<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><br class=""><div> I’ve been mentioned twice in this thread, so I feel obliged to recap the summary of field reports of SB fires I gathered for Bruce King’s 2006 book, <i class="">Design of Straw Bale Buildings</i> ( Each of you DOES have a copy, right?? ) </div><div><br class=""></div><div>There were fourteen fires in the survey, and it will surprise no one on this list that the best correlation of fire to damage was whether the bales were plastered. </div><div><br class=""></div><div> Six fires occurred after plastering; of them, five had only local damage and one was a total loss ( in which the fire began with an electrical short in the roof framing, and the fire department felt obliged to demolish the bale walls, even though they were only smoldering )</div><div><br class=""></div><div>Eight fires occurred before plastering; of them, two had local damage and six were a total loss. </div><div><br class=""></div><div>As mentioned in David Arkin’s post, the biggest fire liability to bale walls are those damn sticks of wood we put up near them. </div><div><br class=""></div><div>Bob</div><div><br class=""></div><div><br class=""></div></body></html>