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Michael Reynolds
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Earthship: How to Build Your Own, Vol. 1 Paperback – January 1, 1990

by Michael Reynolds (Author)
4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 155 ratings
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Earthship: How to Build Your Own 1/E by Reynolds, Michael
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Previous page
  1. Print length
    240 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Solar Survival Architecture
  4. Publication date
    January 1, 1990
  5. Dimensions
    11 x 0.5 x 8.5 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0962676705
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0962676703
  8. See all details
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Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Solar Survival Architecture; First Edition (January 1, 1990)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 240 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0962676705
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0962676703
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.1 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 11 x 0.5 x 8.5 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 155 ratings

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  1. Michael Reynolds

    Michael Reynolds

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    What is an Earthship?

    An Earthship home is a type of passive solar house that is made of both natural and upcycled materials (such as earth-packed tires). Earthships can be completely off-grid or partially off-grid.

    https://earthshipbiotecture.com

    See more on the author's page
  2. Michael S. Reynolds

    Michael S. Reynolds

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    Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more

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Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5 out of 5
155 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Paula
5.0 out of 5 stars great book for basic Earthship starting point
Reviewed in the United States on January 29, 2024
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Plan on building an Earthship she shed in the future, this book has great basic concepts and ideas on how to make them work.
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kh
5.0 out of 5 stars The secret of thermal mass for off-grid house.
Reviewed in the United States on April 19, 2014
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Michael Reynolds discovered how Nature store heat energy and had experimented it over decades in real housing applications.

When I read his clean explanation about thermal mass, it instantly made everything so clearly how to build off-grid house.
Enough amount of material which has good thermal characteristics, i.e. soil or natural rock, works as heat energy storage.

Reynolds suggests at 4 ft to 5 ft depth from the ground, the average temperature is between 25 to 27 Celsius degrees year round. And utilizing the heat energy Earth provides indeed reduces fuel or energy consumption to maintain ambient temperature inside the building. Then he explains how to determine water table, how to maximize solar energy in visible light spectrum on the following chapters.

Using old tires as container of buck soil is cheap, alternative method of achieving thermal mass. Earthbag or other technology are alternative option to do the same thing IMHO.

It's feasible and definitely help out people who want to have better life if they can afford easy-to-build, low cost, environmental friendly house. And the house provides own power even food year round. Considering the fact that conventional house requires huge amount of fuel cost that exceeds the construction cost within two or three decades, off-grid house is real solution.

Combining Permaculture with off-grid house is something most people hardly conceive nowadays. Suppose you have a house that provides electric power, don't cost external fuel, and organic, fresh food year round, you will have freedom in true sense.
11 people found this helpful
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GoSolar
5.0 out of 5 stars A Must Read!
Reviewed in the United States on February 20, 2011
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Being involved in the solar PV/Thermal, and general Renewable Energy industry, I am very familiar with solar's potential. The largest amount of energy that we use is used to heat/cool our buildings. We are bathed in so much solar energy every day- if we harnessed it intelligently, we can make it work for us with little effort on our part (after initial construction of course). Better planning, intelligent design, more stable future- this should be mandatory reading in all architectural and building design programs. I'm buying the rest of the series now- as well as looking for land. How about a separate little earthship garage- an EV docking port. ;) READ THIS BOOK! It's just the beginnings, and I'm sure some design concepts and building practices have changed, but there's a lot of good information in this book!
4 people found this helpful
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Ryon
4.0 out of 5 stars Loved this book!
Reviewed in the United States on October 24, 2010
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I absolutely loved this book, and if you are interested in breaking away from the confines of the savings and loan based housing market, you will too! The only thing I can really say negative about this book is that it was not longer! Michael Reynolds could have made this a lot more detailed which would have been a big help because there are some concepts of the Earthship design that are still a bit fuzzy in my mind. Other than the slight brevity of this manual, this is a fantastic read for anyone interested in the alternative, ecologically-sound lifestyle. It really got my mind running in the direction of discerning what I hope to achieve in my housing goals, and made me really want to try this unique architecture concept myself.
4 people found this helpful
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pamela conklin
5.0 out of 5 stars Great doit-yourself method of building your home!
Reviewed in the United States on June 24, 2015
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We are attempting to build a home with this style in Maine. It has its pros and cons just like all other types of construction. There are some issues with costs of these houses and the fact that they may cost more because of some different issues. See how it is for you. Our other choice is cordwood. The building process seems somewhat inexpensive but there is much labor involved and this is not for the weak person. If you hire one of the companies to build, it will be $185 per square foot. Yikes! If you can build it yourself, you could probably build it cheap enough and have an earth-friendly home. There are step-by-step instructions in all 3 books so make sure you get all 3 and decide for yourself. Great books!
9 people found this helpful
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M. Sutton
3.0 out of 5 stars Desperately needs a second edition.
Reviewed in the United States on December 1, 2012
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Like many of the other reviewers I am fascinated by sustainable housing. I was drawn to this technology after a some research online and in the library on earth sheltered homes. I would really love to inhabit an earthship of my own. For now though I've purchased the entire trilogy in the last year and enjoy reading through them.

