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| clay |
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| sand |
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| straw (and some water) |
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| smoosh it all together |
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| stir it up |
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| eventually you will end up with a pile of cob like this |
Tractor Cob
-a much faster method of mixing cob than by foot
-roughly 3 buckets of clay, 2 buckets of sand, 1/2 bale of straw
-spread out each ingredient and run over it thoroughly before mixing
with the bucket
-add the hay after the dry ingredients are combined, cover the pile
completely
-soak the whole mixture down with the water hose
-tractor cob must be mixed wetter than by foot, it may need to dry out
before use
-larger, more heavy duty forms must be used with tractor cob as so
much weight will be on them
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| scraping out the tractor cob |
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| spreading out the cob |
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| watching :) |
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| the heavy duty braces for the tractor cob wall |
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| That's our instructor, Diane, climbing in the frames to stomp the cob! |
The second day of the workshop, after we learned
to mix the cob by foot, we learned how to make it with the tractor. It is much
faster, less labor intensive and it can be mixed several tons at a time. It doesn't
get mixed quite as thoroughly though, there are drawbacks to either method.
Once it is mixed it may need to set out overnight to dry out enough to use. On
the third day of the workshop we poured it into the forms on the shop building.
The cob must be scraped out of the bucked of the tractor with rakes and
shovels, not dumped as the weight will most certainly break the forms. The cob
still needs to be tamped down thoroughly, but if the forms are big enough you
can just hop in and stomp around on it.
Until next time,
Angela Kelly
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