stick built or other ??????

[Beavis]

My in-laws have purchased some land in central kansas and are wanting to move into the country. The question is: do they go with a stick built home (regular wood frame 2 x lumber), Morton type metal building and finish the inside like a home, or styrofoam forms filled with concrete.

Stick built: almost any contractor is comfortable with this type of construction, fairly affordable, could be built with 2x6 with spray in insulation.

Metal Building: the metal building itself is fairly reasonable in price, but then cost add up quickly when finishing the inside. Not all contractors will be as comfortable with this. Don't have to worry about exterior maintenance.

Styrofoam forms: Again, not all builders in our area are familiar with this building process. Would be extremely quiet and the entire house would be like a safe room; remember we are in tornado alley. Just in the last couple of years we have lost Greensburg Kansas and Chapman Kansas to mother nature.

I am open to pretty much any input you may have so that we can make the most educated decision possible.

thanks

 

[warhammer]

The only comment I have is I once saw a metal building completely finished out on the inside with a stone exterior facade on the front and it was a really nice place!
What really made it for me was the huge shop area in the rear two thirds of the building.

Warhammer

 

[EddieWalker]

It's very hard to build a house better then a traditional stick built building. With tornado's being a concern, build it to Florida code. They have learned the hard way how to build homes that will hold together in strong winds.

The concrete homes have their issues and in my opinion, not quite up to the hype you hear about them.

The metal building won't hold up to the tornado any better then anything else, and probably be the first building to go. I don't know of any code for them that address's strong winds. Some are built to withstand 100mph winds, but I know allot of them that have lost metal on 40mph winds.

Eddie

 

[kennyd]

If I was building in 'hurricane alley" as you say...there would be only one type of construction I would use, and that is the ICF's.

Besides the safety factor, there is also the benefits of:

R-value
quietness
possible insurance breaks due to fire and hurricane resistance.

 

[framer]

Being a framer i would have to recommend stick built.Several reasons cost its
cheaper than other two methods.Safe rooms can be on main floor or basements.Like you mentioned contractors are more experience in stick
built. Framer

 

[woodlandfarms]

Try and get a bank to give you a loan on anything but stick built right now is going to be a major challenge. Heck, just trying to get a loan to build a house but that is another story.

We have been mulling a modular home, steel built with lots of glass, and banks are not talking to us at all. Too crazy, not conventional enough in this market... no resale (Again, I am not talking manufactured, I am talking pre-fab modern).

 

[Mike Costello]

Another possibility: Log home. I built one in 2004 that had 8" thick exterior walls anchored into the foundation with 5/8" all thread each torqued to 200 ft. lbs. The walls carry an R41 value and the outside noise is reduced to almost nothing. Very energy efficient.
Went through a couple of earthquakes--the home didn't make a sound!

 

[patrick_g]

Don't confuse Florida's hurricane codes with tornado protection. Hurricane winds are not even close to tornadic speeds. For example: you can buy storm shutters for your windows for hurricane protection but they are a bad joke for tornado protection.

Stick built homes will be destroyed if hit by an energetic tornado.

If cost of ICF construction is too prohibitive, even after you factor in the energy savings, then consider building your master suite in ICF, I did. ICF construction is not rocket science and is not beyond the scope of DIY.

Read up on the "stud cannon" used at the university in Texas. It fires a stud end wise into test walls of various construction ranging from traditioinal stick (2x4 and 2x6) to those but with brick veneer, ICF (with and without styrofoam insulation), and others as well and you will quickly see what is needed to safely survive tornado tossed debris.

Traditional stick construction (2x4 or 2x6) with OSB sheeting and vinyl siding with sheetrock interior is penetrated like a hot knife through butter. As little as 3 inches of steel reinforced concrete stoped the flying studs cold with no compression cracks or spalling of the concrete.

There are waffle grid as well as post and beam pattern ICF's which are quite economical in concrete use. I was personally concerned that debris hitting a "thin spot" would penetrate the envelope. After I spent the $ to go for 8 inch solid walls I read a year or so later of more recent tests on the waffle and post and beam pattern ICF's which would have saved me significantly in concrete costs.

For really complete tornado protection you need sufficient barrier all the way around with no exceptions. This is easy in a closet, just line it with sheet metal and install a good FEMA shelter type HD steel door and frame with 3 deadbolts. It is more difficult in a larger room like a master bath or bedroom, especially windows.