The problem here is, this series of books was written in the early 1990s, making them 20 years old. In those 20 years Michael Reynolds and his crew have done a lot of tinkering and trial and error, managing to improve the system drastically. These leaps forward are not represented in these books. Some of the techniques enshrined within have been discarded completely as their flaws came to light.

I hope they do update in the future. I'll gladly get another set.

For now, the books have solid information, just be sure to do deeper research.
113 people found this helpful
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Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars great book
Reviewed in the United States on March 6, 2022
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Probably will not build one but learned a lot from the book I will use other places
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David B. Webb
5.0 out of 5 stars Get it...read it...free yourself !
Reviewed in the United States on February 25, 2014
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My wife and I are currently in the planning stages of building a Simple Survival earthship. These books were written over twenty years ago but the material covered in them still holds true to this day. These books will give you a very good idea how they go together and how the systems work in a symbiotic relationship with one another. The latest earthships like the Global and Simple Survival models are even more efficient than the ones in these books but once you read them the newer models will make sence instantly. Great books for anyone wanting to get off the insane treadmill that our society is on!
2 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

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Velvet A. Peavoy
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in Canada on November 3, 2017
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Great starter book
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Margie Greyvenstein author of 'Masked Gods'
5.0 out of 5 stars Earthship
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 29, 2012
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I bought this because I'm going on a course next year on how to build Eathships and it did not dissappoint. I work in construction so I perhaps had an advantage in understanding the drawings and technical aspects but if you would like to know how it is done, buy this book. It does not waste space on glossy pictures but gets down to the technical stuff quickly.
2 people found this helpful
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Ing Mag Michaela Kohlbacher-schneider
5.0 out of 5 stars IMAGINE ... EARTHSHIPS
Reviewed in Germany on December 5, 2006
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Großartig! Nicht nur die Baumethode, sondern auch die gesellschaftskritische Grundhaltung des Autors und Architekten Michael Reynolds gegenüber den uns beherrschenden Systemen.
In dem Buch wird genau erklärt wie man/frau selbst Hand anlegen und sich sein/ihr eigenes Zuhause unabhängig von Versorgungssystemen wie Strom, Wasser, Abwasser, Gas, Nahrungsmittel, Geld errichten kann. Wunderschön finde ich auch den Klappentext auf der Rückseite des Buches, mit dem auch Michael Reynolds 11-Minuten-Film über die Earthships beginnt (wenn man sich diesen Text auf der Zunge zergehen lässt, dann bekommt man - neben einer Gänsehaut - auch das Gefühl sofort selbst losbauen - oder zumindest sofort loslesen zu wollen.):

STELL DIR VOR ... in einem Haus zu leben, das weder Heizkosten noch Klimaanlage kennt
STELL DIR VOR ... dieses Haus selbst zu bauen
STELL DIR VOR ... Dein eigenes Gemüse während des ganzen Jahres in diesem Haus selbst zu ziehen
STELL DIR VOR ... keine Stromrechnung zu zahlen
STELL DIR VOR ... einfach verfügbare 'unbegrenzte natürliche Rohstoffe' um dieses Haus zu bauen zu haben
STELL DIR VOR ... eine erdfreundlichere Zivilisation
STELL DIR VOR ... EARTHSHIPS

Reynold hat in den 70ern begonnen mit den Rohstoffen des 21. Jahrhunderts und am Bauort vorhandenen Materialien Häuser zu bauen, die langlebig, kostengünstig, weil autark von Versorgungssystemen und umweltfreundlich sein sollen - kurz Häuser, in denen das Leben lebenswert ist. Inzwischen gibt es in den USA an die 1000 Earthships, sogar in Kanada, Südamerika, Japan, und auch in Europa sind Earthships entstanden (Brighton, Fife, Rotterdam, Valencia und Schweden), Projekte in Frankreich und Portugal sollen nächstes Jahr realisiert werden.
Seit ich mit den Earthships zu tun habe, bin ich drauf gekommen, dass es im deutschen Sprachraum für manche Personen ein ziemliches Problem bedeutet, das die Literatur nur in englischer Sprache vorhanden ist. Deshalb habe ich eine österreichische Website zu den Earthships in Leben gerufen, auf der auch Teile dieses Buchs (über die Systeme und über den Grundgedanken des erdfreundlichen Wohnens) übersetzt und von Michael Reynolds genehmigt zu finden sind.Ziel unserer Website wie auch jedes Käufers des Buches ist, einmal selbst ein solches Earthship zu bauen und darin autark zu wohnen. Bleibt nur zu hoffen, dass die vielen Interessenten in DE und AUT auch die selbe Chance bekommen, wie andere EU-Bürger.

Kurz und gut: Das Buch ist Pflichtlektüre für jeden, der daran denkt, unabhängig von der Baulobby sein eigenes Heim zu errichten (ohne dann ein Leben lang dafür zahlen zu müssen)!
26 people found this helpful
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sebastien turmel
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in Canada on April 14, 2017
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Many construction details
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sebastien turmel
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in Canada on April 14, 2017
Many construction details
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Anon
5.0 out of 5 stars Good quality, extremely informative
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 18, 2018
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Great condition, amazing diagrams and information. Gets straight into details but keeps it user friendly for anyone to understand. Is the real deal if you're looking for in depth details
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