Cob: RE: Insulation for cob

[Kelly, Sean]

Hey Shane... 

I have been reading the archives of the list... lots of good stuff there
- I am up to January 1998!  Up to that point the consensus seems to be
that cob has an R value of 1 per inch, but there was much debate about
whether the thermal mass aspects of cob (averages daily temperature
fluctuations) make up for this in a way unmeasured by the R value...  I
read Becky Bee's book about a month ago, and I think (memory isn't so
good, sorry) that she mentioned adding peanuts or something to increase
the insulative properties of the walls, but I wonder how that would work
out, since from everything I have read cob seems to stick to itself and
not that well to other things.  I live near Boulder, CO currently, but
am looking at moving to somewhere in New England - New Hampshire,
Vermont, upstate New York or maybe even Maine - and have some of the
same concerns you do about insulation.  Our dream (my soon to be wife
and I) is to build ourselves a low cost, sustainable architecture home
(maybe even a community, if we can get the support from people we know)
within the next 5 years.  Anyone know of any cob homes in the
north-east?  Or is anyone building up there now?  As for your other
post, cob is just clay, sand, straw and water.  The strength comes once
it is dry.  The clay acts as the mortar or glue, the sand (needs to be
angular, not rounded beach sand) acts kinda like interlocking bricks,
and the straw is like the fibers in fiberglass - they lend strength.  No
cement needed (or recommended!).  Cob is the perfect building medium in
my opinion...  It doesn't require you to pay contractors tons of money,
it is (fairly) readily available, and is flexible enough to do whatever
you want to (curved walls, multiple stories, etc).  I'm (hopefully)
going to a workshop soon, and can't wait to get into the mud!!!!!!!!

Sean