Rammed Earth Builders

Comfortable Living

“ Rammed earth houses are more comfortable than ordinary houses “ insist the people who live in them. Comfort is a combined function of thermal performance, acoustic properties and aesthetics.

Rammed earth walls have spectacular advantages in each of these areas.

For modification of internal temperature changes, rammed earth’s high thermal mass is the most useful and valuable quality of the various factors relating to thermal performance in our climate of high daily and seasonal temperature variations.

In the summer, earth walls absorb the heat slowly during the day and release it during the night.

A house with a substantial amount of rammed earth walling will have a remarkable ability to cool hot air entering during the daytime. Several days of high temperatures without relief during the night are required before internal temperatures rise. If this is not tolerable for the few occasions it occurs during most summers then these are the only times when active air conditioning would be required.

In the winter, warmth entering from north facing windows is absorbed during the day and radiated back during the night. If supplementary heating is used in the evening, this process continues during the night and the house is noticeably warm in the morning even if the heat is turned off on retiring.

Rammed earth walls are virtually sound proof. Used internally, where they also have most value for thermal performance, solid rammed earth walls can effectively isolate separate areas of a home or office acoustically. They are particularly effective as party walls between living and sleeping/study areas or in hotel/motel units. Stabilised Rammed Earth also has a 4 hour fire rating and impressive structural characteristics which make it attractive for use in an increasing number of tourist accommodation developments.

Public and commercial accommodation buildings especially benefit from rammed earth’s aesthetic character. The walls appear to have an organic glow which people respond to from some primal level.

They have a character which is warm and friendly that makes people feel good. The colour and texture and the fact they are composed of the same material as the hills and the landscape give a feeling of permanence and security.

A mixture of differing quarry materials or with the addition of coloured oxides can be used for that enhanced artistic Feature wall if so desired.

Also the rammed earth walls have a smooth slightly grainy finish, with a tight flat surface which is easy to detail against, allowing an accurate, classy finish to be achieved without requiring more work than other commercially available materials.

LOW MAINTENANCE

Stabilised Rammed Earth walls are sealed with silicone water repellents which soak in and permanently bond with the substrate, needing no further treatment.