Benjamin Dinkel

Thank you T for your inspirational post.
I too am baffled about how helpless a lot of modern humans are when it comes to dealing with their byproducts.
I lent my handbook to two different people already and everyone visiting our house gets a prep talk.
One by one we might make a change.

Hey Coydon,
yes, it's confusing. In Spain and Germany we count differently, the first floor is your second floor.

I don't know when they "upgraded" to concrete floors. Probably around the 70s. The new owner had to put steel beams under the "old" concrete floor.

Hey Jackson. The problem here was that we’re not in a first floor, but a second floor of an old house. It was reinforced not long ago. So the owner was obviously concerned about weight and had it checked.
Of course the people with the calculations stick to the safe side of life. But they also have the responsibility of something goes wrong.

Day 4 was probably my favorite day.

We raised all the brick walls to their finished height and solved a bunch of tricky situations with cob and brick cuts.





The exhaust path is closed off with a marble slab. On the bottom right you can see the bypass installed just after the manifold leads into the stratification chamber / bench.


Manifold installed and cobbed into place


Then the whole space around the core was filled with expanded clay and the top barrel put in place.



Baffle and bypass both in place and sealed with super wool


The first of the marble slabs covering the bench


Almost ready for the first burn

Hey Coydon,
I don't understand what you're asking or saying.
I used a similar product. It's like little balls of cereal, but made of clay.

Hi Coydon,
under the core there is a 10 cm (4") layer of expanded clay. The expanded clay is just out down, without a binder. It has pretty good insulation properties.

The stratification chamber is built right on the existing concrete floor. No extras.

Day 3 started with yet another dry stack on the now insulated foundation


The foundation was then expanded and cobbed in place


At the same time the brick wall for the bench was continued


The first and second course of the core, held together with clay slip



I had the hands full, so the next photo is of the core built, with barrel and bypass in place

Also note the baffle to allow the hot exhaust to stay in the stratification chamber.

This is how we left it day 3.


While day 1 and 2 seemed like slow progress, day 3 was super fast and rewarding.

Coydon Wallham wrote:
Is the bypass not connected yet?

The bypass is situated inside the bench. I decided against locating it on the barrel. Instead it only bypasses the stratification chamber by allowing the exhaust to go straight to the chimney after exiting the manifold.
You’ll get some fotos soon

We built on the existing concrete floor

Day 2 started with finishing the roof. A chimney hat and rain protection was installed.




We then proceeded to do a mock up inside to see where to cut out the flooring.


This is after cutting out the flooring and protecting the surrounding area.


We then started building the first course of the perimeter of the bench and the core with red clay brick and clay mortar (clay and fine sand; 1:3 ratio).



With the perimeter set we proceeded to laying down the foundation of firebrick for the core in expanded clay and called it a day!