[Cob] Newbie w/ Questions about 1st project

[Shannon C. Dealy]

On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 littlehouseantiques at att.net wrote:

[snip]
> Am I to gather from Ken's reply that I absolutely HAVE to have a roof?
> I don't wanna build a roof!!  I've nothing against sitting outdoors &
> listening to the rain but I rather fear building a roof that is capable
> of bearing heavy snow loads in the winter is beyond my abilities!  (and
> overkill for this rather small bench of mine too!)

You don't have to have a roof, but it may mean (depending on your climate)
regular maintenance, and if your design for the bench traps water so that
when the rains stop you have a puddle standing on the bench (rather than
immediately draining away), it's possible your bench won't survive the
winter.  Since you don't want to mess with lime, your best bet may be to
seal the top surfaces with linseed oil.  I would tend to leave the sides
(or some large area with less rain exposure) un-sealed to allow any
moisture that gets in to escape.

> Over at the Canelo Project pages they've got a bench with no roof
> that's apparently holding up well after 3 years...so how'd they do
> that???

I don't know the bench you are specifically refering to, but the Canelo
Project is located at the southern edge of Arizona in a pretty dry
climate, also, they are experts at plastering, and probably plastered the
bench with something to seal and protect it.

Shannon C. Dealy      |               DeaTech Research Inc.
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