Disclaimer: This is a Tom blog, and Jessie always says I’m too wordy. There is some natural building information in this post, so if your just here for the pictures scroll down… there are a few in there with all of my blathering
I had the chance yesterday to help out finishing an earthen floor. The floor itself is made from a clay, sand and straw mix like cob, but I imagine much thinner when its mixed. The straw was pretty fine in the floor and showed up as kind of a speckling in the finish. You can kind of see in this picture.
This floor was damaged by water when they area had a sewer back up and the water seeped in around the edges. Doni has done a batch of patching and oiling for places that were damaged and the last step was to finish the entire floor with a sealer to make it a cleanable surface. The original installer put a poly-urethane based sealer on, but it doesn’t allow the floor to breath so when the water got under it there was no way for it to evaporate. We put down a seal using a product called Bio Shield.
Bio Shield Floor Resin #4
The nice thing about Bio Shield is that its a natural sealer so it has no petroleum products in it and it has very low VOC content at around 450 grams per liter. The sealer is a natural tree resin and Linseed oil. It was pretty easy to put on since we were covering the existing sealer so we really only had to brush on the one coat. It has some smell to it when you put it down but its not toxic and doesn’t give you that paint fume fog like latex or poly materials.
I’m pretty impressed now with the look and durability of earthen floors and I think it may be a candidate for our house when we build it. The Bio Shield product is more expensive (from $68 to $85 per 2.5 liter can) but it finished beautifully and doesn’t off-gas toxins into your living space so I think its worth it.
We may get a chance to help install a small earthen floor in the office for OK OK OK Productions while we are her which would be awesome.
--Tom
1 comments:
Tom, I have a few questions. Is it a problem to get good adhesion when putting a water base product on top of the old oil base finish? When I use to do the gym floors in AK, we had to abrade the old surface (and clean at the same time) to get a good bond between the new and old finish. And we were putting oil base finish on top of oil base finish. Also, how thick is the straw mix base material? Does it go on top of a concrete slab or what? Would you describe that a bit more for the rest of us geeks who find this stuff interesting? Not quite to the fascinating level, but getting close! What about the insulating qualities? I'm sure with the proper finish on top it is quite durable. It's nice to have both your's and Jessie's perspectives on what you encounter as you come at things from different angles. Nice job!
CT DAD
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