[Cob] strawbale, geodesic domes, and igloos

[Amanda Peck]

That link seems to have been taken directly (with or without permission) 
from Cedar Rose's book on natural plasters.

Here's the link to the book from Charmaine Taylor:

http://www.dirtcheapbuilder.com/natplasbook.html

Yes, she IS a professional PLASTERER.  While she does mention SB and I seem 
to remember cob, the three-coat procedure is straight from the old-time 
plastering manuals, whether what you are plastering on is straw-bale, cob, 
or what you run into in old houses, wood or metal lath over studs.

As a professional, she would be concerned to have her work look smooth, no 
wrinkles, all the irregularities from the substrate smoothed out.  In a 
word, gorgeous.

Is it necessary for amateurs to achieve that level of perfection?  Up to 
you.  But that IS how you get it.

High-end woodworkers tend to think that sandpaper is for the birds, that the 
best finish comes from plane and scraper, not sandpaper.  I agree, I know 
why, but I'd really be more likely to use rough-sawn than go through all 
that work and the nice long learning curve only to find that I liked the 
funky look at least as well.

As recently as six or seven years ago, the standard finish for straw bales 
in my area was still concrete pumped onto the surface by somebody used to 
doing swimming pools.  One of the buildings I was familiar with was further 
covered with latex paint (I screamed about it, but....).  A couple of years 
later it had what was thought to be a mold problem.  We drilled lots of 
holes through the concrete inside the building in order to both pinpoint the 
source of the problem and let it breathe. All I ever smelled was nice fresh 
straw.  I wonder now if the problem was really a leak in the silo-type roof 
onto the straw in bags up in the attic.

And, a couple of months ago, I heard that the people were still happy enough 
with the building to be planning a larger straw-bale structure.

Shannon's right.  Lots and lots of ways to get all of this done.

............
Paul wrote (snipped):
http://www.webace.com.au/~agstraw/cedar.html just doesn't support sealing
strawbale with cob.

It's clearly about thin coats of plaster, not cob at
all. It recommends earthen plasters. The difference is significant because
cob is not the same as earthen or any other kind of plaster. Plaster is
applied in very thin coats, esp the first coat to "key" into the straw.

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