Light Straw-clay

[melwynnd]

Hi,

Does anyone have any experience with light straw clay?  I think I'm going to try it on a small garden shed this summer.  If it's not too hard, I'd like to do our house with it as well.  It's very dry here(less rain than Phoenix, Az) so I think it would hold up very well and I just love the look and feel of earthen plasters(what can I say, I'm a Capricorn, an earth sign ya know ).  We have an abundance of barley straw around here, but I think I'll have to import the clay from a place in Denver.  We do have local clay, but it's almost all bentonite which is slippery, not sticky.  

Anyway, I'd like to use as few trees as possible in my home.  If you've ever seen Wyoming, you'll know that trees are rare and special here.  I'm always horrified when people move here and the first thing they seem to do is cut down the trees on their lot.  They apparently have no idea how hard it is to actually keep a tree alive long enough here for it to grow up!!

Sherry

[glenn kangiser]

Amanda posted a link to a very good site in the referral links.  There was some info there on light straw clay.

http://www.planetaryrenewal.org/ipr/insulation.html

Dirtcheapbuilder also has some info.

[Amanda_931]

No wood is a good idea for treeless areas.   But bear in mind that light clay is an infill.  In other words you get to do some kind of (stick or timber) framing and then fill in with the light clay.  And most of it is packed into movable forms (slip-forms is one name for them).

I keep thinking that I'll take out a privet thicket and use it for the wattle of wattle and daub on an interior wall.  But I might have to let the stuff dry for a long time.

If you run a search on "light clay" the first one up is this famous article--linked to from dirtcheapbuilder as well:

http://www.foxmaple.com/proclay.html

And a couple links down from there is an article (out of Madison Wisconsin) about the New Mexico standards for light clay.  New link for me.  I sure think I'd try to avoid wrapping my timbers in anything.  Stuff's going to dry out fast anyway.

http://designcoalition.org/features/lansing/NMcode/NMcode.htm

The Wisconsin site may be worth studying.  Even if the web-cam is recycling pictures from last fall.

[melwynnd]

Amanda,

I had planned on ramming it in 2x6 stud walls.  I just wondered how really labor intensive the process is.  I guess I'll find out when I do the garden shed.  I'm also planning on facing the shed to the south and putting a big window in it so I can see the solar performance of the building.  This shoud give me some idea of how a house will perform.

 I'm also seriously playing with the idea of putting a thatch roof over the regluar roof on the garden shed.  I just love the look.  We have lots of canary reed grass(an invasive species, but not too bad here as there isn't much moisture) along the canal banks.  It may not work at all, but one never knows until one tries............

Trees are definitely sparse here. That's why I've resisted putting wood heat in.  I love the IDEA of having a crackling fire in the wood stove, but the truth of it is that one must go such a distance for the wood that it isn't really a sound way to heat.  I know the pioneers on the prarie used to burn buffalo chips, I have cows...hmmmm....

We're trying to work toward a self-sufficient homestead.  Right now we produce almost all our own food.  We have eggs, milk, cheese, butter, vegetables, beef, chicken, and apples and plums.  I also planted several elderberry bushes last fall for wine(medicinal purposes of course) .  I even have a nice team of Morgans for low tech transportation.  But fuel is a toughy.

[Amanda_931]

I've done a small test or two, and it didn't seem too bad, although I was using wood chips instead of straw.

Pictures from that Design coalition forum are pretty nice, e.g. this one:



It's from this page:

http://designcoalition.org/current/kenny/kenny.htm

It's hard to tell how thick those walls are, though--how they framed it.

[melwynnd]

I think the traditional way to frame these wall is post and beam with the infill.  However, post and beam has a lot of fitted joints and I'm not too much of a carpenter.

I love the look of the earthen plaster.  Also with a continuous plaster on both sides, heat loss through infiltration should be significantly small.  Especially if you consider the 1976 mobile home I'm living in now.  When the wind blows, it's pretty drafty in here.  Then there's the lovely freight train sound from the metal roof...

I've found several hands on workshops for natural building this summer that include some light stray-clay, but I don't know if I'll make it.  It's very hard to find someone to milk your cow for you. :-/