[papercreters] Re: pole barn (house) construction with PC infill

Your post got me thinking. Why not fake a timberframe?

Build your pole barn, and papercrete walls. Then, encase your posts and beams with much cheaper rough cut boards. Or... make them out of papercrete and plaster and faux paint them to look like wood? Create fake pegs at the fake timberframe joints and everything. It would add some detail work to the project, and some time, but the effect might be stunning. It also could be done cheaply, depending upon how you choose to do it. That troublesome HVAC ductwork, plumbing stack, and electrical conduit? Run all that inside some fake timberframe posts and beams? It's even possible to wrap your roof trusses in wood or papercrete blocks to fake the look of timberframe.

Disclaimer: Before anyone falls TOO much in love with this concept... try it out on a small scale project first. Make sure you understand what is involved in doing it before committing to it on a big scale.


You mentioned setting your posts in concrete. If your posts are wooden, I do not recommend this. If your posts are metal, or reinforced concrete, go ahead and set them in concrete footers.

If you are really looking to cut costs, consider eliminating the concrete slab and do a gravel subbase and earthen floor. Much cheaper, and it's much more forgiving to do yourself.

I do not recommend embedding other insulation products inside a papercrete wall. If you want more insulation in a wall, just make the papercrete thicker. If you want a vapor barrier or an air barrier, use plastic sheeting.

Bobby, liberty1, had some excellent comments on this topic, and he is correct.

However, in your climate, (you mentioned 20 deg below zero winter temps), a completely air sealed house envelope that liberty cautioned about is extremely desirable. In my opinion it is worth learning and understanding the concept of the "passive house".

This is a system where someone superinsulates a house, and also completely air seals the structure such that there are nearly zero air leaks. Then a heat recovery ventilator is installed to bring in fresh air, but recover the heat energy from the stale air getting exhausted.

Using papercrete, you can build your own passive house extremely cheaply, and in your climate, it makes a great deal of sense.

Keep in mind that the complete air sealing and the heat recovery ventilator must be done together or you run the risk of creating an environment favorable to mold. Do them both together and that will NOT be a problem.

Anyone considering air sealing a house would be wise to build their own blower door. Gary Reysa at BuildItSolar.com has details about how you can make such a blower door for yourself. He also has a lot of detiled information how to use it to measure the performance of your house envelope, as well as how to use it to find leaks and patch them.
http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/Conservation/BlowerDoor/BuildingBlowerDoor.htm


Gary also has a description for an ingenious DIY Heat Recovery Ventilator that you can build yourself.
http://www.builditsolar.com/Experimental/DIYHRV/DIYHRV.htm


With careful construction, quality air sealing, papercrete superinsulation, blower door testing, and a properly sized and built HRV, a DIY builder could construct a state of the art ultra high efficiency home. A home that would be competitive with the most expensive high performance energy efficiency million dollar structures out there.

CAUTION: Getting all the details correct for this type of construction is not for the casual builder. This requires SERIOUS dedication and hard work. Many details must be gotten correct to make the entire system effective. If you're up to the challenge, go for it, but it would be wise to try it on a small scale shop or shed first, just to work out the kinks.

--- In papercreters@yahoogroups.com, "overogypsy" <overogypsy@...> wrote:
>
> THANK YOU Slurryguy......What a wonderful post. That answered SO many question that we had.
> I should have mentioned in the post that we are try to do this as cheap as possible but do it right. So we decided to possibly use that "style" of house but use post like you would use in a pole barn. They would be covered with the wall construction. Would love to have a timerframe but the cost is prohibitive.
> In this researching phase we are also looking into doing a round house using the pole construction and filling in between with PC using a slip form. Both of us LOVE round houses. Mandala in Canada has a wonderful looking round and also Deltec has some great ideas. We checked into Deltec a few years ago but it was way too costly for us. There are several in this area and everyone loves them. The only complant that I heard was about the light. But Mandala take care of that with the center sky light.
> We would like to have the poles set in cement and also do a four inch slab with a one foot riser wall for just the reason you mentioned.
> One question my wife had was would it be possible (given the moisture issue) to put insulation blue board inside the middle of the wall when it is poured ? So the PC would poured on both sides and move the form up the wall as the wall is being built. That way the board would would help prevent any moisture from entering in the wall from the outside and also give extra R value. Not sure if this has been addressed anywhere.
> Also we thought where possible to mount the door and window frames next to the post for added support.
> Thank you again.
> We welcome ANY ideas This is going to be a wonderful project but we want to get all our info clear so we do not have any major hick-ups.
>
>



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