permaculture

["Paul A Cross" <charybda@newmex.com>]

John wrote:

>Yep, though I haven't seen the device myself - a guy built a couple FC
>dwellings near Kalani eco-resort (formerly Kalani Honua) on the red road
>(Puna, Big Island) and I was told he made a small device that fit into a
>drill chuck and would grab the wires and twist them, zip! and it's done,
>next please...with one person on one side placing wires and the other on
>the other side with the drill it sounded pretty quick.

well, this tool sounds like something a lot of us would love to track down. Any idea how to get a hold of him? This is I gotta see.

 

When working on the FC Cistern at Lama I learned a trick so that you avoid having someone placing wires. Bend the wires in a J shape instead of a U shape, so that one leg is 1" / 3cm longer than the other. >From one side of the structure you can hold the long end, slide the bent end through, rotate the wire to another opening so it is grabbing mesh, and pull the short end through back toward you. Tie and continue. Saves a person, and that counts for a lot. Although it may be less fun, not having a partner on the other side of the mesh.

 

>How large?  I've seen 10K gallons at least, hand-built...that's pretty
>large.  More than that and a pond or multiple tanks might be more
>efficient...?

Yeah, I am looking at 10 - 20K gallons storage, would love to have it, but labor and cost are the limiting considerations. Ponds are hard here due to evaporation factors (cold dry montane) and the fact that on my land you hit bedrock basalt within 18 inches / half a metre. So, any pond would have to bermed up, requiring the purcahse of fill. There's no slope to take advantage of. Love the idea of getting it done in a day, though. Hire a backhoe, buy some fill, line it and be done with it.

 

Kirby wrote:

>As far as I know the tanks can get pretty big.  20' in diameter by 9' =
>tall (two bands of 5' wide remesh overlapped 6") is common here in =
>Texas, I believe that comes out to around 22,000 gallons. 

 

That capacity would be great for my application, Kirby, but too tall for gravity feed off the roof.

But if that size is ok structurally, something shorter and wider would certainly be okay, too. Good to hear it's feasible.

 

Krby wrote:

>I think my friend Jack Rowe did not use rebar, lath nor chicken wire.  =
>He tied tar paper to the outside of the remesh and plastered right _onto_ =
>the tar paper and remesh.  Then he removed the tar paper and plastered =
>the outside.  I'll have to double check with him.

 

This sounds very interesting, and I hope it's true, but I am having a hard time believing it. I don't see that the plaster would have enough to adhere to with just remesh and a tarpaper backing. Could you please check with him and get back to the list? The biggest labor effort in FC is the tying, so if we could eliminate that, FC would become so much more attractive as a building option.

 

Anyone heard of reinforced expanded metal lath that we could use with almost no tying or additional reinforcement? I am dreaming here.

 

Paul