Earthen Floor in Hotchkiss, Colorado

Enough about rocket stoves, what about the earthen floor?

Earlier in the summer, David and Maureen had, with Doni Kiffmeier, installed the rough base layer of the earthen floor.  Having missed that event, I don't have the exact details, but it goes something like this.  The bare earth was leveled and tamped.  A 2" thick layer of rigid insulation (blueboard polystyrene, R10/inch) was put down to keep the heat from the home from being conducted out through the floor.  Roadbase gravel was then brought in (using a bucket loader through a window opening) and spread on the floor several inches deep, then leveled and compacted.  PEX hydronic radiant heat tubing was installed in a serpentine fashion at 12" on center, on top of the road base, which in retrospect was a mistake.  It should have been installed deeper down, in the middle of the roadbase.  The shallow installation of the flexible tubing later caused the base layer of earthen floor material to crack above the tubes.  Then, a dry earthen floor mix was prepared (I believe this was a small amount of clay slip, mixed with a large amount of coursely screened sand/gravel) and a small amount of water as needed to make a tamp-able mix.  The mix was then spread 1-1/2" deep, leveled and tamped with homemade tampers.  Afterwards, heated linseed oil was painted on in several layers.  This proved to be another problem, as the dry-tamp floor quickly absorbed several hundred dollars worth of linseed oil.

When we showed up to help install the finish coat of earthen floor plaster, David and Maureen had already prepared all of the ingredients.  The photo below shows all of the materials required for one batch of finish floor plaster.  Two buckets of clay slip, each made by mixing 2/3 to 3/4 bucket of finely sifted clay from the site with enough water to cover, mixing with a paddle mixer, then sifting the resultant slurry through a fine screen into another bucket.  Three buckets of fine masonry sand.  One bucket of sifted red sand from a sand dune near Moab, Utah.  A small amount of straw to give color flecks to the finished floor.  A wheelbarrow and shovel for moving materials, and a small, electric driven cement mixer.

Materials for one batch of finished earthen floor plaster

The next photo shows some of the tools we used to apply the floor plaster.  Hand pump mister bottles to dampen the subfloor before plastering.  Heavy carbon steel pointed trowels to initially apply and roughly level the plaster, and rounded, stainless steel "pool" trowels to do the final leveling and smoothing.  The sponge is used with a bucket of water to frequently clean mud off the trowel as you work.

The next photo shows Doni Kiffmeier and Kaki Hunter, authors of the book, "Earthbag Building", applying finished floor plaster.  It took awhile for the rest of us to have the courage to try this.  At the start it was frustrating and seemed very difficult to get a result that looked anything like what Doni and Kaki could do so easily.  By the end though, we all were plastering like pros (or so we thought).

  It took us two days to plaster the 1000 square feet of so of floor.  Here's a picture of the result:

The finished floor, still wet

At this point, David and Maureen headed off to go Elk hunting, and the rest of us headed home.  The next step for this floor would be to do a finish troweling when the floor is "leather" hard, then a light sponging with a grout sponge to expose the bits of straw for color.  Finally, the owners will apply seven coats of linseed oil, each coat cut with greater amounts of non-toxic thinner, to allow it to penetrate.  The final coat gets mixed with beeswax for a water-proof, fairly durable finish, and rubbed in.  The final finish may need to reapplied every year or two.

We're looking forward to seeing how the floor comes out when we go back up in December (we're signing up to caretake at an elk and bison ranch in the area).  We're told that the floor will have a slight give, unlike concrete, and with the slight waviness caused by hand troweling, will have some texture that also feels good to walk on.  The home is a passive solar design, with large, south facing windows that let in the low angled winter sun.  The floor will absorb the Colorado winter sunshine, and be warm to walk on.  It should be nice!

Rocket Stove Mass Heater in Hotchkiss, Colorado

While waiting for parts to come in for our truck, we got a call from friends in Hotchkiss, Colorado.  They were planning on installing the finish layer to the earthen floor in their house that weekend.  Doni Kiffmeier and Kaki Hunter, renowned earthen building experts from Moab Utah, were coming to instruct and help with the floor.  Would we like to come up and help?  Of course!

When we arrived, we spent a while admiring, and then firing, the homemade rocket stove mass heater, www.rocketstoves.com, that David and Maureen had just finished building in one corner of the living room of their strawbale home.

Rocket Stove Heater and Base Layer of Earthen Floor

The heater consists of a small feed barrel (closest to the door), then a larger 55 gallon drum which conceals an internal, insulated, firetube heat riser, then a long section of piping that serpentines through an adobe block and cob masonry bench with flue cleanouts (the bench that wraps around the corner to the left of the 55 gallon barrel), and a chimney.

Rocket Stove Feeder and Burn Barrels

Above is a closer view of the smaller (20 gallon?) feed barrel on the right, and the larger 55 gallon barrel that conceals the heat riser tube.  You feed sticks into the small barrel on the right.  They burn at the base of that barrel in the start of a masonry, fire-brick-lined horizontal passage.  The hot gases then rise up in an insulated tube inside the 55 gallon barrel, hit the top, then cascade down around the annular space between the concealaed tube and the outside of the barrel, then into an 8" metal stove pipe that heads out through the mass bench.

Rocket Stove Mass Bench

Here's the mass bench.  It has two cleanouts - one at the start just to the left of the barrel, and one at the far left end of the bench, where the internal pipe does a U-bend to head back though the bench, along the exterior wall, to the chimney.

