Straw Bale Building Course - Nov 2012

First straw bale building course of 2012.
Not a lot of people, but we had a lot of fun and achieved a lot.

Straw Bale Building Course - 17 Sept 2011

After the mandatory theory hour or three, the course attendees (roots) headed out to the Pony Cottage on the Riverbend farm in Lanseria (close to the InSynch Training Centre) to build the straw bale walls for a new addition to the cottage a new Bedroom.

Pre-Dipping the bales... before stacking them, making the plastering process quicker and easier.

The bedroom was constructed using a non-load bearing straw bale walling system. The bales were hand-picked as best as possible, the Vapourt barrier was put in, the bales pre-dippedf and stacked and pinned as required. Next weekend we will apply the Base and Final Plaster layers, and thus continue with the construction of the bedroom.

Group Photo of all who did the course...

Sustainable Building & Design Courses - Observatory Cape Town

Hi All

More Pictures and comments to be posted soon.

In the mean time here is 1 or 3.

PS: In case you did not know. At the last minute we had to change venue. We changed from Houtbaai to Observatory.

AA

Upcoming Events: Sustainable Building & Design Courses - Houtbaai Cape Town

(CPD Accredited)

InSynch will be running a number of courses in Cape Town during the Easter break 2011, by popular demand.

The Course Line-up:

1. Green Home Design Course (Saturday, April 23rd)
2. Straw Bale Building (Sunday, April 24th),

3. Cob Building (Monday, April 25th),

4. Natural Paint & Plaster (Tuesday, April 26th) and

5. Rammed Earth (Wednesday, April 27th).

If you are interested in attending any of these courses, please book ASAP. Limited space available.

If you would like to get CPD points for the courses attended, please contact CIFA for bookings and more info.

See you all there... by the 'Mooontin'!!

Bookings: info@insynch.co.za or call Sonia Armstrong on 076 6688877

Date: April 23rd - April 27th, 2011.

Location: Houtbaai, Cape Town

Rammed Earth Course - 5 March 2011

Bulking Factor, Continious System, Formwork, Californian Method, Pipe Clamps, Release Agents, Soil Science, Cement Content, Lime Content, Stabilisation Factor, Crush Tests, Test Blocks, Soil Selection, Council Approval, Mix Ratio's, Moisture Content, Mix Procedures, Ram Vibration, Ram Technique, Production Volumes, Cost per M2, Finishing & Touch Ups....

are just some of the issues discussed during the Theoretical part of this Course.

The day is broken into two parts:

Part One: Theory & Best Practice (Based on InSynch's Experience & Theory)

Lunch

Part Two: Practical - the students select Soil, Prepare and Mix it, Build Formwork and Ram a small test block.

Finally: before we go home, we have a quick sneak peak of the test wall by removing the formwork and revealing the wall.....

"Aaawwh... it looks beautiful", says Sancha, an Architect all the way from Bloemfontein.

Most of the other students flew all the way from Cape Town to do the course.

Lets hope they enjoyed the course and are going to start producing some Rammed Earth buildings in the Mother City.

Alastair

RAMMED EARTH Course - December 2010

Final InSynch course for 2010......

Using Rammed Earth, the students built the 1st of two pillars for the base of a future cob oven on the Riverbend Farm in Lanseria (oven to be completed on the next Cob Oven course).

A usual the theory part of the course extended into a late lunch, giving the students just not enough time to complete the ramming of the pillar. So, unfortunetly the wall (or pillar) was not revealed..!
The pillar will be completed by InSynch staff and will be available for all to see during the next course... in January 2011.

Keep em' Peeled.....!

For the New Year Course Schedule.., soon to be posted to the InSynch website (http://www.insynch.co.za/ ).

From All at InSynch, we wish all our past, current and future students and clients a restful and festive Christmas break and an awesome entry into the new year!!

See you all on the other side.
Alastair & Sonia.

Natural Paint & Plaster Course - May 2010

One of the BEST courses ever...!!!

Natural Paint:

Mixing paints made from local and natural ingredients, non-toxic, zero VOC's, and kinda' cheap.

Cheap, how cheap..?

Well we mix a 20L drum of Alis paint... costing something like R15. It can be used as an exterior paint and should last up to 10 to 20 years.

You don't believe it....

well time will tell on the exterior walls the course attendees just painted!

the paint from previous courses... is still holding strong with no colour fading or deterioration.

The team mixing the Alis paints.. we mixed about 4 or 5 different colours and recipe variations.

Helen as chief chef.

Erwin... our foxie doing some quality control on the Quark (old milk) paints.

Seems it passed with flying colours...!!!

The guys taking on some of the staff quarters with their various natural paints on the Riverbend Farm.

Looking good Jean.

A lovely toned down natural pigment using some of the natural clays.

Helen, now as Picasso putting the finishing touches on the building.

We also teach you to quickly clean your brushes - hee he!

Johan. enjoying himself with the quark paints.... jeepers check the colours bru!!

Aimee, our usual course mascot and "climb in boots an' all" participant does a stunning job painting some roses on the building entrance.

Thanx Aimee'kies

Colours galore.

onto, Natural Plaster:

Mixed with local ingedients, nothing from a quarry or a hardware store.
The fibre was a nice batch of loovly fresh horse manure.

Mark ensuring we have a good mix of plaster aggregate with clayey soil.

Stick it must stick.... and look beautiful and protect the cob walls.

Yip Ladies... the manure is fresh - harvested this morning from Colin and Co. our Plaster Machines (our horses).

Different trowelling techniques are demonstrated and practiced.

It seems even Sonia from InSynch Sustainable Technologies is becomming a Plastering Master.

Sonia is teaching the internal Lime Renders to some of the course attendess.


Gerald, Peter and Alex enjoying themselves..

Wow... the end of the day on Riverbend Farm at the InSynch Training Centre in Lanseria, South Africa.

Alastair