[Strawbale] Airtight plaster

[Wouter Klijn]

Sebastien,

Thanks for your document about air-tightness.  It has a lot of interesting 
details.


As for most of the construction types, air tightness is very good possible 
if you give the details the appropriate countermeasures.  So it is also for 
straw bale  constructions.  But to my experience it is not a quality that 
should be expected without attention.  If you just build a straw bale 
construction, you have a high possibility for a bad air tightness.  I have 
made some thermo graphic pictures of  (loadbearing and infill)  strawbale 
walls with an indication of bad air tightness.   If anyone is interested in 
these pictures, I can send them if you mail me at wouter at strobouw.nl

Does anyone know what the average air tightness is of a bale without plaster 
?

 Warm regards from Holland





>
> Message: 2
> Date: Sun, 17 Jun 2012 23:46:07 +0200
> From: Sebastien Hubert <sebastien.hubert at mc2000.be>
> To: strawbale at amper.ped.muni.cz
> Subject: Re: [Strawbale] airtight plaster
> Message-ID: <4FDE501F.408 at mc2000.be>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>
> Dear all,
>
> I updated the english file and also add a french version.
>
> http://www.mc2000.be/docs/air_tightness_straw_bale_house.pdf
> http://www.mc2000.be/docs/Maison_en_paille-etancheite_a_l_air.pdf
>
> I'll try to translate it in dutch as well...
>
> Cheers
>
> Seb
>
> On 15/06/2012 22:41, Sebastien Hubert wrote:
>> Hello all,
>>
>> Please find below my answer to Dave.  But the file is too big.
>>
>> You can download it on :
>> http://www.mc2000.be/docs/air_tightness_straw_bale_house.pdf
>>
>> Cheers
>>
>> Seb
>>
>> On 15/06/2012 22:32, Sebastien Hubert wrote:
>>> Hello Dave,
>>>
>>> There is no problem to use plaster as the main barrier.
>>>
>>> I've put a document describing airtightness of a straw bale house.
>>>
>>> We did a blowerdoor test before finishing the last plaster layer.
>>> Although the last layer was not done yet, the result of the test was
>>> very good.
>>>
>>> The result we get is quite encouraging as we reach the value of 0.93
>>> (each hour 0.93 air volume of the house is renewed under a pressure
>>> of 50Pa.  For a passive house the value should be 0.6 max.  Altough
>>> we will not be passive we are quite close to it.  A new test will be
>>> done later as the finish coat is done now.
>>>
>>> I hope the file is not too big for the list...  If it's too big, I'll
>>> put it on a web site....
>>>
>>> I hope this will help you ...
>>>
>>> Cheers
>>>
>>> Seb
>>>
>>> On 09/06/2012 15:56, Dave Howorth wrote:
>>>> I'm planning to build a loadbearing bale house next year. I'm currently
>>>> thinking about airtightness (I'm of the 'build tight, ventilate right'
>>>> school of thought). It doesn't seem to be an easy subject to read up
>>>> about, so I'd welcome any advice or pointers to materials about making
>>>> straw bale walls airtight.
>>>>
>>>> I'm planning to use the indoor plaster as the main airtight barrier. It
>>>> will probably be clay plaster, though lime is a possible alternative. I
>>>> know a bit about tapes to use at window and ceiling junctions and so
>>>> forth. My main concern at the moment is about how to use clay
>>>> plaster to
>>>> make an airtight barrier that stays airtight. So things like minimising
>>>> cracking and so on.
>>>>
>>>> I'd be grateful for [links to] any information about practical
>>>> techniques and recipes, and information about any airtightness tests.
>>>>
>>>> Thanks, Dave
>>>>
>>>> ____________________________________________________
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>>>>
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>>>> Strawbale at amper.ped.muni.cz
>>>>
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>>>>
>>>>
>
>
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> End of Strawbale Digest, Vol 79, Issue 4
> ****************************************