There is a vast amount of research on lightweight concretes. Unfortunately most of it is focussed on materials and techniques that are not readily available to amateurs. Structural lightweight concretes are widely made, typically by replacing some or all of the aggregates and cement with various types of fly ash. These are roughly 2/3 the weight of regular concrete and are about the same strength as regular concrete. This is probably stronger than most of use need for our projects and heavier than we would like. Really lightweight concretes in construction are mostly aerated concretes where some or all of the aggregate is replaced by air bubbles. This provides for densities from about half of regular concrete down to a little heavier than expanded polystyrene. The lighter grades have no structural use, they are only really strong enough to support themselves. The technique is probably beyond anything any of use can do. Simple lightweight aggregates such as perlite, polystyrene, and vermiculite are used in industry mostly for non-structural projects such as poured insulation. Little research has been done on strengthening these products because alternatives are available. It is probably fruitless to try since the aggregates themselves are so weak. There are some simple approaches to creating strong lightweight concretes. Leaving out the sand from a regular concrete mix makes a big difference and you can gain back a lot of the strength using admixes and fibres. Using strong lightweight aggregates such as pumice, slags, or fly ash is another approach that is fairly simple. The problems come with finding and using the aggregates. Fly ash in particular is nasty stuff and slag cement also includes lime which is bad, while pumice is hard to find and expensive. The fundamental hypertufa idea of using peat is bad for strength because the voids it creates are too large and you need to use relatively high-cement mixes to be able to join the coarse aggregates. I find that hypertufa recipes need to include sand to get good strength. Again, there are lighter alternatives such as fibres or a reinforcing interior framework. One thing I would suggest to anyone who is struggling to combine strength and light weight is to learn how to mix and cure your concrete. Too much water, improper dry mixing, and insufficient or incorrect curing will dramatically reduce the strength of your work. Also correct laying of the concrete to exclude air bubbles is important, although not really appropriate to hypertufa. For anyone thinking of experimenting with non-hydraulic cements, here is what slaked lime can do when it eats the skin off your fingers. Oh, the things I do just to provide informative photographs!

Joe, A lot of your points are good, but whether intended or not, the basic tenor of your writing, to me, is a bit haughty and uninformed. It is not accurate to lump a restaurant in with a corner store, a gift shop, or a bank. If I buy a product from a store that is defective, or get treated rudely at a bank; I might get upset, ask for a replacement, or write a complaint; but I'll almost assuredly return. If I order breakfast and get soggy potatoes, that place will never see me again. To take the requirement of minutiae control away from each and every plate that leaves the kitchen, to focus on the big picture and the business plan, that restaurant takes the fast road to closure. To chock that up to ego or not letting go is ridiculous. Here's the day to day operation of a restaurant in a nut shell. For each 8 hour shift of operation, one spends 3/4 of it preparing for 1/4 of explosive reaction to the demands of the public; Prepping, cleaning, organizing, filling containers, inventory, ordering. And then for a two hour period, every bit of that preparation focus shifts to all-out barely controlled chaos. Afterwards, you clean up and do it all over again. You get one chance to respond correctly in that 2 hour period. If you blow it, any new customer will probably never return. Current customers will tolerate it to an extent but continue the trend and they're gone as well. In our example, we employed 25-30 people. To keep that level of quality control with that many employees you better have passion. That kind of passion in the restaurant business is damn hard to buy. 9 years of research on small businesses falls short of 40 dedicated years in one business, when it comes to analyzing the demands. We paid our employess more than any other restaurant in our town of over 100,000. We've had many managers. A great manager is eventually going to move on in this career path because greatness inevitably desires to expand and conquer. Anything less than true grit and passion loses customers to sliding quality and inconsistency. There aren't many small businesses that "enjoy" an arena this competitive. When a new place opens up three blocks away, you lose a portion of your business while they go check it out. This cycle is painful and difficult to deal with; employee count, inventory, under preparation of food or waste. Our product has a one day shelf life. When one bad employee steals, it hurts. When the manager spends 2 crucial hours washing dishes because someone just walked, the whole operation suffers- the scrutiny of perfection is lowered but the public expectations haven't changed a bit. When a spurious law suit can be leveled against the business by a crook but still costs 12,000 in legal expenses to WIN in court, above the high cost of liability insurance- trust me- one feels that pain in more than the wallet. To label this level of dedication to survive in a difficult environment, ego, as I said before, is absurd. I could go on and on, but at least felt compelled to speak from the perspective of the trenches of a real working restaurant. I know this came across a little pissy but my arm hairs bristled. Sorry... michael p

I'm glad the sideways thing worked for you. I'll have to give that a try. I used to be able to take any kind of pills and any amount without drinking anything. I was young then I guess. Smiles. Now they all get stuck so I always take my pills with food. I just take a decent sized bite of food, chew it a few times, shove the pill or pills in and swallow. The pills go right down with the food since you are really used to swallowing something bigger than the pill. I do follow with eating a few more bites since I'm usually in the middle of eating anyway. Been using that method for quite a few years and it's been good so far.

To your original query, if 48" is your ideal prep space, then make the counter between the sink and range 48" (and just get used to stacking dirty dishes to the left of the sink). I personally would prefer 60" for my prep counter, but I'm likely taller/longer-armed than you are, and you should go with what feels most comfortable for you. The only caveat I can think of is, if your current prep space is teeny, then 48" probably feels enormous and like all the space you could ever want or need by comparison. For sure, it won't continue to feel so enormous once you are used to 48". If you install it, 48" will eventually feel normal and standard to you. I can guarantee that. The trick is, I've seen a lot of people get used to a larger space like that and then want even more space. For example, people used to eight foot ceilings think ten footers feel enormous and cold, but they enjoy nine foot ceilings and rave about how spacious and airy they feel and buy a house with those. Then they get used to nine. Nine is their new standard, eight footers now feel super low and cramped, and they start considering ten footers for their next house because those now feel nice and spacious and airy by comparison to the new standard. It's not always the case that you will eventually want more, but that kind of of pattern is very common to see in home spatial decisions. Aisle widths, door widths, counter lengths, etc. If you think that might happen to you, maybe go a touch longer than feels perfect to you now -- 54" perhaps?