CONSULTANT

Built 1978/79

My interest in earth building began after I bought land at the end of 1974.
My research into earth building led to a United Nations project in Columbia involving stabilised earth bricks and the CINVA ram. A book produced form this project: ‘Soil - Cement – its use in building.’ which gave detailed data and photos about the project was invaluable. I bought a CINVA ram in 1975. After a couple of years of making bricks and treating them badly, my partner at the time, Bill Thomson, and I began brick production in earnest. This was a big step as we had no other examples of earth building to follow and most people we talked to tended to be sceptical.

Earth Brick production
We used a 9:1 soil-cement mix. The soil was a sandstone clay mix. The resulting brick performed very well in compression and erosion tests.
We made 300 bricks a day but not every day. Some days we just sifted soil from the pile in the paddock. Breaking the clods with a spade and shovelling the soil onto the wire wove set up on the back of a trailer and building up a stock pile in the shed.
I mixed the soil and cement in a concrete mixer, stopping the mixer to spray in water and stir it into the mix. The mixer was turned on again and a few more sprays of water added.
Once the bricks were pressed we stacked them singly on old boards or iron, covering them with more corrugated iron to protect from the sun, rain and wind. After three days we stacked them up into piles over 8 levels high.
We made 5,400 bricks over a period of 6 weeks.

House Construction
I did most of the brick laying myself. I found it very quick and simple to get the walls straight and level.
Simplicity is the key with earth brick construction. Simpler is stronger. Wood, soil /sand/ cement mortar and earth bricks combine well, strong and long.

Earth Floor

Consultancy
My consultancy work resulted from demand. We had streams of visitors before the walls of my house were even half way. Many of the early visitors were engineers and architects, keen to get practical information about earth building.
After the house was completed I began touring, giving regular workshops on brick making and brick laying techniques. These workshops led to more formal instruction with Polytechnic training course.
I was also an original member of the Earth Building Association of New Zealand or EBANZ and on the committee for a number of years.
Limitations experienced working in a formal educational situation led me to establish community training courses in the area where I lived. These courses led to the development of an earth brick factory in 1989 and the development of a mechanised brick making machine in the years following.
Through this factory and a variety of contracts undertaken I trained a large number of people in brick making and low cost earth brick construction techniques as well as continuing to spread information. I was still getting many visitors to my house and continued to experiment with various construction methods, involving earth floors, earth/sand/ cement mortars and plasters, earth brick feature walls, fireplaces and pizza ovens.

I also worked with many potential owner builders developing house plans that used simple construction methods appropriate for those with limited building experience and money.

My practical research and its application over the last 30 years has been reinforced with management and teaching qualifications and work experience in a variety of small business and adult training situations. These skills and experience as well as those associated with earth building have been heavily drawn upon to plan, implement and maintain our current project of building earth brick homes in Te Hapua.