OK, we’ve had a complete change of plan, and the schedule has gone to pot. We were going to miss the window for building anyway (straw bale walls need 3 months to settle before the first frosts) due to Ali’s illness, and now that he’s recovered we’ve been having a rethink about the design.
Because whichever way you look at it, it’s too small. It’s not worth the trouble, time and work of digging into the banking and raising a huge retaining wall just for a few feet of wind-sheltered space.
The tree has to go.
It’s not an old tree, or a particularly big or special one, and its foliage blocks our path to the rest of the field. If Ali takes that out and the banking on which it stands, he’ll gain an extra 50 square feet for his building, which will make it more comparable with the size of the old outbuilding it’s officially replacing and make the work involved suddenly worthwhile.
So we’re looking at next April/May for the build now, and hoping for those few weeks of sunshine that we’ve been getting around that time in 2010 again.
It’s a good decision for me, because it gives me some much-needed time to get some finances together for the little optional extras like windows and doors(!) and it also means the landscaping will be finished in time, so that Ali’s not wading through nettles to get to his house.
His 20th birthday is next June, after which he must increase his working hours and start paying for his keep, so he hopes to have most of the building work done by then.
2 Comments
July 9, 2009 at 7:39 pm
Dear straw bale home builder,
It always great to see someone building, or planning on building a straw bale home, so congrats!
I wanted to comment on my experience in building two so far. One is that the first one I started was a load bearing bale home. There was a lot of time between the foundation, the walls and roof. Eventually it all came down and a post and beam was erected instead. So, both have been post and beam and I am now a believer in post and beam. I have seen too many problems with a load bearing wall system. Many I have seen in Tucson, Arizona have large bulges in the walls after 4 or 5 years. If you decide to go ahead with that type of wall understand the problems that are associated with that type of structure before going ahead with your construction. Good luck and will follow your progress.
Patrick
July 10, 2009 at 6:29 am
Thanks Patrick. I’ve passed your comment onto Ali, who has been thinking favourably about post and beam anyway, from a timescale point of view if nothing else. (Though actually I think it just made more sense to him.)
All advice greatly appreciated, especially about straw bale building in wet, windy England!