Cob: RE: earth bags/cob domes

[Graham Peters]

Do you mean that you are speculating about cob domes which people probably 
didn't build thousands of years ago? Do you have any reason to believe that 
they set themselves such a problem when they could use thatch to roof an 
earth building? It's clear that you are sighingly impatient with folk on the 
list who try to make some sense of your interests. If you want to start a 
discussion, make some proposals.

Graham Peters


----Original Message Follows----
From: Ben Harrison <bharrison at crystald.com>
Reply-To: Ben Harrison <bharrison at crystald.com>
To: "'coblist at deatech.com'" <coblist at deatech.com>
Subject: Cob: RE: earth bags/cob domes
Date: Tue, 8 Oct 2002 11:23:00 -0700

O.K. >sigh< I'm going to attempt to clear up my position on this whole mess
that I
seemed to have created. My apologies to all you cobbers who've had to endure
this
deviation into Super Adobe earthbag talk. I was simply wanting feedback on
my
wigwam frame/wattle and COB dome idea. With only one exeption, I got all
these
replies pointing me to the Calearth site. As if to say - If you want to
build an earthen
dome your only option is to use Nader Khalili's earthbag idea. So I replied
saying that
I was already VERY aware of Mr. Khalili's work and gave him credit for
coming up with
a brilliant idea. But...I don't want to discuss HIS idea. It's been done.
You know?
Been there. Done that. Enough with the earthbag talk. I'm talking about
trying something
different. That was the whole point. And yes I'm very aware that they
weren't building with
nylon bags and barbed wire in the stone age...geez. To the person who said
she get's her ass kicked
everytime she brings up earth building techniques other than cob....this IS
a cob site after
all. I know Calearth has a discussion forum for example. If you want to talk
about earthbags,
rammed earth, strawbale etc., I'm sure there are forums dealing with those
specifically. I
know my idea wasn't traditional as far as cob goes but at least it involved
using cob. So... again...
if anyone would like to discuss how one might build an earthen dome using
only stone age materials:
mud,straw,saplings,natural cordage, etc. then please join in. Also, before
someone suggests that I
simply build a Native American earthmound structure or hogan or some other
already proven technique,
I'm trying to explore a hybrid of some of these things. That's the whole
point. Was I clear enough
this time?
- Ben

 > Ben Harrison wrote:
 > What is intrigueing to me personally is the idea of using only materials
 > and techniques that would have been familiar to our ancestors
 > thousands of years ago to build......

Just what are the bags made out of?  Not likely a material available
thousands of years ago.

Thousands of years ago they didn't have barbed-wire either, which he
uses.

But, I agree with you.  It is an interesting technique to use.  For
myself though, I tend to like the more monolithic type cob technique.  I
think that with cob you have more freedom of forms.

Darel


 > It sounds like an exciting challenge to me.
 > -Ben

Your very right here Ben.  It is exciting and I personally wish I could
experiemnt a lot.

Darel




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