We'd love to build a straw bale house but for our next cabin we won't be able to. We want to super insulate the cabin, which will be built from all salvaged materials by my carpenter dh. We are on a very meager budget, and wish we didn't have to buy fiberglass batting. What alternative kinds of insulation are there that can be used with wood frame construction? He's wondering about stuffing the walls with straw, but I don't think it can be done as compactly as it would need to be. I'd think mice would be a problem, and that the straw would be a fire hazard, whereas in a "real" straw bale house the straw can't burn. Any thoughts, ideas? What did people use before fiberglass? Here in TX, nothing was used. Zip, zero insulation in older houses.

-- Elizabeth in E TX (kimprice@peoplescom.net), February 14, 2001

Answers

The insulation used in attics is sometimes made of shredded cardboard treated with boric acid as a fire retardent and bug control.

-- Jay Blair in N. AL (jayblair678@yahoo.com), February 14, 2001.

Cellulose insulation is some of the biggest bang for your buck. The problem with it is that it usually settles down over time, decreasing the "R" value. They are now starting to blow it into position with a fine mist of water. Think of it as setting up into position, kind of like paper mache'. This holds it in place, no more settling.

Jay is right in the treatment for shredded material to control vermin and as a fire retardant. I have shredded both cardboard and newsprint in my chipper shredder. I'd skip the cardboard and only use newsprint since it "fluffs" finer.

You may wish to contact companies about obtaining packing peanuts. Also see if there is somewhere you can obtain shredded documents. These could be treated for use. The shredded material wouldn't be as good as if ground instead, but would still provide insulation. Of course it would have to be treated.

-- Notforprint (Not@thekeyboard.com), February 14, 2001.

I'd be leary about using any kind of carboard or shredded paper myself. I've thought about the styrofoam peanuts myself. Make sure not to get the ones that are supposed to bio-degrade. The main problem that I can see with the peanuts is that you'd have to leave a gap at the top of the wall to put the peanuts into(a real pain if you are using sheet rock). Then you would really need to leave the opening for a month or so to allow for settling and top it off. Not to mention those blasted things go everywhere with the least breath of wind. This is a question I have been looking for an answer to for a while now. Depending on the price of straw where you are it might be cheaper to build a stick frame conventional type exterior and put a strawbale wall inside. Put the bale up on it's side so it will be narrower. Then plaster it as usual.

-- Amanda in Mo (aseley@townsqr.com), February 14, 2001.

Amanda, I like your idea of the styrofoam worms.I'd think that woud be an excellent insulator, though I've never used it. The beauty of it is that you could be using all recycled materials, if you can find a source-perhaps a company which receives lots of packages or something.

As far as the hassle of putting the worms into the walls, how about this? Cut a hole in the sheetrock near the top of each wall cavity. Make the hole big enough to pour the worms in out of a bucket with a funnel of some sort. Maybe you could even rig up vacuum cleaner to blow them in.

After the wall cavities were filled up, vibrate the sheetrock using a board and hammer, or something electric which vibrates heavily. This to get them to settle, before topping off.

Save the holes you cut out. They can be put right back in, after you're done with the worms. The best way to do this is to put a scrap of plywood BEHIND the sheetrock, screwed into place with sheetrock screws from the front of the sheetrock. This gives you backing to screw the hole piece into place. I've done this a million times to patch large holes in sheetrock, and it works well, with little effort. With large holes, it's best to but a two inch wide scrap of plywood all the way around the hole, with one inch behind the sheetrock, leaving an inch all the way around to screw the patch onto. Screw a longish sheetrock screw into the plywood scraps for a "handle" to hold it in place while you screw them on, then remove this "handle".

Be aware that stryrofoam worms burn, and give off deady poison gas, though, or so I've been told. Of course, you can die from the smoke in an all wood house when it burns down too.

-- jumpoffjoe (jumpoff@echoweeb.net), February 14, 2001.

Check out www.icynene.com. The initial cost of this type of insulation is more than fiberglass batts, but you also get a complete barrier to air infiltration, and a vapor barrier for your money. The air barriet factor makes the actual R factor better than an equivalent thickness of fiberglass batts. Icynene is a carbon dioxide driven foam that remains soft, unlike polyurethane foam, which hardens and can crack over time, as the building shifts.

-- John Fritz (aeon30@hotmail.com), February 14, 2001.

Elisabeth,

Talk to factories in your area if you want vast storages of plastic peanut stuff, almost everything is sent with it packed around it, even office supplies and toilet paper. Colleges and pet stores have a lot, as does office supply stores. Who knows, maybe you can talk to the local recycling center, perhaps they have some they'd like to get recycled as well. My only concern would be the potentiol toxic vapors should your home ever be cursed with fire.

-- Marty (Mrs.Puck@EXcite.com), February 14, 2001.

Up until 6 years ago, I worked in an Oncology office in a large hospital. A lot of the chemo drugs were kept refrigerated, and as such, were shipped in the styrofoam coolers, which were then thrown away by the clinic. After we had our barn built, we contacted the clinic and asked which days they expected shipments of meds, and if they would keep the coolers and cold packs if we agreed to pick them up that day. We cut the coolers up into sections and used liquid nails to glue the pieces of 2" thick styrofoam to the barn walls and then covered that with plywood. Sure made a difference in the temperature in the barn. I have no idea what the "R" rating would be, but it worked, and was free except for the liquid nails. Jan

-- Jan in CO (Janice12@aol.com), February 15, 2001.

There is an insulation product being produced in NZ from wool (as in 'off the sheep's back'). I believe it has good properties including fire retardant and low/no allergy. It would take me a day or two for me to find the details if anyone is genuinely (spelling?) interested. P.S. Our dollar is really weak so the price to USA may be attractive.

