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Müller Geodesic Solitude Johnny's Capsule Geodesic Clay Mud Dome Jurtendorf (Switzerland) Neolithics of Pfyn Strawbale Cabin Plans Numbers Material Reflection Diary 2020/01/07: This Is The End 2017/04/12: Earth Oven (1) 2017/04/09: Spring 2017/03/05: Sunny Day 2017/02/23: Pre-Spring 2017/02/15: Icy Morning 2017/01/05: Winter Arriving 2016/11/19: Cold & Humid 2016/11/07: First Snow 2016/11/03: Upgrading Floor Insulation 2016/10/12: Fall Approaching 2016/08/14: Summer Time (2) 2016/07/25: Summer Time 2016/05/22: Bare Strawbales After 18 Months 2016/05/21: Summer Approaching 2016/04/12: Preparing Garden 2016/03/23: Spring Approaching 2016/02/18: No Winter 2016/01/16: Winter Arrived 2015/11/18: One Year of Cabin, Mild Weather Continued 2015/10/29: Fall 2015/06/26: Summer Time 2015/04/30: Springtime 2015/01/04: Warm Day 2015/01/03: Snow Slide Down 2015/01/01: New Year 2014/12/31: Week with Snow 2014/12/27: First Snow 2014/12/23: Walk Around 2014/12/19: Fine Tuning 2014/11/28: Sunny Afternoon 2014/11/27: Cleaning Up 2014/11/26: Roof Complete 2014/11/25: Roof Almost Done 2014/11/24: Roof Started 2014/11/22: Ceiling Done 2014/11/21: Finishing the Walls 2014/11/20: Continue Building the Walls 2014/11/19: After Rainy Days, Starting Strawbale Walls 2014/11/18: Sorting Strawbales 2014/11/14: Planning Procedure 2014/11/12: Planning the Walls 2014/11/08: Strawbales Arrived 2014/11/07: Fixing Floor Insulation 2014/11/06: Rainy Days 2014/11/04: Floor Finished 2014/11/03: Floor (Continued) 2014/11/02: Floor (Continued) 2014/11/01: Floor (Continued) 2014/10/31: Floor (Continued) 2014/10/30: Floor (Continued) 2014/10/24: Floor 2014/10/12: Ground Poles 2014/09/24: Planning Site Search Enter term & press ENTER If you found the information useful, consider to make a donation:   Page << Prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | Next >> Strawbale Cabin written by Rene K. Mueller, Creative Commons CC BY NC 2014, 2015, 2020, last updated Sat, July 18, 2020 Updates Sat, July 18, 2020: This is the end: taking down the cabin after 6 years. . Wed, November 18, 2015: A year in the cabin. . Wed, November 26, 2014: Roof finished, ready to move in. . Wed, November 12, 2014: Strawbale details, more plans and wall building plannings. . Sat, November 1, 2014: Starting with the diary, documenting the first steps doing the insulated floor. . Current state 2017/04/10 I have been pondering on a load bearing bare Strawbale Cabin for quite a while, after the tipi, yurt and geodesic dome the winter 2014/2015 something more solid: an easy to build and take down strawbale based cabin. The main idea is to be modular and cutting as little parts as possible of common sized timber, like 3m and 4m long beams, and maintain bare strawbales, inside and outside and see how it does. The main measures are based on the OSB/MDF, in my case I used 22mm thick 2050mm x 675mm OSB/MDF, and I ended up with roughly 4m x 6m, or to be exact: 3 x 6 x OSB 2050mm x 675mm = 6.15m x 4.05m floor size, the room height is around 2.20m. Reminder for non-metric people: 1m (meter) = 100cm (centimeter) = 1000mm (millimeter) Plans Rough Sketch with 2 Options for the Roof Numbers Floor Plan Ceiling Plan Roof Plan Floor: 6.15m x 4.05m, ~24m2 (interior: 5.5m x 3.4m, ~18m2) Wall Thickness: 45-50cm Ceiling Height: 2.20m Strawbales: ~140 pieces (apprx. 90cm x 50cm x 35cm per strawbale) Features: 1x door (prefabricated) 2x windows (prefabricated) Total Height: ~4m Material Strawbales ~180 x small strawbales (90cm x 50cm x 35cm, apprx. 2-3 Euro/pc) Solid Wood 20 x 4m x 7.8cm x 5.8cm wood beams (a 5.80 Euro/pc): floor and ceiling (14 used, 6 spare) 30 x 3m x 5.8cm x 5.8cm wood beams (a 3.50 Euro/pc): roof 50 x 4m x 4.8cm x 2.4cm wood struts (a 1.30 Euro/pc): floor and roof 30 x 3m x 4.8cm x 2.4cm wood struts (a 1.00 Euro/pc): roof OSB 20 x OSB 205cm x 67.5cm x 22m (a 10.50 Euro/pc): floor (18 used, 2 spare) 25 x OSB 205cm x 67.5cm x 12mm (a 5.20 Euro/pc): ceiling (18 used, 7 spare) Misc 24 x 2m x 0.91m bitumen roof (a 8.65 Euro/pc): roof 1x door with frame 2x windows with frame 7m x 7m PVC: to cover construction to prevent rain entering the strawbales Prices as of 2014/10, wood & OSB from Bauhaus.info (Germany), strawbales from local farmer, door and windows were spare. Reflection I started to plan the cabin with the idea for a single person to build it, and test some of the wall construction methods. Due to logistic issues like belated arrival of strawbales, the late fall and more humid and rainy days cut the experimentation period short and I had to accept help by two people. Compressed Wall with Threaded Rods The chosen method I ended up doing was "Compressed Wall with Threaded Rods", actually suggested by one of the helpers named Cyprian: compress 4 layers and the top 2 layers of the bales using threaded rods, which requires 2 people to position a bale, particularly at the edges: one positions the bale, the other one makes sure the threaded rod pushes through the bale and doesn't bend when resistance is met. This allowed to develop a rather stable wall, while still be "Load Bearing" and little wood involved in the wall construction itself. I estimated the material cost about ~1500 Euro overall, given you have the basic tools for construction, and door and windows are already available. It took 9x afternoons (~4 hrs), or ~4 1/2 days to raise the cabin with the roof complete, apprx. 2-3 persons worked on it. A single person might work 10-14 days on it, an experienced person a few days less. So far this has been the most "solid" temporary building I did, and also the first were I had to accept help from others to actually raise the building, with domes, tipi and yurt, you can raise it as a single person (up to 6m diameter of those). With some patience and dedication one can build a strawbale cabin as a single person as well, e.g. by compressing the wall with cords instead of threaded rods as I did, and this way simplify the manual handling when positioning the bales. 2014/10/12 14:54 2014/10/30 16:51 2014/11/02 15:29 2014/11/04 15:34 2014/11/19 14:02 2014/11/19 16:03 2014/11/19 16:55 2014/11/20 15:44 2014/11/22 13:05 2014/11/24 13:13 2014/11/25 15:08 2014/11/27 14:28 The main disadvantages of constructing with bales are the sizes are not even or regular, one has to account to margins and compensate accordingly prevent water (rain) to enter the strawbales while you raise the building whereas the main advantages on the other hand are the bales are flexible and not too rigid, which gives 2-3cm margin on the side to jam things, e.g. window, door, or general unevenness (of the bales themselves) light(er) bales might not be perfect for larger buildings, but they are easy to handle rather inexpensive construction material has good insulation properties About the actual exposure of the bare strawbales as I plan, I can't say anything yet (2014/11/26), check later in a couple of months. I'm more fond of circular and spherical structures, as the rest of this web-site tells, there were two reasons to go rectangular with the strawbale cabin: the strawbales are rectangular the bitumen roof sheets are rectangular in particular the roof sheets were a strong reason to keep the rectangular shape. I thought first of a strawbale based dome, but the rain cover would have been very cumbersome, as the entire surface or most of it, to be properly sealed, as straw does compost quickly when exposed regularly to water and air. So, to minimize the roof I decided to go with vertical walls and due the assembly of overlapping bitumen roof sheets, I went rectangular overall. Next Page >> Page << Prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | Next >> Content: Page 1: Plans, Numbers, Material, Reflection Page 2: Diary, 2020/01/07: This Is The End, 2017/04/12: Earth Oven (1), 2017/04/09: Spring, 2017/03/05: Sunny Day ... Page 3: 2015/01/03: Snow Slide Down, 2015/01/01: New Year, 2014/12/31: Week with Snow, 2014/12/27: First Snow ... Page 4: 2014/11/18: Sorting Strawbales, 2014/11/14: Planning Procedure, 2014/11/12: Planning the Walls ... Home   ·   About   ·   Tipi   ·   Yurt   ·   Dome   ·   Features   ·   Gallery Print   ·   Bookmark Creative Commons (CC) BY-SA-NC 2005-2017, developed, designed and written by René K. Müller Graphics & illustrations made with Inkscape, Tgif, Gimp, PovRay, GD.pm Web-Site powered by FreeBSD & Debian/Linux - 100% Open Source