I finally found a plaster contractor to do my job and they've started on the strawbale cabin that we've been working on too damned long. Scratch was done Saturday; brown coat today. The finish color coat goes on Thursday.

Nothing like getting the pros to go after it. Best stand back.


Pictures soon...

__________________
Never a dull moment at Berry Hill Farm.

Good to see progress!

Where are you located? How you planning to seal the stucco to keep out moisture?

Tom W

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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC]

..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis.

Tom, the last thing to do to a straw house is to seal in the walls, potentially trapping moisture. Straw (rammed earth also) needs to breathe in both directions (out->in/in->out) - that's one of the technique's best features (aside from being cheap, local and sustainable)...
Moisture/humidity issues are addressed by proper roof overhangs, carefully fitted openings and a decent foundation system to keep the bales off the ground. Think "big hat and strong boots".

Rleo, enjoy your cabin!

Giles

That's interesting. I will have to do a little reading on them. Do you have a website to recommend?

Tom W

__________________
[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC]

..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis.

Giles is absoluetly right about the need for moisture permeability in straw construction. In our original pollyannaishness, the plan had been to do a traditional lime plaster (highly permeable) but after spending a weekend with two of us busting our asses, actually doing the plaster on a smaller bale building that I'd built and getting almost nothing accomplished, I had to reevaluate the coating situation if I ever hoped to get this thing finished. Knowing that most other strawbale buildings in central Texas have been stuccoed (I know the architect that's done these) I felt pretty good about the decision to move forward and plaster the building with cement stucco. Additionally, and most important, it would not be me humping 90# bags of Portland, Mason's cement and sand (or lime and sand) to the mixer for the 1600+ sqft of surface on the cabin.

The structure is on a pier & beam foundation and has 3' eaves on three sides with a 7' porch on the fourth side so there's pretty decent protection from rain. Additionally, the top of the bales are against sheetrock (for a firestop) which has not been taped or floated above the bales so there's some breathability right there. The bottom course of bales sit on 30# felt that's on 2x4 sills to protect them from any leak inside the structure. Blowing rain shouldn't be a problem because of the physical location and because of the way we constructed this building, moisture infiltration at the bale/window, bale/door interface is unlikely. Plus we've taken extra care to seal any openings that can go directly to the bales.


I can tell you right now that there are much less expensive and more efficient ways to build and, as far as embodied energy goes, this SOB has got to be way up on top of the useage heap. Suitable bales are hard to find (mine came from almost 200 miles away plus, my bale man regularly sells and hauls his bales to projects in Arizona!!!!) and, because of the moderate size of the project (720sqft) and the building schedule (pretty much weekends only) many, many trips and deliveries for building materials were made to the site, consuming more than a few gallons of diesel along the way.

If you listen/read carefully from the people in the know (Myhrman & the Steens), you'll learn that strawbale construction is NOT cheap and is extremely labor intensive; anyone making claims otherwise probably never hoisted a bale or spent hours on the other end of a Lancelot, trimming bales. IMHO, the only truly cheap way to construct a strawbale building is in the Nebraska (load bearing) style. But, this was not an option for us on this structure (I do have a small Nebraska building that I basically built in a couple of weeks) considering that we could only work on weekends.

That said, I love bale structures and I still have 300+ bales in the barn which I plan to use on the next project: our 1400+ sqft residence. The difference this time is that I can see the project's challenges much more clearly since I've removed my rose colored glasses.

__________________
Never a dull moment at Berry Hill Farm.

And here I thought we were gonna get drunk in the Straw House..... bait-n-switch thread...

__________________
"It's normal for these things to empty your wallet and break your heart in the process."
2012 SLK 350
1987 420 SEL

Believe me, it's already happened and, will happen again. After this , having a bottle of Jack Daniels on-site is practically mandatory.

__________________
Never a dull moment at Berry Hill Farm.

another GTG? WOOOHOOOOOOO.

__________________
"It's normal for these things to empty your wallet and break your heart in the process."
2012 SLK 350
1987 420 SEL

Change your name from R Leo to Willie Mays.

Did you say where you are located?

Tom W

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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC]

..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis.

Indirectly, yes.

These buidings are in Milam County, Texas about 90 miles NE of Austin.

__________________
Never a dull moment at Berry Hill Farm.

What happened to your progress photos? I remember you were posting them for awhile. Are they still here somewhere, Randy?

__________________
" We have nothing to fear but the main stream media itself . . . ."- Adapted from Franklin D Roosevelt for the 21st century

OBK #55

1998 Lincoln Continental - Sold
Max 1984 300TD 285,000 miles - Sold
The Dee8gonator 1987 560SEC 196,000 miles - Sold
Orgasmatron - 2006 CLS500 90,000 miles
2002 C320 Wagon 122,000 miles
2016 AMG GTS 12,000 miles

that would be-
Longitude -96.82833 Latitude 31.05833 just in case you wanted to know.

__________________
"It's normal for these things to empty your wallet and break your heart in the process."
2012 SLK 350
1987 420 SEL

Show off . . .

__________________
" We have nothing to fear but the main stream media itself . . . ."- Adapted from Franklin D Roosevelt for the 21st century

OBK #55

1998 Lincoln Continental - Sold
Max 1984 300TD 285,000 miles - Sold
The Dee8gonator 1987 560SEC 196,000 miles - Sold
Orgasmatron - 2006 CLS500 90,000 miles
2002 C320 Wagon 122,000 miles
2016 AMG GTS 12,000 miles