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FW: Re: [Cob] North Carolina Workshop costsAmanda Peck ap615 at hotmail.comWed Aug 11 18:25:26 CDT 2004
Of course Phil is right. Sometimes these will be led by somebody very very good. The time we were plastering a straw bale chapel, the man teaching us was--still is--just super. And we did a good job the time that six of us got together to do my floor. I did feel a bit like it was a case of the blind leading the blind there, but, the job got done. ........... Phil Hawn forgot to send this to everybody: There are groups (like The North Carolina Natural Building Coalition) that offer free workshops nearly every weekend during the summer. Our experience may be limited but already this summer we have learned to raise a strawbale wall, make natural plasters, build a dry stack stone wall, mix cob and lay cordwood. We may even get to start a cob wall before the season is over and we already have one or two ovens planned for September. The learning opportunities are out there and in some case they are even free. Phil Hawn, President The North Carolina Natural Building Coalition http://naturalbuilder.org cob, strawbale, cordwood and other sustainable earthbuilding techniques --- On Wed 08/11, Amanda Peck < ap615 at hotmail.com > wrote: From: Amanda Peck [mailto: ap615 at hotmail.com] To: coblist at deatech.com Date: Wed, 11 Aug 2004 09:50:37 -0500 Subject: Re: [Cob] Workshop costs <br>It's perfectly true that those workshops sound horrendously expensive. <br>Especially if they are hundreds of miles away. Especially if, like me, you <br>are burdened by lots of friendly animals.<br><br>There have been a few people who thought that their house could be REALLY <br>free if they held workshops for everything. The story in some magazine five <br>years ago or so had the people who tried this really really disappointed. <br>These guys, whoever they were, were leading the workshops on their own <br>house. It strikes me that that might be a bad idea--one might be burdened <br>by an inability to see the forest for the trees.<br><br>By the way, it looks as if most of the high-dollar workshop leaders require <br>you to have gone to at least somebody's real workshop--not just helped a <br>neighbor stack bales--before they will come to the one that you are hosting. <br> It makes sense to me. Give one a good sense of what kind of organization <br>is required, what at least some of the potential problems are, how much you <br>can expect to have done, etc.<br><br>I'd want the workshop leader--whether I was hosting or just paying my money <br>to go--to be someone who came with pretty good credentials. Not necessarily <br>a (THE?) book, but it would be nice to see a building, at least pictures, <br>talk to someone who had been at a previous workshop with or led by the <br>leader.<br><br>But by going to workshops you are looking for experience for yourself. And <br>inspiration, and a support group, and how to avoid expensive mistakes, all <br>stuff that will cut down or eliminate your hiring people to do the work, or <br>at minimum give you the ability to oversee the people you do have to hire.<br><br>The experienced log cabin guy who worked for me last year charged $10 an <br>hour if the job came with a place to stay. He said it would be $18 or more <br>if he had had to rent something. Probably more than that if he'd hired a <br>helper, not including the price of the helper. So a full weeks worth of <br>just him--he alternated between staying at my treehouse (he built it) and <br>his brother's house up the road--ran $400 (for better or worse he usually <br>didn't work full time). This is in an area where part-time for 6-8 bucks an <br>hour is considered good money.<br><br>Running the numbers this way makes the costs of the workshops sound a lot <br>more reasonable.<br><br>_________________________________________________________________<br>Check out Election 2004 for up-to-date election news, plus voter tools and <br>more! http://special.msn.com/msn/election2004.armx<br><br><br>_______________________________________________<br>Coblist mailing list<br>Coblist at deatech.com<br>http://www.deatech.com/mailman/listinfo/coblist<br> _______________________________________________ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web! _________________________________________________________________ Is your PC infected? Get a FREE online computer virus scan from McAfee® Security. http://clinic.mcafee.com/clinic/ibuy/campaign.asp?cid=3963
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