[Cob] fast mixing

[phil]

This is a less traditional method of mixing and purists (of which I used to be one) may not approve.

As to fast mixing: Working alone on the solar shed here at the college this summer I found that you can use a rotating cement mixer to make cob. I was able to mix approximately 27 gallons at a time by first making screened soaked clay and then mixing that in the mixer with sand. You can even add straw. The finished product still needs a bit of trodding but for one person this is a lot less work. It also means that I can continue cobbing while mixing and you can't beat that!

The process is as follows - add one 5 gal bucket of sand to the a rotating mixer and then wet clay by the handfull to ratio (2:1 in this case). I ended up using 3 buckets of sand and 1.5 buckets of wet clay. That was the max the mixer could hold without destroying itself.

Notes: I had to build a more stable base for the mixer and weight it down with sand bags. Also, I found that at the defualt angle the mixer wasn't mixing well and had to prop it up a bit. To help facilitate mixing and keep cob from sticking to the walls of the mixer I added two twenty pound squarish stones.

Phil Hawn
Berea College, Kentucky
http://www.berea.edu/sens

Ed wrote,

***** Fast mixing and application is essential to making  cob work economically******

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