[Strawbale] Re: Re Jumbo Bales

[Herbert Gruber]

Dear strawbalers, dear John

Ok, here is the english version concerning the compression-tests made by
Arch. Schmidt in Switzerland, for a strawbale-house he planned in Disentis
(you find pictures of the building at:
http://www.baubiologie.at/europe/schweiz/schweiz.html )
You can download the complete ESBN-report (pdf-file, 2 MB, so wait a little
bit) in german and english here free: http://www.baubiologie.at/report.html

Here is the report by Arch. Schmidt (ESBN-gathering 2002):
"Two years ago we constructed a house for a family of five with 160m2 net
floor area and 18m2 thermal solar panels as well as an electric oven for
emergencies only (capacity: 2kW). Insulation was achieved by 50 cm of
cellulose. Over all annual costs for heating and warm water supply ­ an
energy consumption of app. 4000 kWh per year - account for 300 EUR.

We now draft a straw bale building of 110m2 net floor area in Disentis (1300
m above sea level) with an annual energy consumption of 3000 to 3500
kWh. Therefor we projected straw bale walls of 120 cm (u-value: app. 0,05
W/m2K). Jumbo bales are employed to bear two storeys¹ weight and the loads
of snow (650kg/m2). Stability tests with loads of 3 and 6 tons resulted in a
compression of app. 7 cm in 74 cm­bales. We will increase the thickness of
the interior plaster to 4 cm with two meshes applied to help it bear the
enormous loads of snow.

In order to do without retaining walls and to prevent ground water from
rising into the bales the building will be placed on piers and studs."

Now the building is completed, as you can see on the photos above...

best wishes, Herbert Gruber
-------------------------------
asbn austrian strawbale network
herbert & astrid gruber
http://www.baubiologie.at
email: asbn at aon...
-------------------------------

> Von: Huff & Puff Construction <huffnpuff at shoal....au>
> Datum: Wed, 28 May 2003 08:13:30 +1000
> An: "\"Herbert Gruber\"" <asbn at aon...>
> Betreff: Re Jumbo Bales
> 
> G 'day Herbert
> 
> Would you be able to translate the results of the tests that you did? as per
> the URL you sent :
> 
> http://www.baubiologie.at/belastungstest.jpg
> 
> We have now built and consulted for several jumbo bale buildings.
> 
> I attach a photo of our latest two jumbo bale, one is the winery and the
> other is the house we are currently building.
> 
> We have not tested these bales for anything as they work in the field.  That
> is the winery has been up since 1999 and NO problems apart from the cement
> render cracking where one would expect it to crack 32 mpa cement is far too
> strong fro render!
> 
> We are using earthen and lime renders for the jumbo bale house.
> 
> The winery is load bearing the house is in-fill.
> 
> Kind regards
> John Glassford
> http://strawbale.archinet.com.au
> 61 2 6927 6027
> 
>