Cob (Fwd) Re Sand arch

[Patrick Newberry]

Hey John, I'm going to post this on the cob list as it might be of interest 
to someone.


John wrote: 
> 
> I visited Nadir's place in Hesperia & was impressed with the forms of what
> they have done there - some beautiful stuff !!
> 
> I was also impressed by how cold it was inside the long white vaulted
> structure 
(snip)
> 
> would feel more positive if the earthbag technique was worked on with an
> emphasis towards passive solar design - so that the building was always
> comfortable inside regardless of if it was being inhabited or not - I got the
> feeling that the long white vaulted one in Hesperia was not being inhabited &
> hence not heated (will require some form of active heating to be livable

Pat replied:
You are correct that the building is not occupied(or last time I was there 
anyway). But then again the winters aren't too bad and somewhat short. I'd be 
more interested to see how they were in July. The building did have a wind 
catcher in it to help with cooling. There were very few windows as I recall.
Pasive solar is good, but in middle GA and Florida, it can be rough in the 
summer with too much emphasis on solar gain.

 
John wrote:
> -I feel that earthbags (superadobe) have potential - altho I am somewhat
> troubled by what will happen if & when the bags deteriorate - If the bags can
> be made permanent then this would not be a problem - seems also that a lot of
> cement was used in these structures to stabilize the exterior finishes.

Pat replied:
I'm not sure why you'd be trouble with the bags deteriorating. Think of cob, 
there is no bag. The only advatage I can see with bags is it will allow you to 
go a bit faster. Since there is not slump factor, you can keep going up as long 
as you have earth and bags. But looking at it the other way, anything you can 
build with the bags, you can build with cob, you just need to let each level 
dry a bit before you put the next level up to avoid the slump factor. Even then 
the difference is not that great. If you think ahead when building with cob, 
you can arrange the work so that you don't spent too much time waiting for 
levels to dry. An example, when I work with the earthbags, I might go up 3 or 
four feet in one section, while if I was building with cob, I'd do one foot in 
multiple sections, but the total amount of earth could be the same. The earth 
in the bags require less mixing so that is a factor.

Pat
Mauk, GA  
http://www.gnat.net/~goshawk






> regards john fordice otherfish at aol.com 
"There is No Hope, but I may be wrong."