Zee Swartz

Does anyone have any input concerning clearances for wood stove installation in a bale-cob house??  We have a Fisher Grandpa Bear (Yes, the house is that big. Yes, we have considered a RMH and yes, we decided on a wood stove instead), and the clearances are 36" to combustibles, and all of the reduction information I can find measures from the stove to the wood studs of a wall.  Our hope is to put a ceramic tiled double concrete board wall shield behind the stove with a 1" air gap between the wall and the shield, reducing our clearance to 12".  The question, however, is since there is a rather thick (2" more or less) plaster layer over the bales, does that change our clearance at all?
** I know we're not talking "codes" here...this is a bale-cob house for crying out loud.  But as with all our considerations when building this house, we would like to keep things safe!

Thanks for any input you might have.

Zee in OK

Hey All,

Around here (central OK) D.O.T "ag-base" or road base is basically recycled concrete from old roads, etc.  Finding what a 'normal' permie (oxymoron???) would call "road base" around here is nigh near impossible.  The closest I've found is decomposed granite (love the stuff, but the closest to us is 3 hours away).  The question becomes, how far can one deviate from purity when it comes to creating an earthen floor?  The second question becomes, what else might one use?  We're interested in basically a tamped floor with the option of tile, etc. on top.  Our original plan was gravel over tamped grade (4"), then road felt, then decomposed granite and a thinner finish of troweled cob and tile, etc.  Now, funds are short.  If you've read any of my questions before, you may have gathered that we've had a long line of "unexpecteds" and crazies happen since the beginning of our building fit journey and they have drained our resources.  Now we find we need our house to be done.  DONE.  And I need practical ideas.  Yes, I have the book.  Whichever one you want to reference.  Yes, I've read that article.  I promise.  Now my brain is smoking and I need your input.  

Blessings upon you.  

Zee

Satamax, thank you for the links; there's so much information there and it's fascinating!  

Here's a question for you (and whoever else feels like jumping in!), and although it may seem a bit, er, persnickity, here it goes:  We have spent the last 5 years figuring out how to build our house.  Finally figured out a system that works for us.  We've known the whole time that we would either build a RMH or just install a wood burning stove (I know, I know...).  Well, the house is finally "getting there" and our experimenting faculties have been spent.  We would really love to install a RMH based on time-tested "what works" methods without trying to improve upon, experiment, or otherwise tinker with a system much.  That's not to say that we assume you can just throw up a RMH like you would install a refrigerator or set a vase on a table.  We get that there are variables based on individual situations.  However, we understand that there is a method with sound mathematical and scientific principles in place.  All that's to say, as I look through the batch burn RMH information, it appears that all of that lot of the deal is still in the works, whereas "traditional" (HA!) RMH's have had time to settle into their own conventions.  Am I WAY off?  Given our situation, would building a RMH "by the book" be the wisest move for us?  Meaning mass bench, central location, yada yada...  Also, we are not welders or metal fabricators or expert masons (we obviously can stack stuff straight, etc.).  We do well with wood and dirt. Oh, and gravel.  I hate gravel.  It's expensive to have delivered, hard to shovel and *necessary*, and we've moved something like 90 tons of it by hand over the past 5 years.  But I digress.  

Background, this is a bale-cob house with a well insulated metal roof and insulated earth-bag (gravel filled-ha!) stemwall in central Oklahoma.  We are zone 7 (b?) and considered sub-tropical.  We suffer more from drought and fires than floods and storms, although we do have our traditional tornado seasons with short bursts of driving rains in the spring.  We occupy the highest elevation in our area, and therefore never see the flood part of our state's storm season.  Our heat index can reach 115F+ in summer and an average high temp of 94F.  Our wind chill in winter can be in the single digits, but not too often and not for long.  Our coldest month is traditionally January, with an average low of 29F.  We have a long growing (and therefore building) season with our last frost date set at April 15 and our first frost date at October 15.  

