[Cob] Question concerning wood fiber cob

[Henry Raduazo]

	No there isn't, but all of the wood fibers that I have seen so far  
are stronger than any straw that I have ever seen.
	The pile of shredded wood in my photo essay is 100% willow oak, and  
my friend Robert produced that entire pile from one normal day of  
removing unwanted trees from people's yards. Robert uses a six inch  
Vermeer shredder with auto-feed, but I have seen similar chips  
produced by other chippers and other types of wood.
	Not all wood is acceptable. Sometimes his chipper will produce short  
fat chips and I would not attempt to use those, but if you look at  
the wood in the "hand full picture" it looks just like straw only  
finer and stronger.
	For people living in areas of the country where there is no straw I  
would start by looking around to see what sort of wood fibers are  
available then making a few test bricks and breaking them to see what  
physical properties you could expect with different amounts of clay  
and sand. Then, if you can build an experimental structure, go for  
it. You can always use another storage building or chicken coop.  
Mixing with a rototiller makes cobing with a small crew fun and easy.  
If your experimental structure works out, you will know as much as I  
do about using wood fibers in cob.



ED

On Sep 28, 2010, at 10:12 PM, Mary Lou McFarland wrote:

>
> When making the wood fiber cob is there any record keeping going on  
> concerning which  tree type is producing the strongest cob?  I have  
> a good deal of hedge (Osage Orange) and it is exceptionally tough.  
> Even a dead branch doesn't want to snap off but tears into long  
> strands that are very difficult to break.  I wonder how it would  
> work in comparison.
>
> Mary Lou
>  		 	   		
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