Guide: Prof. V. R.Shah Mrs. Dhara Shah Mrs.

Aanal Shah Sachin Butala SD 0111

Center for Environmental Planning &Technology School of Building Science & Technology

INTRODUCTION BASIC METHODS STRUCTURAL INTEGRITY POSITIVE ASPECTS NEGATIV ASPECTS BIBLIOGRAPHY

Introduction

Straw bale construction is a building method that uses bale of straw (commonly wheat ,rice, ray and grass straw) as a structural element, building insulation or both.

This construction method is commonly used in natural building or green construction projects.

Straw bale building typically consists of stacking rows of bales on a raised footing or foundation, with a moisture barrier or capillary break between the bales and their supporting platform. Bale walls can be tied together with pins of bamboo,rebar or wood or with surface wire meshes, and then stuccoed or plastered.

Basic Methods
There are four basic methods for construction .

1. In-fill or non-structural bale 2. . Load-bearing (or Nebraska) style 3. Straw-clay building 4. . Mortar bale

1. In-fill or non-structural bale

This building system, useful for construction of large structures, depends on a pole or post-and-beam building design.
In this method, the weight of the roof is carried by a wood, steel, or concrete framework, and the bales are simply infill insulation blocks between the posts. The straw-bale walls have only themselves to support. The bales are attached to each other by piercing the bales with rebar or bamboo and attaching the bales to the pole or column.

2. Load-bearing style In this method, the bales themselves take the weight of the roof - there is no other structural frame-work.
Windows and doors are placed inside structural box frames, which are pinned into the bales as the walls go up. A structural roof plate is placed on top of the walls.

3. Straw-clay building
A pancake like batter of clay and water stirred into the loose straw produces a straw-reinforced clay mud.
In the past, this mixture was packed into a doublesided wood form between the posts and beams of a timber-frame building.

Today, a light weight wooden ladder like frame replaces the old heavy timber frame.

4. Mortar bale

Here the bales are used much more like conventional brick walls, with cement mortar holding them all together. Structural mortar, made of portland cement and sand, is applied between the straw bales.

Bales are stuccoed on the exterior and plastered on the interior to protect them and provide an attractive finish.
The mortered joints, stucco, and plaster also add to the structural integrity of the wall system.

Straw bale buildings use the same foundation, flooring and roofing technologies familiar to builders of frame homes.

Bales are stacked in vertical position

Windows and doors are placed inside bales

 Procedure repeated from bottom to top of straw bale walls

 Smaller weld mesh applied over top of doors.

Wire mesh

There are building code approved of both loadbearing and post and beam straw bale homes in Ontario, Canada. Much testing has been done on straw bale wall systems, and all tests show that they outperform the standard 2x6 frame wall. Fire tests show a burn time more than double that of a frame wall, and structural tests show similar advantages.

Exceptionally strong
Load-bearing straw bale walls can withstand loads of more than 10,000 lbs/sq.ft equivalent to 48,826kg/m2.

Straw bale houses more earthquake resistant.

Straw bale house is fire resistant.

Fire Resistant

The straw bales/mortar structure wall has proven to be exceptionally resistant to fire. The straw bales hold enough air to provide good insulation value but because they are compacted firmly they dont hold enough air to permit combustion. Once the straw is built up into a single bale wall it tends to behave as though it were solid timber, particularly when it is loadbearing, but also when used as infill. When the wall is plastered both sides, the risk of fire is reduced even further, as the plaster itself provides fire protection.

Economic savings in construction by using unskilled labor. Straw provides super-insulation at an affordable cost. Low fire risk.

More earthquakes resistant.

Environmentally friendly.

The straw must be kept dry throughout the whole building process until it is plastered. Openings for windows and doors must not exceed 50% of the wall surface area in any wall. Maximum unsupported (unbraced) wall length is 6m.

This can be very difficult on a large building, or one that is being constructed slowly.

Nebraska Historic Buildings Survey: Custer County Nebraska State Historical Society. Retrieved 2010-0829.
Wiki pedia. Steen, Steen & Bainbridge (1994). The Straw Bale House. Chelsey Green Publishing Co.. ISBN 0-930031-71-7.