Back To Base

So it was time to get back to working on the base. We were ready to begin plastering so we can seal the oven with the lime whitewash. I enlisted the help of my daughters Chrissy and Alexa. I showed them how to press and work the cob mix into the spaces and partially smooth it out. We learned early on that it helped a lot to keep the trowels clean and wet. If the cob mix is too dry that will cause a problem too as it will become sticky and as you drag and press it will stick to the trowel and pull off.

I also modified my standard cob mix. Instead of using 2 buckets of sand and 1 bucket of clay earth I added an additional 1/2 bucket of clay earth. I also used a screen to sift the sand and the clay earth. I found a screen that has about a 1/8th inch opening. That's larger than a window screen but, smaller than the screen that I found at Home Depot or Lowe's. I found the right size on the screen top that we had for an aquarium. It filtered out all of the larger stones that would be fine for the bricks but, not for a smooth finish. I also filtered the clay earth that I'm using. I wanted to make sure that all of the organic matter was removed along with any stones or large clods that wouldn't let me get a nice plastered surface. I also found that adding extra water to the mix so that I could get the consistency of about soft icing was the best to use.

This modified mix gives you a nice dense and hard outer shell that once combined with the lime whitewash should be completely waterproof. With our monsoon rains here we need to be waterproof.

My two daughters working away. Chrissy on the left and Alexa on the right. They got the hang of it pretty quick.

You have to love their concentration since they didn't even know that I was taking pictures of them.

As you can see they made pretty good progress. I helped throughout the day but, I have to say my girls did a good job and did most of the first layer of plastering on the base.

You can see in this picture the bricks of the base. Also notice that they look dark. This is because you have to wet the surface of the bricks if you want the plaster to bond otherwise it cracks and peels off as it dries. I made some test patches and found this out very quickly. 

They finally had noticed that I came back and took more pictures but, they were good about finishing the plastering. They did very good and had fun too and that was good to see.

So the above three pictures are of the finished first plaster layer. I think the girls did an excellent job.

At the end of the day Chrissy is taking a well deserved break. As I was taking her picture she said she was dirty and was proud of it.