“As the founder and owner of A. C. Morrison Construction, LLC, Andrew has a passion for straw bale construction that is matched only by his desire to teach his knowledge to others. Andrew is the creator and builder of the Straw Bale Village, a community of 15 straw bale homes in the National Historic Landmark City of Jacksonville, Oregon. He is a skilled, licensed General Contractor (CCB License #161204) with experience in designing and building both conventional and straw bale homes.”

He also has a pretty good team working with him to pull off these training seminars. I would not be surprised if these ended up on the DIY Channel.

The How-To Guide to Building a Monolithic Concrete-Slab Foundation

Before you can put on a roof, you need to put in a foundation. The other DVDs show how to create a deck-like above-ground foundation, but this one looks at how we can create a solid concrete foundation that will pass inspection. There is around 1 hour and 46 minutes of solid instruction and some out-takes beyond the published “running time”.

I discovered which concrete types work and what to ask for once the forms are built. I also found out how to do form squaring, proper radiant floor heat tubing and besides polishing, also coloring and texturizing concrete.

We are also shown how to properly install anchor bolts in the concrete for holding the 4x4 beams to the floor.

If you want to do a basement, this does not cover that aspect of construction.

In the series, I would think this would be the first to look at before going on to the other DVDs.

Concrete Foundation

The How-To Guide to Building with Straw Bales (Load Bearing)

Do a starter building first before going full-bore on a major facility. Think “outbuilding”.

This DVD goes for 2 hours and 3 minutes (with time not included covering a “Special Considerations” section on electrical, plumbing, interior partition walls, handling wet environments, installing hanging cabinets and running baseboard trim).

Andrew shows us how to create an above-ground stilt foundation and plywood floor, adding straps to hold the bales in place, using needles to resize bales, and using welded wire (2-inch stuff) instead of chickenwire to give plaster “teeth”.

I also learned how to use a nail-bed instead of all-thread or rebar to hold bales in place and (surprise!) adding washed gravel between the outer beam and inner beam to act as a drain in case moisture enters the straw after construction.

I though it was rather innovative using strapping material to hold the straw bale walls in place and then to cinch down all around to level the bales before adding the 4x4 frame above the walls to support the roof – thus the “Load-bearing” title.

This DVD also shows detail work on how to build a 3x12-pitch roof.

Load-Bearing DVD

The How-To Guide to Building with Straw Bales (Post and Beam Infill)

If you want to do something that is more “conventional” and works as a frame-built home on a concrete foundation, then this is a “real” house DVD with the straw acting more as insulation rather than as the main building material.

If you watched the Load-bearing DVD, there is repetition here, but we learn a lot more about framing doors, windows and protection the beams with tarpaper and the stuffing walls with more straw and filling voids behind the 2x2 welded-wire so less plaster is used.

There are plenty of tips and tricks from lessons learned included in this DVD.

The “Special Considerations” section is also repeated from the “Load-bearing” DVD.

Strawbale How-To

The How-To Guide to Plastering with Natural Hydraulic Lime (NHL)

Now that the building is “built”, there is the finishing process. Because this is a Lime process, I learned that this could take as much as 6 months to complete, because lime plaster has to be prepared one day and used a day or so later to mature and can be used up to many months afterwards. I had no idea!

I learned about scratch coats, “Hawks”, using either shovelfuls of lime and sand blends and the various sand types and premixes if ‘doing the plaster mix by hand” is less desirable than getting bagged mix.

This is an involved process with 3 coats and close to 2 inches of plaster on each side of the walls, but the final results sure look like they were worth the effort.

But using lime apparently is better than using other plastering methods with straw bale buildings. Why NHL? Because it is easier to work with.

So this is the “final coat” for the DVD series.

Strawbale Plaster

Conclusion

The videos were beautifully organized, filmed and edited by Gabriella Morrison. The websites were created by Dicken Weatherby. The experience was provided by Andrew Morrison, who obviously likes what he is doing.

Learn even more by going here - http://www.learnstrawbale.com/straw-bale-articles/

Read the Blog - http://www.thestrawbalehouse.blogspot.com/ Follow the Straw Bale Minute - http://www.thestrawbaleminute.com/ or listen to the Strawbale podcasts - http://www.strawbale.com/#podcast

Recommendation

If you have been going through our list of Renewable Energy Resources on our website and have been interested in alternative building materials and want something besides styrofoam-covered concrete and want to avoid chemical outgassing issues with new construction, think straw.

And if you think you need help to design a green home, go check out Chris Keefe’s website - http://www.organicformsdesign.com/

More Here

Mini Course