[Cob] Insulation Idea

[Clint Popetz]

On Sun, Mar 14, 2004 at 02:44:22PM -0800, Charity Davis-Custer wrote:
 
> I was also considering only building my walls about 1'
> to 1' 1/2 thick.  Is this too thin?  Again it's the
> space issue.  

My cob walls are only 1' thick, and they are doing great.  It depends
on whether your walls will be load-bearing for your roof, and if so
what you expect the weight of your roof to be.  It also depends on the
shape of the building; curved walls do better than straight, and
corners are weak.  In general, I think going less than 1' thick for
load bearing walls is risky.  Some would consider 1' risky, but mine
has survived a heavy snow, and it's bearing the weight of a living
roof, which is pretty big.  Also, the risk is less for a non-inhabited
structure.  I'd probably go 1.5' thick if my kids were sleeping in it.
My constraint was also space, but not for lack of it; I was limited to
100 sq. ft because anything more than that required a permit.

			-Clint