Build diary of our new house.

[jkpell]

I have been looking at TBN for sometime now. A good friend told me about it and the information on here is GREAT. I just wanted to share with everyone our build progress for our house and if anyone has comments or ideas I would love to hear from you.

I guess an address to the site would help!

jkpell - jkpell'sÂ*Home Page

[Havoctec]

The house is looking good!!
What kind of a heating/cooling system are you going with?

[EddieWalker]

Nice pictures and a great floorplan. I'm looking forward to following along on your progress.

I've never seen headers done like your framer is doing them. I looked real close and can't see any jack studs. It looks like some of the have double king studs, but others only have the one king stud and no jack studs. There might be one picture of a window with jack studs, but I'm not sure.

I've never seen the headers on top and the cripple studs underneith either. I don't see why it wont work or is any different than what I consider normal. It's just different.

Do you have code, inspectors and permits in your area?

Thanks,
Eddie

[jkpell]

Thanks for the replies!

The house is drawn from about 4 different houses. It has taken about 3 years to get to this point and I am really excited.

To be quite honest Eddie I have never seen headers like that either. The windows are going to be right at 6' tall. We were going to do a window and transom but we can save money by using a solid window the same size. DO we have codes, inspectors and permits...YES! There are a total of 3 to 4 permits just for building, about 3 sources of codes that are "refered" to. Impact fees and as for Inspectors...well we are not done yet so I won't say anything.
Our framer is one of the best in this area. They are a heard working group of brother and cousins that have a system in place that allows them to really get alot done in a short time. I am amazed so far!

As for the HVAC, we will have a heat pump. That is what I have now and being in GA the winters are not that bad.

Again thanks for taking a look!

Joe

[Havoctec]

Did the header design pass inspection? It does not look like it will but if they have been dong this for a while it should be ok. However, I am courious to hear what the inspecter says.

Glad to hear you are going with a heat pump. I was going to suggest that if you were looking at something else.

[jkpell]

We haven't had the rough in inspection yet but when we do i will post the info!

Our heat pump has been great so far in our existing house so that 's why we are going to use one again. I looked at a geo-thermal unit but i think the cost would be a bit much. Also, there are not that namy of them used around here so service might be questional...

[jamiec]

From what i can see from the pics all the load bearing walls have cripples under the headers. Looks like the interior wall headers dont have cripples all though prob not the best way of doing it i have seen lots of int walls with no headers just a couple 2x's for the cross memember on top of door framing.

[thunderworks]

JKPELL . . . do look at the geo thermal unit. The upfront cost is high, but at current energy costs, the payback is very quick (in our case, approx 6 years). We installed a ground-water electric unit (radiant floors) and I am very pleased with the cost of utilities in our new house. If you intend to stay in your house for more than 6 years or so, the geothermal is ecnomically appropriate. It's also ecologically responsible.

Rick

[jkpell]

I will look at the geo-units and see what I can do.

All of the jack studs were added today. They finished up the framing and I will get a few pictures up soon!

Joe