Lecture 03

EARTH & CLAY

Definition: EARTH/SOIL

Since soil is a widely available material, it has

been used in construction since prehistory.
It may be combined with other materials,
compressed and/or baked to add strength.
Soil is still an economical material for many
applications, and may have low environmental
impact both during and after construction.
Earth structure materials may be as simple as mud, or mud mixed with straw
to make cob. Sturdy dwellings may be also built from sod or turf.
Soil may be stabilized by the addition of lime or cement, and may be
compacted into rammed earth.
Construction is faster with pre-formed adobe or mudbricks, compressed earth
blocks, earthbags or fired clay bricks.
Adobe or mud-brick buildings are built around the world and include houses,
apartment buildings, mosques and churches.
SOIL
Soil is created from rock that has been
chemically or physically weathered,
transported, deposited and precipitated.
Soil particles include sand, silt and clay.
Sand particles are the largest at 2 to 0.05
millimeters in diameter and clay the smallest
at less than 0.002 millimeters in diameter.
Both sand and silt are mostly inert rock particles, including quartz, calcite,
feldspar and mica.
The very small clay particles interact with each other physically and chemically.
Even a small proportion of clay affects the physical properties of the soil
much more than might be expected.
Clays such as kaolinite do not expand or contract when wetted or dried, and
are useful for brick-making. Others, such as smectites, expand or contract
considerably when wet or dry, and are not suitable for building.
MATERIALS
MATERIALS:
Earth/soil usually requires some sort of
processing for use in construction.
It may be combined with water to
make mud, straw may be added, some
form of stabilizing material such as lime
or cement may be used to harden the
earth, and the earth/soil may be
compacted to increase strength.
Mud
Coursed mud construction is one of the oldest
approaches to building walls.
Moist mud is formed by hand to make the
base of a wall, and allowed to dry. More mud
is added and allowed to dry to form
successive courses until the wall is complete.
With puddled mud, a hand-made mud form is
filled with wetter mud and allowed to dry.
Typically the technique is used for garden walls but not for house
construction, presumably because of concern about the strength of walls
made in this way. A disadvantage to the approach is that a lot of time can be
spent waiting for each course to dry.
Another technique, used in areas where wood is plentiful, is to build a wood-
frame house and to infill it with mud, primarily to provide insulation.
In parts of England a similar technique was used with cob.
COB
Cob, sometimes referred to as
"monolithic adobe", is a natural building
building material made from soil that
includes clay, sand or small stones and an
organic material such as straw.
Cob walls are usually built up in courses,
have no mortar joints and need 30% or
more clay in the soil.
Cob can be used as in-fill in post-and-beam buildings, but is often used for load
bearing walls, and can bear up to two stories.
A cob wall should be at least 16 inches (410 mm) thick, and the ratio of width
to height should be no more than one to ten.
It will typically be plastered inside and out with a mix of lime, soil and sand.
Cob is fireproof, and its thermal mass helps stabilize indoor temperatures.
Tests have shown that cob has some resistance to seismic activity. However,
building codes in the developed world may not recognize cob as an approved
material.
Sod/turf
Cut sod bricks, called terrone in Spanish,
can be used to make tough and durable
walls.
The sod is cut from soil that has a heavy
mat of grass roots, which may be found
in river bottom lands.
It is stood on edge to dry before being
used in construction.
European settlers on the North American Prairies found that the sod least
likely to deteriorate due to freezing or rain came from dried sloughs.
Turf was once extensively used for the walls of houses in Ireland, Scotland
and Iceland, where some turf houses may still be found.
A turf house may last fifty years or longer if well-maintained in a cold climate.
The Icelanders find that the best quality turf is the Strengur, the top 5
centimeters (2.0 in) of the grass turf.
STABILISED EARTH
Clay is usually hard and strong when dry, but
becomes very soft when it absorbs water.
The dry clay helps hold an earth wall together,
but if the wall is directly exposed to rain, or
to water leaking down from the roof, it may
become saturated.
Earth may be ‘stabilized’ to make it more
weather resistant.
The practice of stabilizing earth by adding burnt lime is centuries old.
Portland cement may also be added to earth intended for construction.
Mixtures of cement and lime may also be used for stabilization. Preferably
the sand content of the soil will be 65% – 75%. Soils with low clay content, or
with no more than 15% non-expansive clay, are suitable for stabilized earth.
The clay percentage may be reduced by adding sand, if available. If there is
more than 15% clay it may take more than 10% cement to stabilize the soil,
which adds to the cost.
If earth contains little clay and holds 10% or more cement, it is in effect concrete.
Cement is not particularly environmentally friendly, since the manufacturing
process generates large amounts of carbon dioxide.
Low-density stabilized earth will be porous and weak.
The earth must therefore be compacted either by a machine that makes
blocks or within the wall using the "rammed earth" technique.
Rammed Earth
Rammed earth is a technique for building
walls using natural raw materials such as
earth, chalk, lime or gravel.
A rammed earth wall is built by placing
damp soil in a temporary form.
The soil is manually or mechanically
compacted and then the form is removed.
Rammed earth is generally made without much water, and so does not need
much time to dry as the building rises.
It is susceptible to moisture, so must be laid on a course that stops rising
dampness, must be roofed or covered to keep out water from above, and
may need protection through some sort of plaster, paint or sheathing.
In China, rammed earth walls were built by the Longshan people in 2600–
1900 BC, during the period when cities first appeared in the region.
Thick sloping walls made of rammed earth became a characteristic of
traditional Buddhist monasteries throughout the Himalayas and became very
common in northern Indian areas such as Sikkim.
The technique spread to the Middle East, and to North Africa, and the city
of Carthage was built of rammed earth. From there the technology was
brought to Europe by the Romans.
Rammed earth structures may be long lasting. Most of the Great Wall of
China was made from rammed earth. In Northern Europe there are rammed
earth buildings up to seven stories high and two hundred years old.
ADVANTAGES &
DISADVANTAGES
ADVANTAGES:
Cost Effective: Earth is cheap and widely available.
Low Environmental Impact: Earth construction has low carbon dioxide
emissions and pollution impacts.
Temperature Regulation: Earth construction can help regulate temperature,
which can reduce energy costs for heating and air conditioning.
Indoor Air Quality: Earth construction can create indoor air relative humidity
that's beneficial for human health
DISADVANTAGES:
Durability: Earth can lose strength when saturated, and it's sensitive to
erosion from rain.
Water penetration: Earth has low resistance to water penetration, which can
cause crumbling and structural failure.
Shrinkage and swelling: Earth has a high shrinkage and swelling ratio, which
can cause major structural cracks when exposed to changing weather.
Soil suitability: Not all soils are suitable for every building need.
Advantages of Clay:
There are a number of advantages of clay for which it can be used in
architecture. One of the main being the fact that Clay as a building material is
ideal for tropical conditions in our subcontinent. Other than these natural clay
– of which terracotta is made of, is the most flexible form of earth.
It is essentially the least resisting material. Clay is the oldest known versatile
building material which has lasted for centuries sustaining its value and utility,
it is the most plastic and workable material as it takes shapes of a toy to a
material used for making high rise buildings.
Clay is the most versatile product from plasticity moldability point of view. It
can be molded in to any shape or size without least effort.
It can acquire pleasing forms as desired by the architects.
It is the Clay as a building material is the most eco-friendly available on earth.
The common red clay used for the production of tiles is the most abundantly
available mineral, with high plasticity and workability in wet condition.
Class END !