Building a stick frame house in the woods in 90 days

[FairfaxStu]

I wonder if you have considered moving the HVAC air handler to the other end of the basement bathroom since the stairs in that location have been eliminated.
It looks like it would centralize the unit better. I don't know how they had planned running the hot and cold air trunk lines taking into consideration the two wooden cross beams I added in "brown"

Is there a floor drain at the old location or is there a condensate pump in the mix? If there is a floor drain, it might make more difficult to move.
-Stu

 

[pacerron]

Is there a floor drain at the old location or is there a condensate pump in the mix? If there is a floor drain, it might make more difficult to move.
-Stu

With a bathtub ( probably elevated ), and a Lav, right through the wall, I doubt if there will be any problem installing a condensate line. Most have trap and a T-stem with a cap at the air handler to stop any gas and to be able to flush or add some water to the trap if it evaporates.
Ron

 

[pclausen]

Day 37

Floor is done!

Dumpster and a dumper are now onsite.

View from dirt pile.

Looking into walk out basement:

Basement. The T-posts are temporary and will be replaced by 6x6s.

I hope these are temporary wall spacers...

Floor itself

View from living room. Once some of those trees are cut, that will be a great view

Extension for the fireplace

Closeup of the flooring they used. Tongue and groove, all glued together as it was put down.

 

[sixdogs]

One thing you could do is walk around in the basement and see if there are any nails that missed the floor joist when they nailed the floor down. If no second nail that hit the joist it probably wouldn't nurt to put a nail in and solve any future floor squeeks. Considering what looks to be very high quality workmanship so far, they're probably on top of things but it doesn't hurt to look.

 

[pclausen]

Ron, good idea about moving the air handler. There is a floor drain where it was originally to be located, but I'm sure something can be figured with with that, like maybe just a 1/2" PVC pipe on the floor for now and then at some point in the future when putting up the bathroom walls, run the drain pipe inside it. As for the air handler install at my house, I had them do it over and take out the furnace and put in an air handler instead. At $3/gallon for propane and $0.89 per kwh, it just did not make sense to have a furnace...

I spoke to the builder about the insulation, and they were going to just put in fiberglass batts. They still will, but they're going to blow on a layer of 1/4" foam first. We also took some measurements for the stairs in the garage, and it is a go! Cost difference will be minor is anything at all. Yes, all exterior walls will be 2x6.

 

[ustmd]

Ron, good idea about moving the air handler. There is a floor drain where it was originally to be located, but I'm sure something can be figured with with that, like maybe just a 1/2" PVC pipe on the floor for now and then at some point in the future when putting up the bathroom walls, run the drain pipe inside it. As for the air handler install at my house, I had them do it over and take out the furnace and put in an air handler instead. At $3/gallon for propane and $0.89 per kwh, it just did not make sense to have a furnace...

I spoke to the builder about the insulation, and they were going to just put in fiberglass batts. They still will, but they're going to blow on a layer of 1/4" foam first. We also took some measurements for the stairs in the garage, and it is a go! Cost difference will be minor is anything at all. Yes, all exterior walls will be 2x6.

Just out of curiosity, will you have to be inspected at various points (framing, electrical, etc)? Didn't know who it might impact the build schedule.

 

[pclausen]

Yes, there will be a lot of inspections along the way. In fact, there have been 3 already. They typically come within 48 hours of calling them when we're ready for the next one, so I don't think the timeline will be impacted.

 

[pacerron]

Yes, there will be a lot of inspections along the way. In fact, there have been 3 already. They typically come within 48 hours of calling them when we're ready for the next one, so I don't think the timeline will be impacted.

Really wouldn't make them mad if you had a little heat formed trap like this in any condensate lines.

Wondering about the 6x6 wooden post planned for under the beams.
There could be some movement and/or shrinkage of the beams. I imagine wood posts are cheaper
but metal pole screw jack posts always avail correction. They can be boxed around with wood if not on a wall line but still
be adjustable.
I have a lot of tile flooring and have 5/8" plywood on top of the 1" T & G sub floor like you have down now.
Never had to make an adjustment and never had a tile crack or grout crack but I feel better about having
screw jacks that would make an adjustment possible.
I just like to build things that never break, but if they did would have simple alternatives to correct them.
Ron

 

[Dr Dave]

I would stay away from wood posts, if possible, and deffinatly not have a wood spacer block in the concrete wall pocket, that should be steel shims and use steel columns. My mothers home was done that way 20 years ago and the center of the floor is 1" lower than the floor by the outside walls. The contractor said this was do to shrinkage of the posts, he recommended replacing with adjustable columns and steel spacers in the wall pockets. He said this could be slowly adjusted, over time, to prevent cracking walls. I would hate to see this happen to your's.

Dave

 

[mjncad]

Pete,
I wonder if you have considered moving the HVAC air handler to the other end of the basement bathroom since the stairs in that location have been eliminated.
It looks like it would centralize the unit better. I don't know how they had planned running the hot and cold air trunk lines taking into consideration the two wooden cross beams I added in "brown"
I would think running them as I have depicted cold=blue, hot=red would make a little sense. That way they could be hung from the bottom of the floor joist, leaving the little gap required at the top and not stick down much, if any, more than the beams. The red hot trunk may need to be sized down as it goes toward the perimeter of her house.
The hot laterals to each room would then fit between the joists. I would want a cold air return inside the master bedroom in case your mom or whoever in the future likes to sleep with the door closed.
I'm not a heating engineer so your company will, of course, design for the best flow..let's hope., along with not messing up more basement space than absolutely necessary.
I'm not an architect, either, but it appears to me from the drawings you posted that the perimeter studs of the house are 2 x 6?
Ron

Ron's idea of moving the HVAC unit is a good one. I'd also make sure there are return air inlets in all the bedrooms. Our bedrooms don't have them and it makes no difference whether the door is open or closed, the lack of a return air inlet doesn't allow the cold air to leave the room quickly. Plus the other reason to add a return air inlet in the bedrooms is when someone closes the door while the furnace is running, the added air pressure tends to want to slam the door shut.

I would stay away from wood posts, if possible, and deffinatly not have a wood spacer block in the concrete wall pocket, that should be steel shims and use steel columns. My mothers home was done that way 20 years ago and the center of the floor is 1" lower than the floor by the outside walls. The contractor said this was do to shrinkage of the posts, he recommended replacing with adjustable columns and steel spacers in the wall pockets. He said this could be slowly adjusted, over time, to prevent cracking walls. I would hate to see this happen to your's.

Dave

I agree with the use of steel screw-jack columns. They'll be easier to install and tweak versus manhandling a 6x6 of the right length into position.

I was surprised to see the 2x floor joists, as I haven't seen them used here since the early 90's. Most 2x's are pretzel wood here. The most common floor joist I see for residential use in my area is the TJI style followed by the built up joist using 2x4 framing.