[Cob] reinforcing!!

[Amanda Peck]

Karen replied to someone who wants to know about reinforcing in cob.  She 
remembered that somebody in Canada  had done a shake test on a cob model.  
It did very well, thank you.

Here's the link--I had to run a Search for it, found it in one of my own 
notes to this list.

http://www.stanleyparkcob.ca/

Straw bale people use Bamboo to avoid concrete and rebar.  Easy enough 
there, but not with cob.

So the solution looks like good strong straw, and good design.

The grad student might also want to take a look at this, by Gernot Minke and 
some of his (unnamed, IIRC)students on the subject of earthen building in 
seismic areas, pretty much unreinforced adobe or monlithic earth.  Minke 
lives in a mostly underground mostly earthen house in Germany, featured in 
one of the natural house magazines a couple of months ago.

http://www.gtz.de/basin/publications/books/ManualMinke.pdf