[Cob] rubble trench foundation questions

[Amanda Peck]

No.  The point of draining to daylight is to get the water that could cause 
frost heave away from your foundation.

The water won't come from your house, but from around it.  (in my case, 
towards the bottom of a hill--but it could be ground water, or runoff from 
the roof.  I was concerned enough to have TWO drains one a couple of feet 
out.)

You could insulate the outside of the trench--styrofoam or something, lay 
insulation out underground a ways from there.  (this might make it a 
"shallow frost-protected foundation" instead of a pure rubble trench)  Here 
is one of a couple of zillion links--and they do do them differently, some 
really are on a gravel filled trench.  Running a search on the phrase, 
without the quotation marks, will give you useful links.

http://oikos.com/esb/43/foundations.html

Here's an interesting post on the strawbale list from '99.  It does involve 
the gravel-filled version, and two of the people are from Canada.

http://listserv.repp.org/pipermail/strawbale/1999-April/023116.html

What's making me wonder about it is those big pole foundations that cover 
the inside of the trench.  How well will it drain?

James wrote just to me (and I'm seeing it as an attachment, so I can't 
snip!)