Cob: mass house/oven

[Vicki Wicker]

Darel,
It helps to berm for sure. By five feet you would get I would guess in the 
60s. Our well water is very cold, I'd say 50s. We looked into some concepts 
of using the well water to cool and return it to the well to recool, but 
we're not getting a lot of water from our well, 3 gal/minute. Didn't think 
we had the volume of water to be successful with that strategy.
Our house will be about 1 third bermed exterior walls, living roof on 2 
thirds. We figure doing totally without air conditioning is not feasible 
unless we are willing to do some sweating. What we are trying to do is 
minimize our need for running the a.c. as much as possible. At this point I 
am convinced that maximizing insulation is the best way to do that. I could 
be wrong.
I just didn't want to go totally underground aesthetically. Plus, with 3 
children there is a real concern about being able to escape if needs be.
There is someone in Northern Arkansas who has a very upscale house in a 
cave. Saw it on Extreme Homes on HGTV. I don't think they had to do any 
cooling.
vicki in arkie

At 01:34 PM 11/1/01 +0900, Darel Henman wrote:
>Charmaine,
>   You are right if you have a normal cob building in a climate that does
>not have cool evenings that whatever heat trapped in the walls will
>radiate out.
>
>   Here are some more thoughts on the subject and queries.
>
>   In climates like this it may be usefull to use a lot of thermal mass,
>i.e., berming and going down into the ground or into a hill, or other
>type earth sheltered structure.  Enough thermal mass should give you a
>seasonal lag, not just a daily lag in temperatures.
>
>   For example what is the temperature of the earth five feet down in
>Arkansas in the summer?
>
>   Have you ever been in an basement is Arkansas during the summer.  Is
>is cool?
>
>   Any caves to take temperature readings there?
>
>Darel