[Cob] Insulation Idea

[Amanda Peck]

Wild ideas are good.  Even better is reading the archives! Amazing how the 
same stuff gets recycled over and over again.

Insulation vs Thermal Mass.  As far as I know, nobody has come up with the 
final answer there.  Friends with their back wall (slip-form concrete) 
buried in the hill almost never have to heat their house here in the 
southern part of Middle Tennessee--although I think she bakes a lot in cold 
weather.  No insulation in the walls, just those however many inches of 
concrete.  They have nearly solid south-facing windows, and a greenhouse 
with a blower that heats the house when it gets over 80 in the greenhouse. 
dark-colored slab floor.  It's held up well for 20 years, by the way.  
Depending on where you are, a foot or better of cob wall, with south-facing 
windows might do perfectly well.  Those people open the greenhouse, run 
shade cloth and vines in front of the windows in the summer, and their place 
is comfortable with a tiny window air conditioner.

Two feet of wall on each side, plus roof overhang, is fine if you've got 
room for it.  It might be overkill if you don't.

Welcome to the list.

My projects this spring include finishing the barn--earthen floor! and an 
earth oven.

..............
Charity wrote:
I'm gearing
up to design and build my first cob structure.  I'm
looking to build a shed/partial greenhouse/winter
bunny house.  Space is a major issue as I'm building
in our tiny suburban backyard which is mostly garden
space.  I'm concerned about the lack of insulation
value in cob and I was considering wrapping the
exterior of the walls in a 6 inch layer of papercrete
(Charmaine Taylor's lime recipe) and then coating that
with a lime plaster.  I'm mainly concerned about the
north and west walls.  The south and east walls are
sun faced and will contain the windows.  I would
rather not use strawbale because of the added
thickness....I just don't have the space.  I will be
using a solar closet design and just plain old solar
gain but I would like to keep the building above
freezing in the winter.  Has anyone tried papercrete
for insulation?  Any suggestions?  Is this a
hair-brained idea fired from an inexperienced
designer-----> I'm rather well known for these ;)

Thanks for your time and the wonderful reference
you've created in the archives.

Keep on cobbin'

Charity

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