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James,<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>Thanks for
this reply. The newspaper article didn't do you justice. I'm still not
sure that I agree with all of your decisions - though you have made some
smart ones, as well as independently reaching conclusions shared by the
leading edge of SB practitioners about certain flaws in older common
practice - but I'm going to digest this a bit and will look forward to
any additional details you'll send before I spout off about them. There's
lots of ways to accomplish things, and what makes sense to one person can
seem utterly bizarre to others. (Just ask those rednecks you were talking
about.) Fortunately for me, however, as noted previously, I'm
perfect.<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>As
promised, I'm going to send this on to the GSBN list. If any thoughts,
comments, or questions are made in response, I'll share them with
you.<br><br>
<br>
Mark<br><br>
<br>
At 10:20 PM 6/19/2009, jamesehaze@yahoo.com wrote:<br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">Hello Mark,<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>Thank you
for the opportunity to correct the skimpy newspaper article. I would like
to first of all make it clear that I am not an amateur builder. For
30-plus years I have been in all types of construction: residential and
commercial as well as some bridge building experience, including
extensive supervisory positions. I ran this building idea by George
Vlastos, a registered architect in Casper Wyoming before executing the
plan.<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>A little
history:<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>I assisted
my neighbor in the construction of his straw bale place in the Pine
Shadows (Hot Springs, SD) subdivision. This subdivision burned
extensively in the Alabaugh Canyon wildfire on 07-07-07, entirely
destroying my conventionally built frame home & all my possessions.
My neighbor's place, which was a timber framed structure, was destroyed
as well. He didn't seal the tops of his bales and that caused significant
smoldering from the top down: the windows melted out and the RBA
collasped after the internal framework ignited.<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>While
helping him on his place I noticed extensive cracks developing, and it
occurred to me that the stucco lacked control joints. My subsequent
investigation found that a great deal if not all strawbale homes with
long unbroken walls developed these unsightly and water permeable cracks
in them and that led to my inquiry into whether I could engineer these
problems out. After at least a year of thinking, reading and designing, I
decided to build a prototype, as it were. Sometimes you figure things out
best by just doing it.<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>My first
step was to give the bales a significant toe up. The foundation of my
previous structure was an intact 6 inch poured wall. I placed a 3 inch
row of closed cell foam along each side of this wall for insulation and
poured 4 inches of new concrete on each side and 2 inches over the top,
which gave me an 8 inch high and 18 inch wide toe up over the footprint
of my old building. On the newly poured section I just used a foam core
center and 4 inches of stemwall on each side and 1 inch over the top, to
minimize both concrete usage and cold conductivity.<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>I then
sank #6 rebar in the wet footer 8 ft tall and no more than 12 feet apart
3 inches in from the edge on both the inside and outside edges, of the
building, which made for external pinning. I hated the internal pin
system after spearing my chest at a Colorado seminar and it also seemed
that sometimes the bales shifted too easily despite the pins.<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>At this
point I had forty 8 ft lengths of rebar standing around the
perimeter of my building with a mate for each one inside and out. As the
building progressed I realized this was overkill and I didn't need ALL
that rebar to act as a trimmer and kingstud arrangement... but at least I
know that southfacing window wall will never fail. I also realized the
corner posts could be brought in at least a foot and eliminate some
complicated notching. At no time were the bale ends ever notched... not
sure where that idea came from.<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>After this
the stacking began. When we reached the rebar we marked the bales and
cinched the strings together with a rebar twist tie to get them away from
the notching operation. An electric chainsaw with no oil, and a 4 to 5
inch deep by 6 inch wide notch was made on either the inside or the
outside of the bales, where each column would be. We got pretty good and
fast at this after the first dozen or so! This left 6 to 8 inches of
straw in the middle at each column location, to limit the cold
conductivity.<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>As we
stacked the bales we placed a form of two 2x4s with a 13 inch 3/4 plywood
piece screwed together over the notch and rebar, after we gave the
channel one last cleaning out with the chainsaw. This allowed us to
straighten the walls for plumb as we went. We drilled 6 small holes in
the forms from top to bottom and wire tied the inside and outside form
together using a small screw as an anchor for the wire ties. This was
both inexpensive and effective: we had no forms break out and the bales
themselves were 3 sides of each column with an unbroken tie-in between
bale and concrete.<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>At the top
I cleated a 2x4 to 2x10s with the 2x4 down and toward the bales and used
the wire tie system to hold it tight. This meant that the concrete
superstructure would be 1 1/2 inches out from the plane of the bales and
of course like any good bridge builder I tied all of the rebar together
at this point. The thickness of the top bond beam averages 4 inches and
with some planning could be designed as a honeycomb to eliminate at least
a yard or two of concrete.<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>Next was
the pump truck, a couple concrete vibrators and four good friends. Three
hours and only 8 yards of concrete later I had compressed bale walls,
that shed water, and a carpenters dream of a bond beam on which to set
trusses, and a cut roof with bales in a tji framework. My total concrete
cost was under $2,000, including the rebar.<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>I've
already identified more time and cost savings. A really cool thing is
that the concrete bond beam holds up the bales from the top... less
compression as time goes on, and I don't have that pesky timber frame in
my way.<br><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>Tommorrow
I will explain how this really makes the stucco work so much better...
and I will gladly forward pictures... but for now... thanks for allowing
me to share... after all we all hate fiberglass don't we?<br><br>
James Hay Hot Springs South Dakota
jamesehaze@yahoo.com</blockquote><br><br>
At 10:35 PM 6/19/2009, james hay wrote:<br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">mark this is probably too much
info but it does chronicle the whole stacking phase with rebar placement
and form detail. you can download individual pics if you
like....james<br><br>
--- On <b>Thu, 10/2/08, Ronnie
<i><ronnie.hendershott@gmail.com></i></b> wrote:
<dl>
<dd>From: Ronnie <ronnie.hendershott@gmail.com>
<dd>Subject: Invitation to view Ronnie's Picasa Web Album - Bale Out
<dd>To: jamesehaze@yahoo.com
<dd>Date: Thursday, October 2, 2008, 11:15 AM<br>
<br>
<dd>You are invited to view Ronnie's photo album:
<a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/ronnie.hendershott/BaleOut">Bale
Out</a>
<dd><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/ronnie.hendershott/BaleOut">
<img src="cid:.0" width=144 height=108 alt="[]"></a>
<dd>Bale Out
<dd>Aug 31, 2008
<dd>by Ronnie
<dd>The Project in Hot Springs
<dd><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/ronnie.hendershott/BaleOut">View
Album</a>
<dd>
<a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/ronnie.hendershott/BaleOut#slideshow">
Play slideshow</a>
<dd>If you are having problems viewing this email, copy and paste the
following into your browser:
<dd><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/ronnie.hendershott/BaleOut">
http://picasaweb.google.com/ronnie.hendershott/BaleOut</a>
<dd>To share your photos or receive notification when your friends share
photos, <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com">get your own free Picasa
Web Albums account</a>.
<dd><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com">
<img src="cid:.1" width=206 height=31 alt="[]"></a></blockquote>
</dl><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com"><br><br>
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