Cob Re: new photos from CalEarth

[Patrick Newberry]

> Thanks for the hot links to the CalEarth homepage.  I went to looked and
> liked the houses.  But the outside of two of them looked far different
> than the other earth houses I've seen.  Do you know what the mix is that
> they use?  And how do they get it to look like stones on the outside?
> 
> Carol
> 
the thing that looks like stone is really stabilized earth made into 
balls and place like stones. It's more obvious in person. On one or 
two of the structures they are about base ball or softball size. The 
concept was that since stucco / plaster can crack (especially in the 
hot desert sun  where Nader is located You sort of force the cracks. 
The junction of the balls are then filled with some type of grout 
mix.  the refer to them as "reptiles" because one of the first 
structures with the balls (done by some young folks) looked like the 
skin of some kind of reptile (plus the tile...etc)

The mix is about 20% cement. The soil is quite sandy there as well. 
However not all the photos are from Cal-Earth. I kind of which they 
would identify the photos with a least some short little notation. 

Pat