[Cob] Patio of cob? lime stabilized

[dirtcheapbuilder-Charmaine Taylor]

Clint--well...considering the entire  Dallas Ft Worth airport runways 
are all stabilized lime and clay.. I'd say so.  there are hundreds of 
miles of runway that planes land on...still funcitoning since the 1970s 
when they built it.

  if you allow room/slope for drainage that is best.

it would not be an actual COB or adobe  and lime floor, but you would 
till the earth, and then compact it using lime as an additive, and tamp 
smooth.   I have an article somewhere that explains this entire 
construction process.  on a small scale it could be done.


There are so many weedy parts to my little 1/3 acre that I am very 
tempted to do this too.


another option is to lay scrap tiles, slates into the mix while setting 
up and protect the top layer a bit more from the rain.
  Having a rock border sounds nice as long as water can get out.

  email me off line about the articles on doing this

Charmaine Taylor Publishing    books at dirtcheapbuilder.com
PO Box 375 Cutten CA  95534 USA  -- 707-441-1632
www.dirtcheapbuilder.com  &  www.papercrete.com
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On Apr 10, 2005, at 9:26 AM, Clint Popetz wrote:

> I know this has been talked about before, but an hour with google and 
> the
> cob archives didn't turn up much.
>
> I want to build a patio off the back of my house.    I'm imagining 
> something like a poured adobe
> floor.  Would it be possible to stabilize cob with lime, or seal it
> with something natural such that if it had a small grade (say, quarter
> inch per foot) and was smooth enough that water wouldn't puddle, that
> it would survive with periodic re-finishing?  The edges would be
> urbanite, so that the transition from patio-to-garden wouldn't erode.
>  				-Clint
>
> _