've been involved in structural design since the late 1880s, but will bow to your superior knowledge.
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