We have made the most wonderful friend here in the Ozarks and that is Jim Vokac. Every now and then he flies over in his ultra light plane and surprises us with these awesome photos. It is very interesting that you can see the progress being made even from the skies. Thank you Jim you are awesome.
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Moving a 600 pound cistern is no easy task. It is wide and unusual to handle. Once again our tractor has saved the day by giving us the man power to move them into place. Two thumbs up for a task completed. Now to hook them up, check for leaks and cover with dirt as we finish the back fill.
These cisterns will store the collected water that comes off the 2100 sq. ft. roof of the EarthShip. They are 2,000 gallons each giving us a total of 4,000 gallons of stored water. With 44 inches of rain per year we will have no troubles with water issues. We had the pleasure to getting help from John (above) & Dana, and Corey (below). Without their help we would of had to do more work ourselves. We love volunteers and are really grateful for those that have come out to help this spring. It is amazing getting to know the local area and it gives us momentum and energy for finishing the earthship. The more people that come out to visit or help the more of an incentive it is for us to finish this project. With this last winter combined I don't want to spend another winter in our camper. Thank you John, Dana and Corey for lending a hand with the fifth row. We have now started the 6th row with 7 tires completed. We have put up 5 more panels of the thermal barrier (second layer). Have done a huge amount of backfill behind the insulation and behind the tires. Backfilling takes a lot of time do even with a tractor. Tons, and tons of dirt is needed. When we do this kind of work it seems like not much is getting done. It still needs to get done to continue with the progress of our home though. All in all we are making progress. We will soon be getting ready to put the cisterns in place. This will need to be done in order for us to finish putting up the thermal barrier and to finish backfilling. This will be our air conditioning system. During the summer time we will open the outside and inside doors to the cooling tubes. The vents in the green house will be opened as well. As the heat leaves the greenhouse this will bringing the cool air from the tubes into the house. Simple science. The cooling tubes will be buried in the earth where the temperatures are at 58 degrees. What is papercrete? The ingredients are water, cement, clay, borax, and lots of shredded paper. This is a homemade way of making your own insulation. According to www.livinginpaper.com the R value for papercrete is 2 to 3 per inch. I would like to say that is really good compared to commercial products you can buy up town. The experiments we did last year did not work out. So we keep working with it until we get it right. I would like to say that we have succeeded with a few batches that we have made this spring. The photo above is what the papercrete looks like in a slush form. This application is to go around the cooling tubes for the EarthShip. We want insulation around them so they do not heat up. The purpose of the cooling tubes is to bring in cool outdoor air into the home. Since the tubes are buried in the dirt, they stay cool hence the air that goes through them will be cool as well. Depending on the application would determine how much cement and clay to add to the mix. Since the papercrete around the cooling tubes will be subject to the weather, until the roof is on, we added more cement to this mix so the weather would not bother it and for structural strength. Since the papercrete would have to hold a few more rows of tires filled with dirt we wanted something that would not only insulate be be strong as well. After the papercrete is poured where we want it it is pressed into place with a stick. We tend to keep things simple. This is the completed top view of the papercrete abound the cooling tube. Notice the excess water will drain. This is normal for papercrete. The photo below is the inside view of the EarthShip. Another application that we have been successful at with papercrete is for insulating the tires of our sunrooms. This is in the front of the home and will be packed with papercrete for insulation and then covered with rock for the finishing touches. We will do the same for the greenhouse. This photo was taken after a really good rain. The bottom is still wet. The papercrete held up just fine. This is the first layer of using papercrete. We will keep layering it until it is completely filled in. We did add straw to this application. This will help the next layer to stick to it as well as keep the papercrete together better. If you have any questions please do ask. We will be working with this at out workshop at the end of may as well. We are still experimenting with panels that will be used for the insulation in the ceiling. We are working at making the panels lighter to go up in the roof. At the moment they are a little to heavy. We would like to congratulate Jay and Nanette for coming out to the Severin EarthShip site and learning to pound tires. With their great ambition they helped us to complete 12 tires yesterday which finished off our 4th row of tires. Because of their help we were also able to work on back filling about 40 feet of dirt behind the tires and thermal barrier as well. We are filling in 2 to 3 feet of dirt behind the tires. This gives them support and us a platform to work off of. Jay and Nanette are hard and ambitious helpers. Nanette would like to build a EarthShip of her own some day. Now that she has some experience in pounding and leveling a tire she say's, " I'm really excited about building my own." There is a lot of labor involved in this kind of building. For those that would like to build their own EarthShip I do suggest that you go and get some experience and learn as much as you can. That will tell you weather or not you will still want to do the project once you got it started. We were told from a friend that works with EarthShip in Taos, New Mexico, that 1 out of 30 volunteers that apprentice will build a EarthShip. Nanette even admits that it is going to take longer than she had expected. Time on this kind of project can vary depending on how big of a home one builds, and how many volunteers one can encourage to come and help build. Our EarthShip is starting to take shape. Our son Arron is on the right standing on top of the backfill. Jay and Nanette is on the left finishing off the 4th row and Allen is behind the thermal barrier adding more dirt to support the insulation. The tires that are in front of the tires with dirt are what Mary Kay say's, "Is our tire scaffolding." This gets up to the height that we need to help with pounding a tire on the inside of the EarthShip. The tires that we are working with are stiff trailer tires. You can stand on the side of the tire and it will support you. So this works great and is a cheap way to get higher into the air.
