<html><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; ">I agree with Lance that adding salt to clay could be a a very bad idea. Clay attains its strength (and thus hardness) through an ionic bond. If you introduce anything that interferes with that ionic bond - such as salt - you will very likely weaken the clay. <div><br></div><div>However, materials such as cow manure have been used for centuries to increase the strength and durability of clay plasters. This is documented in Gernot Minke's book (Building with Earth) where, in a waterjet test, the addition of a mere 3.5% cow manure increase the earthen plaster's resistance to erosion from 4 minutes to 4 hours!<div><br></div><div>Regards,<div><div apple-content-edited="true"> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0; "><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; "><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; "><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; "><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Papyrus; color: rgb(255, 160, 18); "><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Papyrus; color: rgb(99, 10, 255); "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 18px; ">Steve Satow</span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Papyrus; color: rgb(99, 10, 255); "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Papyrus; color: rgb(99, 10, 255); "><a href="http://www.naturalbuildingsite.net">www.naturalbuildingsite.net</a></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Papyrus; color: rgb(99, 10, 255); "><a href="mailto:naturalbuilding@shaw.ca">naturalbuilding@shaw.ca</a></div></div></div></div></span></div></span></div></span></div></span> </div><br><div><div>On 13-Jan-11, at 11:42 AM, Lance Collins wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite"><div> Hi Kenn,<br><br> This might be a really bad idea, I vaguely recall from making adobes many years ago reading that salt and clay made for crumbly blocks. Also salt would make dry clay hydroscopic rather than hydrophobic.<br><br> Cheers<br><br> Lance<br><br> At 04:06 AM 14/01/2011, you wrote:<br> <blockquote type="cite" class="cite" cite=""> <font face="Comic Sans MS" color="#008000">I just had an idea. You could use salt that you feed livestock, mix it into the mud that you put into the wall. It will dissolve temporarily into the wall then dry rock hard, and will not sustain insects, plant growth or insects. My borate is labeled for pest control.. It doesn’t matter to a do it yourselfer.<br> Kenn Brown<br> </font></blockquote></div> _______________________________________________<br>Greenbuilding mailing list<br>to Send a Message to the list, use the email address<br><a href="mailto:Greenbuilding@bioenergylists.org">Greenbuilding@bioenergylists.org</a><br><br>to UNSUBSCRIBE or Change your List Settings use the web page<br>http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/greenbuilding_lists.bioenergylists.org<br></blockquote></div><br></div></div></div></body></html>