The house is situated on a gentle southern slope, facing SSE.  We have windows on the south side of the house (3 rather large ones for the living space, then 1 in each bedroom), none on the west, 1 on the north and 1 on the east all placed with winter solar gain and summer airflow in mind.  We have a 24-ish inch overhang all around the house.  Taking all that into consideration, gimme your best guess: what heat source would YOU use?  Also, there are 7 of us.  This is a 2700 ft2 house with 3 bedrooms.  The living space is completely open and amounts to something like half of the total square footage, with the bedrooms, bathroom, laundry/family closet off a hallway, and each of those rooms (excepting the bathroom) will have open-able transom windows above the doors.  We have 30+ linear feet available for a mass bench with a 90 degree turn (SW corner of the house) about 2/3 of the way through. There is a whole-house fan centrally located with gable-end fans in each end of the attic.   Can't think of anything else, but if there's something else you need to consider, lemme know.  Oh!  and ceiling fans.  There will be ceiling fans.  Also, it's "off grid" with solar power for electricity and propane cooking/water heater.  In addition, all of the "heat producers" are located on the N. side of the wall ie, oven/stove, water heater, dryer (although we only use that when hanging laundry outside isn't an option and we can't hang it inside for whatever reason.  This is rare.)  We are not installing radiant floor heat.

                                                                                                                                                                   **Deep Breath**

So, lay it on me, if you will.

Blessings upon you for reading through all that and for your thoughtful responses.

Zee

Satamax,

When I first saw Mr. van den Berg's design show up, I was totally intrigued, and thought, "THAT's what I want".  I ultimately became intimidated by its seemingly more difficult design (as compared to a "regular" RMH).  However, I shall now return to my wits, do the hard thing, and figure it out!  Thank you for that link, I hadn't seen that one before and the several designs there are fascinating.  If you've got anymore resources to throw at me, I'm wide open.  

I'm still curious about all those turns in the dragon's channels though ;o)


Zee

   

Hi All,

So, I'm wondering about this RMH build by My Little Homestead:     I'm especially interested in it because I'd love to build a RMH in the middle of a living space without taking up room with a large bench.  From reading "the book" (Weisners', that is) however, I would say that the way My Little Homestead configured their channels is unwise.  BUT they seem to have found success with this build.  It seems to mimic a masonry heater in a way, considering how the channels "snake" upward.  Any thoughts?  

PS, watching this family and their adventures over the past 6 years or so has been lots of fun.  We gather almost weekly around the newest video and enjoy them lots.  I'm not trying to pick them apart at all.  They don't always do things the way I would do them (concrete and latex paint on earthbag walls, for example) but it seems that mostly, they have good success with what they do, and they sure aren't afraid to try just about anything!

Anyway,
Blessings to ya!

Zee

Thanks All.  We will proceed with this plan and let you all know how we get on.  I will also try to post some pictures.  

Blessings to ya!

Zee

Thank you Joshua.  Yes, it's better than no responses!  These forums are so full of people with so much knowledge that it's uber disappointing when a legitimate question goes unanswered.  

I think you and my husband are on the same brainwave.  He suggested creating a little cob hut for them, so that's what the kids and I started on Wednesday.  We plan to "capture" the bees since they don't sting or anything and show them the new place, hoping they'll get the drift.  

Hopefully that works.  I'll update when we do find a solution.  Hopefully it will be helpful to someone else.  I know others in this area are dealing with them as well.  It's not a big deal, I suppose, if your cob structure is, say, an oven or a shed.  But this is my HOME.  

Again, thanks for your response.  

Zee

Hello Beautiful Permies,

We have a problem:  Some lovely miner bees have been inspired to take up residence in the cob wall we've been working on.  In actuality, it's the bed of the "bale-cob" wall we're working on.  From another small project, it appears that they only like the pure cob portions, and eschew the bale portion.  Funny thing is, the other project's been sitting un-plastered (well house) for 2 years and this is the first time we've had any trouble.  I HATE to spray the darlings, but I hate more to have my future home turned to Swiss cheese before my eyes.  We have evicted most of them by way of an essential oils-based insect spray (I know, I know!!  CRINGE), and have begun filling in their holes (don't judge us).  It appears that at present, the holes are only about 1/2 finger deep, and have caused no real harm, which is great. The REAL question is:  How do we deter them?  I recently read that a final finish of lime plaster will do the trick; does anyone have experience with that?  That may end up being our deciding factor for the question of lime vs manure finish.  AND since we are many steps away from a final plaster/render, does anyone have suggestions for keeping them at bay until we reach that step??

I appreciate your input, as always.  

Blessings upon you,

Zee

Thanks, Ardilla!  That's very valuable input!  Your intended outcome sounds like it would've been very pretty.  I'm sorry it didn't work out for you (  But thank you for sharing the information, I appreciate it.

Thank you, Daniel, for responding! I appreciate yiu sharing your experience and recipe; I'll report back with our experiment results. Yay!
Zee