A few house details

John Dow

Former Member (at his request)
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535
Just a couple things we've been working on in the mad rush before carpet installation.

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African mahogany paneling in a hall. I've got the wood for the doors, but they're a low priority, even though I can hardly wait not to see that water heater every time I walk past. The utility room door will open out and attempt to blend in with the paneling, while the bath door will be more conventional.

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A nicely coped inside corner. They didn't all come out this nice, but I'm not posting the messy ones! :rofl:

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This is the return on a piece of molding where there's no door. Ended up doing about four of these, and its not too difficult. Pine molding and a nice new rasp makes quick work of it.
 
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Not quite living there yet. We slept in the house last night, but I just got the kitchen functioning today, so we're still a bit tied to the trailer. Happiest day this decade is going to be seeing the back end of this trailer heading down the drive behind someonelse's truck!:rofl:

We skipped ahead a bit on the inside, since the weather has been too hot to do a good lime stucco on the outside - lime shrinks a lot more than conventional stucco, so it cracks a lot if it dries too fast. We're hoping to finish the scratch coat in a couple weeks, then do the brown and finish coats when it cools off a bit.
 
I forgot all about that this was a straw-bale house...thanks for reminding me Todd. That is pretty impressive.

Myself I was never too green, nor too environmentally friendly, but now that I am married to a school teacher with a double degree in Environmental Science, well let's just say we get into plenty of arguments about environmental issues. (I guess it's true that opposites attract).

Actually if the truth be told, getting green makes sense fiscally, but I did trade my snowshoes in for a snowmobile a long time ago and probably will not return to them. :)

Nice house though, sweet details and thanks for keeping us posted.
 
................... I did trade my snowshoes in for a snowmobile a long time ago and probably will not return to them. :) ...........

Yeah, but we always kept a small set around, (we called them Bear Paws) easy to walk on top of the snow when you are digging them beasts out!

Up in the Okanagan, where I come from, we get about 7 meters (24') of "Champagne Powder" every year, fun to ride, but, when you get stuck, step off the machine and you are up to the waist :doh:

Sorry for the hijack.... :eek:

John, the house is looking great, those details are what set a custom job apart from the hammer and Spackle jobs that are too common.

How is the house preforming in the heat?

Can't wait to see more pics!
 
Sorry for the hijack.... :eek:

I never mind a hijack, they're kinda interesting...

How is the house preforming in the heat?

Nice and cool, but it rarely gets real hot here, mid-upper 90's, and usually less than 30% humidity (we're at 6800'). The house is on a little finger ridge sticking out from a larger hill, so with the windows open we usually catch whatever breeze is going. Real question for me is going to be how it works in the winter :eek:. We're going to try to use two off peak electric heaters, which the company's estimater says will work effectively for our square footage. We'd also planned to put in a wood stove, but the roof geometry and aesthetics didn't really allow for a chimney, so we got no back up plan now. I may put in a pellet stove next year if we're kinda cold, they're a lot easier to vent, even if I've got to go all the way to town to get fuel.

Funny thing Travis, for me its less a question of green, and more a question of cheep :rofl: 2-string straw is about the cheapest r-40 wall you can find, and after spending 20 years in Tucson, I'm sick of high heating/cooling bills. Houses are so loose there that you pay about as much to heat them as in Maine, and are often about as cold, and then in the summer, you pay about $100 a month just to run the A/C at 78 :eek:
 
That is cool John and I appreciate your honesty. Green is beginning to pay off fiscallyand I hope it works for you.

I laughed at your post, not the intent, but at the loose house comment. I could never say this on Wood Online as they are the parent company of Better Homes and Gardens, but so many people here order their standard plans, have a home built and then throughly hate it. My best friend did this and man is it the construction/ design foolish.

2 x 4 walls do not work in Maine. We need the extra width for insulation and snow loads. Neither does the multi-level approach. His home has individual floors for each room. Granted its only 2 steps per level, but considering ALL of us are only ONE CAR ACCIDENT away from a wheel chair, that's not a good home design in my opinion. Neither is loading a home with windows on the north side to take in views of mountains, lakes or because it faces the road.

Let me go out on a limb here and guess that you did the one single most important thing any new homeowner/ builder could do...orient the home in accordance to the compass...that is facing the south and not just because your home would look great from the road?
 
I laughed at your post, not the intent, but at the loose house comment. I could never say this on Wood Online as they are the parent company of Better Homes and Gardens, but so many people here order their standard plans, have a home built and then throughly hate it. My best friend did this and man is it the construction/ design foolish.

Yeah, I've seen that happen a lot. Even with custom homes that cost a fortune and are professionally designed. Nothing against builders, but I think a lot of pro's in design and building get set in their thinking, my favorite example being the kitchen sink ALWAYS being below the window. I remodeled our kitchen in Tucson, and moved the sink out from under the window to a peninsula area across from the stove, made the kitchen work a lot better, and gave us something like 6' of counter top between the two. Counter top guys couldn't believe it though... "why would anyone move the sink?, its always below a window":rofl:

2 x 4 walls do not work in Maine. We need the extra width for insulation and snow loads. Neither does the multi-level approach. His home has individual floors for each room. Granted its only 2 steps per level, but considering ALL of us are only ONE CAR ACCIDENT away from a wheel chair, that's not a good home design in my opinion. Neither is loading a home with windows on the north side to take in views of mountains, lakes or because it faces the road.

They don't really work in Tucson either, but there they can pretend its ok 'cause the pipes don't freeze. I remember that about Maine, lived their for 10 years or so. We had one house in Orono that was an 1840's, uninsulated timberframe with clapboard siding. Man that place was cold. Best bedroom in the house was the one over the living room - and thus the wood stove.

Let me go out on a limb here and guess that you did the one single most important thing any new homeowner/ builder could do...orient the home in accordance to the compass...that is facing the south and not just because your home would look great from the road?

We actually didn't have much leeway in orientation, there was about one way to fit our floorplan on the site without cutting down lots of trees. But we did design it so that the bedroom windows face east and south, and the largest exposures of wall face south, only two windows face north. That was more a matter of why we picked this lot, so its kinda what you're talking about. Only real mistake was facing the front door west, the others in New Mexico will know why thats a mistake :rofl: at least in the fall and spring! But we can always use the back door.
 
Orono huh? Just went through there today as a matter of fact. We were headed over to Bradley to see Lenard Mills, an old logging history museum of sorts. Kind of cool, though there was not much going on due to the rain.

Now you are really making me laugh though. When I redid my kitchen the sink under the window just did not work for me either. I pushed it over in the corner, but it really works in this house, Like you it added a lot of counter space, probably 8 feet or so. It made hooking up the pipes easier too and I have had a ton of compliments on how it looks.

One of the design elements I used was thinking outside the box...literally. I love timberframes so I thought, Travis, why don't you put the frame (2 x 2's) outside the cabinets so the frame shows, and then put the sheating (cherry boards) on the inside, that way the frame of the cabinets show. Anyway that is what I did, and other than losing some room into my drawers, it works, and works well. It looks good too and really gives this country home a country feel. Again, its one thing for me to say it looks good, but I have got a ton of compliments on it. Really the latter does not matter, I live here so as long as it works, it works.

Here is crappy, but picture of my "outside the box" timberframe cabinets...

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Hey, now those are cool!:thumb:

Great way to have lots of fun making those neat joints without having to build a whole house (even a little one!) :D
 
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