So, let's get this straight....even books on straw bale building start you off with "let's pour tons of concrete into the earth"???!

I'm hoping to build a very modest 80 sq m super insulated bungalow out of Masonite I beam panels. My architect, patient man, starts to baulk at screw in piles (Screwfast) with a timber ring beam and wooden floors. It seems an obvious way to do things without using concrete, but old habits die hard, if at all.

Has anyone had experience of using this method, what is it that I am suggesting that is so naughty?

We use power driven timber piles, just keep bashing them until the correct resistance is reached. Trim the tops, span bearers then joists and you have a floor to build off (light weight timber construction). A few bolts & braces you have an earthquake proof foundation with no concrete.

Fencing contractors sink a 250x250 oak gatepost 1.5m deep in half an hour - how do they do it and why don't they offer cheap pile founds as a sideline?

Ram it in there and build away -- will be OK but unlikely to get it past building regs or most engineers.

There are hundreds of thousands of old buildings around, built on dry coursed bricks laid in a clean bottomed trench. only using lime mortar after about 5 or 6 courses. I demolished one awhile ago for the clamp bricks it had stood OK for 180 years, but had suffered from all sorts of modern brick infill, the foundations were in great condition though. The adjacent ones are still standing and occupied. I wonder how all the love of concrete foundations came about.

There's no foundations at all under the 800mm stone walls of my cottage. With some stones over a tonne in weight there's just 200 year plus compacted earth! And the walls have not moved at all AFAICS.

Posted By: BrightgreenThere's no foundations at all under the 800mm stone walls of my cottage. With some stones over a tonne in weight there's just 200 year plus compacted earth! And the walls have not moved at all AFAICS.

Same here. Well, except at one end where the water tank overflow pipe was dripping down the wall for 20 years, it's sunk a bit

That's great but how are you going to do the calculations to prove to building control that it's not going to sink / dissolve / fall over?

Tell me and I'll copy it :)

What about Building Regulations?

There are three buildings in the UK that have both planning permission and building regulation approval for rammed car tyre foundations, all designed by Amazon Nails.

the technique that will have been used is called "stone columns" and are installed with a huge vibrating poker. they are generally classed as "ground improvement" and are designed and guaranteed by the company to increase the bearing capacity of the ground to allow pad or strip footings to be used instead of conventional piling.

as regards trench foundations there is a huge difference between compacted rubble and either brick/stone walls laid directly on clay or concrete strip footings.
masonry buildings are very flexible and able to accommodate differential settlements. i daresay the same for strawbale. you will need to mend the cracks in the plaster though.

all foundations would have to be signed off by a chartered civil/structural engineer for building regs unless they are the one size fits all approach for smaller buildings in which case an architect or similar may be able to do it.

brick is not generally accepted as a suitable recycled aggregate for concrete, but this may be your best bet to reduce the environmental impact. ie chuck them in the concrete and don't tell any one. foundation concrete will often use waste product cement replacements as standard - ask about PFA, GGBS or flyash.

option 3 mentioned above - the ring beam is a strip footing but with steel reinforcement to allow a smaller cross-section of concrete to be used?

I might be wrong but I half remember reading something about building standards of other EC countries being acceptable in the UK. If that's correct perhaps you can find an EC country that allows timber foundations or similar and invoke EC harmonisation rules to get it approved here. There might also be some CE marked foundation system around. Hard for the UK to refuse to allow its use here?