I’ve added a third entry in ‘The $300 House Open Design Challenge’. CEBs are popular and practical, and some of you may be thinking of using them for columns, next to wood stoves, interior walls or as a design element. They would make a great center column in a roundhouse. Geopolymer CEBs turn to actual stone as explained in several previous posts.
Please vote on my projects. It’s shocking how few people have voted. This means a handful of votes changes the ranking considerably. Here’s the direct link to the $300 Geopolymer CEB House.
Update: Come on guys, help me out! Hundreds of thousands of people have read this blog and only 18 people have rated this CEB house. That’s a bit discouraging when you consider how much work goes into this blog (almost 600 posts, over 2,000 comments). I’m glad to see my Stone Dome in the top 10. I know this CEB house and my $300 earthbag house are also extremely practical, but I need your support.
Update: Yeah to go team. The Stone Dome is currently #3, the CEB house pictured above is #7, and the $300 Earthbag House is #18. They all jumped in ranking from just a few votes. Thank you! Also note how earthbag houses are now ranked #1, 2 and 3!
I was definitely willing to go through the (BS) to sigh in and vote for you. Best of luck! Your a genius and inspiration to us all, keep up the great work. Just a thought though, it seems to me that the CEB ideas are the best with EarthBag being the most practical for the allotted budget of $300 is quite low. What about Rammed Earth? With re-usable forms, plus no need for special additives that may or may not be available locally it just makes since to me.
Thanks a lot.
I tried to vote, signed up and then it wouldn’t let me log in. Sigh.
I check your site every day and am very happy with the regularity of your posts!
Please consider your labors very worthwhile. I value them, tried to vote – even though I wouldn’t vote on any other such website in which I had to sign in. No joy, whether it’s because I run Linux or some setting in my browser, I couldn’t get logged in and my vote didn’t count.
Warmest regards,
Missey
thanks. That’s very nice of you. It sounds like it’s Linux causing the problem. Maybe you can vote from an Internet cafe or coffee shop?
I had problem too until i realized it. I was using noscript plugin. Usually you can see this problem.
Right, thanks.
Hi Owen,
my idea is the “earthbag community” and I am really happy to have such experienced supporters! Also want to thank you for your support in my comments!!
Just want to say to all earthbag fans: Vote fair! Otherwise your votes won’t count. The jovoto team checks all votes afterwards – unfair votes will be deleted.
Try to understand the other ideas and (if you have the time) try to help them to improve their ideas. Constructive criticism is always welcome.
Thanks again!
iLINES
ILINEs has the number one ranked project right now at the $300 House design competition. It provides a clever community housing solution with shared walls. http://www.jovoto.com/contests/300house/ideas/
And I agree with iLINES about voting. All we’re doing here is encouraging people to vote and tell their friends about the competition. Don’t lose sight of the importance of the larger goal of providing affordable housing. Add your constructive input to improve the quality.
I voted as well. Hope it helps. Will spread this around on the FB earthbag builders page. :D
Thanks, Luke. All of my projects shot up in the ratings from just a few votes. So it’s easy to see the impact from just a few people. Please spread the word.
My first post just had to be a “Me too!”
Working from home here and I took the time out of the workday to get the karma needed for my votes to count. It will be interesting to see how the prototype phase actually takes place regardless of the “winners”. I think it should be done “Survivor” style – drop the winners with minimal tools and basic supplies somewhere and have them implement their designs.
A big thanks to everyone that bothers to participate here. You were the spark that started a process that will eventually bring a new earthbag home to Custer County. I recently closed on the land ~10 acres near Westcliffe, Colorado. I think I followed most links provided here with special attention paid to projects located in the southwest US. I will sharing my project details as time permits….link to be determined.
This is great news, thanks for sharing. And I love your idea of a Survivor style experience. This idea seems good enough for a TV show. One option is building in the slums are proposed in the $300 house design competition. Now that would be some serious reality.
