Electrical wiring gets installed in Strawtron

Over the past number of years, April and I have strived to live without electricity in our main living spaces. We certainly don’t live without it completely (this website certainly wouldn’t exist then), but we’ve enjoyed a candlelit lifestyle in Gobcobatron and planned the same for Strawtron. Now that our straw bale/timber frame is for sale, however, we’ve decided to go ahead and install electrical wiring in the house. It’s a bittersweet feeling — it’s not necessarily what we intended for the house, but I think it makes the home much more desirable for folks considering it as a possibility for themselves.

Strawtron is now firmly in the solar-powered 21st century, as it is now wired for Dancing Rabbit’s solar grid-tie cooperative.

Installing Electrical Wiring in a Straw Bale House

Normally, if you were planning to install electrical wiring in your straw bale house, you’d do it before any plaster was applied to the walls. In our case, the decision came after the fact… but thankfully, before the finish coat was applied. The first step was to cut channels in the base plaster to run the wire (other than decide where outlets and fixtures would be located, of course).

Now, I can’t go on much about wire specifics, outlet boxes, etc., as that stuff is far out of my range of knowledge. Thankfully, Jacob took command of all of those specifics. I can say that we opted for a simple yet functional wiring plan, with no overhead lights in the main space (with the exception of one in the porch, and a track light on the east side). I really despise overhead lights, and think they help create a supremely ugly and dysfunctional nighttime setting. (Sorry, I’ll end my rant there.)

Jacob cuts channels with a Sawzall to run wire in the bales

Moving on… the tool for the job of cutting channels turned out to be a Sawzall with a sawed-off blade. The blades were quickly destroyed by the dry plaster, but at least the amount of dust that was kicked up was minimal. An angle grinder kicked up tons of dust, and was quickly ditched. Note: anyone considering doing this same thing should absolutely wear a pair of good goggles and a respirator. All of that dust is terrible for your eyes and lungs!

Of course, the path of least resistance for running wire was the most preferred, but we could not avoid having to get behind posts and beams. That was okay, though. We did avoid having to turn a corner, which would have been mighty difficult and requiring that quite a bit of wall be removed to actually thread the electrical wire around the corner posts themselves. Again, if the bales were unplastered…. it would be a different story.

Once the wires were run and placed in the channels, they were secured with homemade pins, similar to bobby pins made of wire bent along the length to stay secure in the bales.

Installing Outlet Boxes and the Breaker Box

To get outlet and switch boxes affixed to the wall, we made 2×4 deadmen and drove them in the straw bales about 8-10″ deep. These provide a surface which we could screw the boxes onto. Deadmen aren’t particularly easy to drive into straw bales, but once they’re in, they’re very stable. The other trick is driving them in just enough so that the boxes stick out the appropriate amount. Ideally, the finish plaster would be flush with the edge of the outlet cover.

Simple 2×4 deadmen for driving in the bale walls

An electrical outlet box in its final position

The breaker box, obviously much larger than an outlet box, took a bit more finagling to get oriented in the wall. In this case, we borrowed a handy-dandy Lancelot carving tool to chop some extra depth out of the bales (once the plaster was pulled off), so that the breaker box could be appropriately recessed, and not stick out terribly proud of the wall plane. Since the breaker box has an number of wires coming in and out of it, we factored in some extra breathing room. Deadmen were driven into place here too, but we affixed 1x boards as a wider and more stable screwing surface for the box. The combination of deadmen and these boards makes a very strong anchor.

The breaker box gets a strong anchor to solidify it in the wall

Sealing the Wire in Plaster

Once all the wires were run, the boxes installed, and everything checked out, the wire could be hidden under plaster. April, Tyler, and I sprayed down the walls along the channels, and using a nice sticky mix of plaster (ideally with lots of chopped straw), we smeared the mud around the wire and boxes, effectively sealing them in the wall. We took photos of the location of all the wiring, since once the finish plaster is on, it will be impossible to tell where everything runs.

Plaster is applied over wires and blended with existing coat

Again, this could have been avoided if the house was wired when the bales weere still exposed, but alas… things change. Sometime this week, the house will be hooked up to the solar grid tie cooperative at Dancing Rabbit, the finish plaster will go up, and we’ll close the chapter on interior walls of Strawtron. It’s going to be nice.