-- john hill (john@cnd.co.nz), February 15, 2001.

Elizabeth, I thought of perhaps a less labor intensive way to deal with stuffing the wall (less than my first idea of cutting small holes in the drywall)

Make the first piece of drywall below the ceiling six or seven inches wide. Don't install it yet; put up everything from six or seven inches below the ceilin first, leaving this six or seven inch space open (you'll actually have an opening smaller than this, because there are the top plate and double plate just below ceiling level. Place the top FULL sheet of drywall accurately, so that the six or seven inch pieces you put in later will fit nice and snug.

After you have all the drywall up except the top six or seven inches, fill up the wall with worms. Vibrate to compact, then top it off. You'll then be left with a space of about three or four inches that needs insulation. Fill this small space with fiberglass, if you can't figure out a way to keep more worms in place.

Your drywall will be run horizantally, and you should have a "bevelled" edge (the way drywall is manufactured, the two long sides have "bevels", which enable the tape do be applied easily, with less mud required to smooth out the joints) at the top of the top full sheet. Put the bevelled edge of the six or seven inch strip you cut DOWN, so that you've got a nice, bevel to bevel joint, which is then very easily taped.

JOJ

-- jumpoffjoe (jumpoff@echoweeb.net), February 15, 2001.

Last year we were building a new barn (36x100).Near us is a company that makes steel insulated doors. When they cut the window openings in the door, the 22 in x 48 in cutout is just shipped to the dump. We got enough of the 1 1/2in thick waterproof foam insulation to cover the whole barn (for free)under the metal sheathing and just had to get rid of the metal pieces we peeled from the foam. Check in your area for companies that have waste products.

-- Harald in ontario (stahl@bestnet.org), February 16, 2001.

Just a thought before anyone fills the walls of their house with styrofoam peanuts or worms -- check their flammability and see what happens if you touch a lighted match to them. If they don't burn or give off toxic fumes, then go ahead (it's great to recycle the things). But I must admit that I would be very dubious about using them. I'd be more inclined to go with the treated wool. And, in Texas, might you be able to get away with using no insulation (as you mentioned, the early settlers didn't use any, since they didn't have anything available to use)? I'm thinking that a double roof would help to keep the house cool in summer, and mass in the walls (adobe? cob?) would help with heating in the winter, and also help prevent drafts. Or perhaps a minimum of insulation *and* a double roof for the top of your house, mass for the walls? Figure out what the purpose of the roof and walls is, then think out of the box to serve that purpose. Small structures aren't hard to heat even in much harsher climates than yours, so I think your biggest concern should probably be cooling, and good ventilation will take care of a lot of that, plus strategically located shade. Oh, and I'm pretty sure you are right about stuffing the walls with straw -- my husband had the same idea as your husband, and my response to him was the same as yours! Re-bound thick flakes of straw might work for the roof insulation, though. By the way, Texas isn't the only place where houses used to be built with no insulation -- our 150-year-old house here in NH was built with no insulation, and in Alaska we helped tear down part of our church that had been built in the forties or fifties (1900's) and it only had a few layers of old newspapers for insulation. We've gotten so used to the luxury of central heating (as a culture) that it seems unthinkable to live without it, but our ancestors did just fine!

-- Kathleen Sanderson (stonycft@worldpath.net), February 16, 2001.

Also being in Texas, and with it getting hotter each year, this is just not something I would want to cheap on. We not only used the fiberglass "pink panther" and I have the jacket that came with the purchase of it :) but we then also skinned the house with Celotex, a styrofoam fronted with an aluminum vapor barrier. The amount of money you will save on using another kind of insulation that may not work, is going to be totally offset by sky high heating and electical bills. We figure the dumpster diving we did for non insulated alumminum windows, that we got for free, and now have replaced with double insulated windows, cost us far more than simply using them in the first place, in higher bills, and a much less comfortable summer.

Save money by scouring the pennysaver and buying materials in bulk, we bought a whole truckload of 2x4's for 100$. Purchasing used materials, scouring the for free sections and reduced sections of your home hardware in town. Run adds that you will take old plumbing and elctrical, and tear down some garages! The actual building of the structure (drying in) is not the real expensive part of building, so do a good job. Lots of times garage kits built on your site by a contractor, than finsihed by you (just tweak it and add some windows and don't have them put in the garage door) is alot cheaper than stick building. See if you can apply for a credit card from you local building supply, and make monthly payments on it like a mortgage. Vicki

-- Vicki McGaugh TX (vickilonesomedoe@hotmail.com), February 16, 2001.

I realise this information will not be of much use to anyone but it is kind of interesting. I went to a model machinery exhibition once and saw a model hay baler, it was a perfect working scale model of the old type square baler. I thought the bales were rather cute at the time but now I realise they were just the right size for filling a wall cavity!

-- john hill (john@cnd.co.nz), February 17, 2001.

I'm curious as to why you can't do strawbale now?

-- snoozy (allen@oz.net), February 18, 2001.

Thanks everyone for your ideas. We can't do strawbale now because my husband will have to do all the building himself--I can't do much with two small children. For economic reasons this cabin will have to be built in stages. He builds components in the shop and assembles them later. With strawbale you pretty much have to get the walls up and roof on quickly to avoid getting the straw wet.

-- Elizabeth in e tx (kimprice@peoplescom.net), February 19, 2001.

Elizibeth, Search the web for Max Pot. It is the center for maximum building potential in Austin, TX. They have a clay slip dipped straw mix that they use that is not too labor intensive, has good R value, is not toxic, is fire resistant, and literally dirt cheap.

-- Annie Hamett (sahamett@msn.com), June 28, 2001.