And I love Westcliffe, by the way. Been there dozens of times hiking and hunting. We look forward to hearing about the progress on your home. I hope you start a blog.
Voted. I don’t particularly like the voting process for this competition, but this is important. Earthbaggers, get your facebook friends onto it too.
Thanks Jason.
Doesn’t take that long to vote up your karma so that your votes count. I pretty much ended up voting high on most of the earthbag and rammed earth structures. That got me most of the way.
Way to go, thanks. I just checked and two of my designs are at #9 and #10. The Stone Dome has 86 Facebook “likes” in just a few days. Some in the top ten have 1, 3, 5 or even zero. I wonder if the judges consider things like this.
The trolls are really coming out of the woodwork now.
Yeah I gave the earth-based stuff high marks and the re-use/recycle stuff medium marks – it goes by pretty quick and you don’t have to go through all of the choices, just what – 25 I think right?
I just hope the judges are better informed than the commenting public.
Thanks a lot. Two of my entries are currently in the top 10 and holding steady. And yeah, lots of ill informed and negative attacks. It’s starting to look like some are out to “get me.” Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but they may realize I’m a serious contender and so they’re starting their attack. Or maybe they’re just not real bright, who knows.
I’ve already had one encounter with a judge. They retracted their statement after I challenged them on one of their erroneous ‘facts.’ Their comment and mine were quietly deleted.
Owen, The negative are like you say trolls. Dont read too much in to it.
The “cement” house system that is currently in lead seems to be a business. They are selling their idea on license or doing joint ventures it say on his website.
The encounter in CEB brick comments is just troll. He have I think 2 contributions himself and one is just silly.
I have promoted the competition on a earthbag builders Facebook group with about 250 members. So hopefully we will see some votes from them.
So stay frosty a few more days.
Any good ideas to get people to vote?
Ideas to encourage voting: Remember if you don’t vote, that’s a vote (by default) for something other than what you would prefer.
And like I said earlier, most entries just have a few dozen votes. A few dozen more will likely decide the winner. That’s not very many people. Out of the thousands who read this blog alone, plus our other blogs and websites… there should be plenty of votes if people can pull themselves away from what they’re currently doing for a few minutes.
I tried to vote for the domes, but it told me I had to vote on a bunch of other stuff before it could count my vote, and I just don’t have time to look at all the other things on there.
[Wipes tears.] That’s okay, thanks.
Easy, If you have a login the click on owens name and you have a few projects to click on.
This is not a really nice way of voting but you are half way. Just look att at the first page and klick on other structures you find likeings OR unlikings for. Unlike votes count too.
I dont encourage you to vote on any special project since that would be unethical.
I’m sort of blown away by people’s ignorance and generally bad attitudes on the contest forums. It’s a little disheartening for the future of affordable housing.
Some of the ignorant comments are off the charts. Things like (I’ll paraphrase) “adobe walls are too thick”, “domes are too difficult”, “geopolymer is just old school cement”, “adobe would exceed the budget.” Heh, if adobe is beyond the budget then let’s just forget about this contest. Part of the problem is $300 is a ridiculously low amount and so it kind of forces contestants to fudge a lot. And as things heat up people are resorting to name calling. So yeah, it’s a little discouraging. But a lot of good could come out of this….
Here’s another gem. “Your Stone Dome is too similar to the Earthbag Community House.” Really? How transparent can you get? They’re hoping the judges will eliminate all other earthbag houses even though they’re vastly different.
The comments in the competition on all the projects is just too much now. I feel exhausted and I dont even have a project to defend. I was going to add a last minute project but there was too much with the thesis and I missed the deadline to submit my project. Now Im glad I did not manage to submit it. The chance of winning any money is not worth it and I had planed to donate any won money to house projects.
You and all the other do a fantastic job just to stay sane and healthy from the comments.
I will only go in and look ones a day I think from now on.