Over seventy percent of Americans cannot afford to own a code-enforced, contractor-built home. This has led to widespread interest in using natural materials-straw, cob, and earth-for building homes and other buildings that are inexpensive, and that rely largely on labor rather than expensive and often environmentally-damaging outsourced materials.

Earthbag Building is the first comprehensive guide to all the tools, tricks, and techniques for building with bags filled with earth-or earthbags. Having been introduced to sandbag construction by the renowned Nader Khalili in 1993, the authors developed this "Flexible Form Rammed Earth Technique" over the last decade. A reliable method for constructing homes, outbuildings, garden walls and much more, this enduring, tree-free architecture can also be used to create arched and domed structures of great beauty-in any region, and at home, in developing countries, or in emergency relief work.

This profusely illustrated guide first discusses the many merits of earthbag construction, and then leads the reader through the key elements of an earthbag building:

Special design considerations
Foundations, walls, and floors
Electrical, plumbing, and shelving
Lintels, windows and door installations
Roofs, arches and domes
Exterior and interior plasters. With dedicated sections on costs, making your own specialized tools, and building code considerations, as well as a complete resources guide, Earthbag Building is the long-awaited, definitive guide to this uniquely pleasing construction style.

Mother Earth News Wiser Living Series

Autorentext

Kaki Hunter is an award-winning actress who has been involved in the construction industry for the last 20 years, specializing in affordable, low-tech, low-impact building methods that are as natural as possible. Together with her partner Doni Kiffmeyer, she co-developed over the last nine years the "Flexible Form Rammed Earth Technique" of building affordably with earthbags and has taught the subject and contributed her expertise to several books on natural building.

Inhalt

Acknowledgments
Foreword
Introduction

Chapter 1: The Merits of Earthbag Building
Chapter 2: Basic Materials for Earthbag Building
Chapter 3: Tools, Tricks and Terminology
Chapter 4: Foundations
Chapter 5: Structural Design Features for Earthbag Walls
Chapter 6: Step-by-Step Flexible Form Rammed Earth Technique, or How to Turn a Bag of Dirt into a Precision Wall Building System
Chapter 7: Electrical, Plumbing, Shelving, and Intersecting Walls: Making the Connection
Chapter 8: Lintel,Window, and Door Installation
Chapter 9: Roof Systems
Chapter 10: Arches: Putting the Arc Back into Architecture
Chapter 11: Dynamics of a Dome
Chapter 12: Illustrated Guide to Dome Construction
Chapter 13: Roofing Options for Domes
Chapter 14: Exterior Plasters
Chapter 15: Interior Plasters
Chapter 16: Floors
Chapter 17: Designing for Your Climate
Chapter 18: The Code

Appendix A: Build Your Own Dirtbag Tools
Appendix B: How to Figure Basic Earthbag Construction Costs, Labor, and Time
Appendix C: Conversions and Calculations
Appendix D: The Magic of a Circle

Resource Guide
Index
About the Authors