We are needing to collect glass bottles of various colors. Will need two of the same bottles to make one bottle brick. Why?? So we can create walls that look like jewels. When the sun or the light shine through they glow. The great thing building this way is you are allowed to be as creative as you want when building your walls. Putting a bit of color and sparkle into your home never gets old. These are just a few photos of how this kind of building material can add charm to ones home. If you have any glass bottles that you would like to give away give us a call at 417-274-9885. Please have them rinsed out. And thank you for supporting Severin EarthShip.
Well, I can actually say that we have been inspired. More than we have already been. Because of the video below. We originally had designed for the kitchen and dinning room walls to be constructed of tires. The main reason is for the thermal mass. I believe we have found a substitute for this. That would be to use water bottles filled with dirt and used as bricks. This would give us thermal mass and would also give us 4 additional feet of living space in our home. For those who are familiar with EarthShips, we are going to use this technique instead of pop cans for the bond beam. And for our bathroom walls. This would give more support to the roof as well. Reason why we are not using aluminum cans is in the Ozarks no one is going to give them to you because they are worth money. And in today's economy I don't blame them. But everyone would get rid of their water bottles. Adding the dirt for additional thermal mass in the home that would not of been there if using cans is a big plus. So we would like to request that if anyone has 16.9oz or 20oz (Most common sizes) water bottles with the lids we will take them. We need the lids to hold the dirt in. We will take soda bottles as long as they are rinsed out. Otherwise we will not accept them. One word why BUGS. Give us a call at 417-274-9885. Enjoy the video. You see Allen smiling for a very good reason. Not only is he happy that it is 50 degrees in January. He is leveling tire #199. He got an extra tire completed tonight to make it an even 200. This is a great feat for the Severin family of 3 to do this all by themselves. We are now working on the 4th row of tires. Mary Kay has gotten an extra 10 tires that is in stage 2 and 2 tires in stage 1 of completion for the 4th row. We are extremely happy with our progress. With using bigger tires than normal, it is taking us longer to fill them. But will give us a solid home when it is done. This winter has not been pleasant for us. December we did not see many working days. Our neighbors keep saying this is the worst winter that they have ever seen in the 43 years that they have lived here. This is the reminder of the 12 inches of snow that we had in december. We did have 2 inches so far in January as well. With the rain we had as well makes for the construction site really muddy. We are now just starting to dry out from the wet conditions of winter. Any time we get sunny weather that is above 35 degrees we are out and working. We have 250 more tires to go to finish the back row of tires. Then we have 160 tires to complete for the inside wall of the kitchen and dinning room. And then the tires for the greenhouse and then the tire work will be done. We have a long road to go yet. But we are making progress. That is all that is important at this moment. This is the Severin Christmas present. 8 pallets of rough cut lumber. About 1/2 is Black Walnut and the other 1/2 is Cherry. Beautiful wood. We spent the last two days loading it on our new 20 foot trailer and bringing it home to our pole barn. Now my car needs to sit outside but that is alright. We are going to use this lumber for kitchen cabinets and for the ceiling of our EarthShip. If we have anything left we may make some outdoor furniture as well. We have about 2300 feet of board length. If you are ever in need of finding a great place to get any building materials, check Craigs list. This is where we found this lumber at. |
AuthorMary Severin writes about her families embarkment on a learning adventure to build an Upcycled Home using Earthship Principals. To find out what these Principals are click on the Earthship Principals link above. CategoriesArchives
March 2018
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