debbie76

Hi can anyone give us some idea of the typical weekly hours a brickie does in brisbane area? What time do they start and finish, how many days per week and average salary? Thanks it would be a great help.

hantsfamily1

Normal sites start at 6.00am-6.30am through til around 3.00pm.

Not a brickie myself but I would have thought at least $40 per hour but most will be on price work and be able to earn $2500-$3000.

5 days minimum and saturdays are optional.

Timber Floor Au

LOL $2500-3000 ????

per week?

Bullshit !

That perhaps is for a Owner Bricklayer with a 3 n 1 gang ! and plenty of flat work , whack in cuts/squints/ledges/obscure returns ... nooooo way

But your average trowell aint gonna earn that !!!

and the hours 6 till 3 at $40 per hr. = $360 / day x 5 days = $1800

for 3k a week at $40/hr he would be working 75 hrs per week full steam !

Geelong Gent

Debbie

Here in Melbourne we were quoted $35 per hour for a tradie (him and his partner) with $18 per hour for a labourer (3 person gang).

They had alternative pricing based on $1 per brick - so not sure how many bricks per day you could do - this would depend on the particular job.
Is 500 - 700 possible? ie ($2500 - $3500)

As Timber has said - bewary of comments suggesting large amounts of income - there may be reality behind the $2500 - $3000, but it could be based on a one off week with loads of overtime or a particularly easy wall? and I think Hants is just trying to be helpful and pass on knowledge - perhaps just expanding where those figures come from could open up the debate and provide the OP with more info?

king kong

you wont earn $360 a day here in perth ,looking at 280 - 300 plus gst per day and price work has took a 15% nose dive .

But your quiet right in what you have stated Timber .

king kong

i would base a bricklayers wage on average for the year at 50000 or about 21000 pounds [give or take ] .Includes holidays and general downtime ie jobs not ready etc .
Big money can be earnt but you must employ heaps of men and have heaps of commercial work and also pay out heaps for insurances .Its a numbers game like anything else these days .
My income has plummeted by more than 50% here in perth because it is slowing down ,not the same for everyone but the investors are pulling out of the market at the moment and i know here in perth they represent up to 50% of the housing sector .

Geelong Gent

KK we are seeing loads of WA investors coming over here in WA. Most of the builds here are Brick Veneer (but mainly timberframe with fibre sheets with rendering.

In perth is it only double brick? ie to retain the better insulation properties or do some builders use thinner skins? Is ICF taking off over there?

Sorry for the questions but hope you might have some answers.

Timber Floor Au

Mate I wasnt stating a Trowell can earn that lol.

Exactly my point, most Brickies ive met on a good week, can pull about 250+ ish a shift

Ive had a few brickies working for me over the years, and 1 directly employed, back in early 90's.

As I recall 1 trowell + 1 offsider would do about 600 bricks a day, straight work. Think at a rate of about 55 bricks a m2 and blockwork about 10 blocks / m2 would be slightly different.

Our house which we recently had built i think was about 5000 bricks, may be well out there, cant remember but i did do the calcs. I spoke with the brickie, and he showed me his invoice book. This house was a $8 grand job to him

He had 1 lad setting out for 1.5 days.
Him and 3 trowells for 8 days.
1 guy on the saw permanently
1 guy mixing at full speed.

Id imagine all up, about 400 man hours
so 400 hrs for 8k = 20 bucks per hour per man
Obviously he varied what rates he paid his fellas, but as he said, after this many years doing it, he aint gonna retire as soon as he thought, when he was 18

king kong

i know here in perth it is double brick and i think thats because the customers demand it really .In kalgoorlie it tends to be brick veneer much like the rest of aussie .
The only time you may see timber framing is on the second floor and that is very rare .
I suppose at the end of the day its all about cost and we build a house every 2-3 days [brickwork only] which is pretty quick and tmber framing and external brickwork wouldnt be much quicker and at the end i believe timber framing is an inferior way to build .I know the pine is treated but with the ends cut off etc its bound to be a weak point and may well let white ant in and they go through pine like a dose of salts .
Inregards to ICF to be honest never heard of it but i have just looked at a website in victoria which has the letters ICF in it and i presume it must be the systems they have and i can say i have never seen anything like that here in WA ,but you have to remember i think we have the largest brick manufacturer [midland brick] in the world here in perth and the system would be in direct competition with them .
I remember many years ago they had thermalite blocks here and they were all the rage ,now they were great in the uk as we always laid them in normal mud but here they decided to use the german system [hebal] and lay them in a glue with 2 mm bed and a much bigger block ,this system didnt seem to cope to well with the perth tempreture ranges and because of the tighter beds and bigger blocks and subsequent lack of allowance of expansion these blocks were cracking all over the place .
Often people were moved out of their new homes in to hotels and a team of brickies went in there and gutted the thermalite out and put clay verticore back in .
I believe this system is now being used in the uk now ,so only time will tell on wether any problems will occur there .

king kong

i was agreeing with you and just stating what can be earnt here in perth and you are on the money with the calculations .
Its a misnomer all bricklayers are wallowing in wods of cash but it seems to be a myth thats been going on for years and years and a lot of it is down to fact people look a the price per brick and dont factor in costs to the subbies ie workers comp for starters which is well in excess of 50-60000 a year for a small 3-1 squad .

Timber Floor Au

The smart money is on the Sparkies !!!

They are the real earners in my opinion ( of the tradies )

And to some degree well earned too !

_______________________________

Still fkn amazes me how bricklayers, are still treated like shite. And looked at as the simplest trade on site ( by that I mean skill level )

Which as we all know is utter crap !!!

Geelong Gent

Thanks KK, I agree wholeheartily about timber v brick

We are building in ICF (Insulated Concrete Forms) -
http://www.thermacell.com.au/index.php
This is one supplier we looked at - we are also looking at another which is easier too attach internal plasterboard too.

Basically the forms are put up about a metre at a time and then concrete poured directly in which sets. There is a lot of problems with inferior suppliers which have qiven the process a bad rep.

Timber Floor Au

Yanno... Ive toyed with another option, Tilt Panels.

But at the mo im being quoted about $3k a sq !!! Which doesnt bode well.

I read HomeBuilder mag, and seen quite a few who are into formwork etc.. inc mud. Will check that link out.

I did see a few months back some plasterers rendering blockwork. With a spray gun !!

Intrigued the shit out of me !!

king kong

This kind of stuff reminds me of the old prefab houses in the uk built just after the war ,they all got concrete cancer in the end.
That wont happen here as the propeties wont stay up long enough as the land will easily outstrip the structure value wise ,so reallly a good quality cheap form of constuction is good for australia whereas uk houses are up for at least a hundred years and are seen as homes to bring your family up in .

king kong

I think just about anybody who works in construction in Australia works bloody hard and deserves every penny .
There is indeed a bit of rivalry between trades and the brickies cop a fair amount of flack for not getting the walls square whereas if the whole building is out of square they should be focussing their attention on the grano worker .
At the end of the day we all blame each other and passing the buck goes from the very top to the very bottom and it all adds to having a great craic on site and i wouldnt do anything else .