Rocket Stove Feed Barrel

Here's a view looking down the feed barrel into the start of the masonry burn passageway.  The loose brick atop the burn passageway opening is used to control the amount of draft to make sure you don't get smoke coming back up the feed barrel.  When the stove is operating, there will be several pieces of wood stuck down into this barrel.  The wood burns at the bottom where it sits in the burn chamber below the brick.

Unlike regular wood stoves, which often control the rate of burn by restricting the combustion air, a rocket stove burns wide open, with as much air as the wood needs to burn efficiently.  Restricting stove airflow causes the wood to burn less efficiently and produces pollutants.  A hot fire with plenty of oxygen produces very little pollution and burns more efficiently.  The 55 gallon barrel releases heat instantaneously, and any excess heat is absorbed from the horizontal chimney by the mass bench.  By the time the flue gases get to the vertical chimney, they've cooled to the point that you can easily put your hand on the chimney without burning it.  The mass bench then stores the heat, and releases it for hours after the fire has burned its way out.

While we were there, we fired the stove for the third time since they'd built it.  We only ran it for about 30 minutes, but an hour or two later we could feel the bench surface beginning to warm as the heat slowly conducted out to the surface, long after the fire had gone out. 

I think what we like so much about this stove is that it is entirely experimental and completely owner built.  If you build it wrong, operate it wrong, or don't use common sense, the results could be harmful, to you or to your home.  If you work carefully, test things as you go, and use common sense, the result is a heating device that costs a few dollars to build, pennies to operate, is beautiful, and offers performance on par with custom built masonry stoves that cost upwards of $10,000.  It requires a different mind set than the conventional one a lot of us are used to, where we're dependent on others for expertise, and as a result, pay others to meet our needs for us.  Rocket stoves rock!

Sustainable auto repair?

Having caught up on summer construction projects, we decided to try and repair the engine on our Toyota moving truck.  Sustainable living to us involves meeting as much of our needs as we can through our own efforts, and as cheaply as possible.  Buying, and then repairing, this truck, was done with that in mind. We bought the truck from UHaul in Boston in the spring of 2008, to use to move ourselves and Linc's mother out west, and to use as a lockable, moveable storage unit here in Colorado.

Uhaul probably never sells one of their trucks unless it's about to expire, but it ran OK during our test drive, and other than a rough idle, it seemed to be good to go, so we bought it for a little over $2000.  The UHaul maintenance records on the truck were extensive, and even claimed that both the engine and the transmission had been replaced in the last 15,000 miles.  The plan worked in that it got us out here for less than the cost of renting a truck, and then has served as a storage unit on our land since then.  But, the rough running continued, the truck began to leak a lot of oil, and the truck seemed to have very little power.

Linc took it apart, replaced some leaky gaskets, replaced a fuel injector on one cylinder that seemed to not be firing, and put it back together.  No oil leaks, but otherwise the same.  A compression check indicated that one of five cylinders was low on compression, and that the problem was in the right cylinder head.  We took it back apart, and quickly got over our heads.  Dawn, our Apache heritage neighbor, and a great auto mechanic, offered encouragement, advice and specialized tools (like an engine hoist if needed).  In exchange, we spent a few afternoons helping Dawn pull a good engine and transmission out of a wrecked Toyota 4Runner and install them in place of the bad engine in transmission in another 4Runner.  We enjoyed working with Dawn, and through workshare-bartering, we all gained a lot, including new friendships.  Fortified by Dawn's energy and reassurance, we continued tearing the motor apart on our own truck, until we were down to the engine block.

We discovered that whoever had rebuilt the engine had neglected to adjust the valves.  As a result, most of the valves were two tight, and three of the intakes weren't even able to completely close, resulting in the loss of compression, rough running, and poor power we'd experienced.  With Dawn's digital micrometer, we were able to determine the correct shim sizes needed and order them.  Meanwhile, Linc pulled out all of the valves, cleaned them up, measured tolerances and checked heads for flatness, and hand-lapped all of the valve seats.

When the shims came in, we put it back together.  Reassembly took most of two days as we were working outside and had to wait each day until it was warm enough to be able to work on cold metal.

With a snowstorm coming the next day, signaling the last of weather warm enough to do auto repair for awhile, we got the engine together and turned the key.  To Linc's amazement, it started and ran smoothly for the first time since we'd bought the truck.  Yay!  But, then he noticed a huge puddle of oil forming underneath, leaking from around the timing belt cover.  Too dark to do any more, we called it quits for the day.  Linc figured it was a camshaft seal that he might have not gotten seated well enough, and figured two full days of work to pull it apart, fix the seal, and reassemble the truck.

In the morning, the clouds had the icy gray of an approaching storm, and we both felt determined to see what we could get done.  Jeanne thought we could get it all done in a day, but I (Linc) thought it impossible.  It's amazing what is possible when you have energy, determination, and this time, the knowledge from experience to know exactly what to do and how to do it.  In three hours, the coolant was drained, radiator, power steering pump, battery, air intake components, timing belt covers, fan bracket, timing belt tensioner, timing belt, and camshaft pulleys off, loose seal found, pushed back in with sealant, everything reinstalled, and refilled with coolant.  Haven't been that good at auto mechanics since 1995 when we removed an engine in a VW Camper in a rainy campground in Whitehorse, Yukon territory, stripped off all the components, installed them on a spare longblock, and reinstalled the motor, in about six hours.  A few minutes after we finished, it started snowing.  We left it to sit overnight so that the sealant could dry.

The next morning, Linc walked out through the snow, turned the key, and it started it up.  No leaks.