Windows will NOT BE tornado safe with Florida Hurricane approved shutters! I chose to go with DIY interior steel shutters with decorative cloth covers. Covers may be attached with magnets/velcro and can be changed to coordinate with bedspreads or whatever.

The statistics put forth by the severe weather folks at NOAA for the center of tornado alley is that on average a residential structure will receive significant tornadic damage on the order of once per 4,000 years. Significant damage is way more than a broken window but less that a slicked building site. Think danger to life and limb. Once in 4,000 years? Why all the fuss???????

Because this (or next year or the year after) might be your year!!!!!!!!!!

With our master suite as a safe room we just go to bed and ignore the weather alerts for tornadoes and such. IT gives great peace of mind. A secondary use for the shutters is to really darken the room for sleeping if long days interfere.

My house building experience is partially documented on the sister site, countrybynet.com, in the Home Building topic of Country Projects. Its title is South Central Oklahoma Farmhouse. That post got nearly 140,000 views.

Pat

 

[carpenter383]

What ever you decide make sure you build a garage the same way so your tractor can sleep safely!!!

 

[DANOCHEESE]

I have a 4 year old ICF two story. Love it. No issues. Have not seen any issues with the eleven other built in the areas. I'm going to build a small heated work shop 20X40 out of ICF. makes more sense than trying to wall off a portion of the machine shop and insulating everything. Now if concrete would jsut drop in price.

 

[rdbrumfield]

For me, the only tornado shelter is below ground. When I see whole houses disappear I think it is the only practicle thing to do. I have often wondered why, when building a house in tornado alley they don't have a septic tank or something like it brought in so a person could put some water and stores in for emergency use. Having it vented for fresh air and lockable from the outside and inside so no varmits can get in. Would seem to me it would be a safe haven for a short time. Having it buried with a ladder to climb in just makes sense to me.

 

[flusher]

My in-laws have purchased some land in central kansas and are wanting to move into the country. The question is: do they go with a stick built home (regular wood frame 2 x lumber), Morton type metal building and finish the inside like a home, or styrofoam forms filled with concrete.

Stick built: almost any contractor is comfortable with this type of construction, fairly affordable, could be built with 2x6 with spray in insulation.

Metal Building: the metal building itself is fairly reasonable in price, but then cost add up quickly when finishing the inside. Not all contractors will be as comfortable with this. Don't have to worry about exterior maintenance.

Styrofoam forms: Again, not all builders in our area are familiar with this building process. Would be extremely quiet and the entire house would be like a safe room; remember we are in tornado alley. Just in the last couple of years we have lost Greensburg Kansas and Chapman Kansas to mother nature.

I am open to pretty much any input you may have so that we can make the most educated decision possible.

thanks

Choose A--stick build the house and spend $5-10K on a good underground hidy-hole when the tornado sirens blow. My son's place in the Oklahoma Panhandle has a nice below ground concrete safey room in the backyard that cost about $6K.
My only experience with a tornado occurred in Jan67 when I was living in St. Louis. One touched down about 2 blocks from our place. Tore up the neighborhood pretty good. Our house was untouched.

 

[Redneck in training]

My in-laws have purchased some land in central kansas and are wanting to move into the country. The question is: do they go with a stick built home (regular wood frame 2 x lumber), Morton type metal building and finish the inside like a home, or styrofoam forms filled with concrete.

Stick built: almost any contractor is comfortable with this type of construction, fairly affordable, could be built with 2x6 with spray in insulation.

Metal Building: the metal building itself is fairly reasonable in price, but then cost add up quickly when finishing the inside. Not all contractors will be as comfortable with this. Don't have to worry about exterior maintenance.

Styrofoam forms: Again, not all builders in our area are familiar with this building process. Would be extremely quiet and the entire house would be like a safe room; remember we are in tornado alley. Just in the last couple of years we have lost Greensburg Kansas and Chapman Kansas to mother nature.

I am open to pretty much any input you may have so that we can make the most educated decision possible.

thanks

We live in Morton building. The biggest problem was to get a mortgage (in 2004) for a barn. After long search we got money from a small local bank for about half of the cost of the property and ended up spending all our cash from sale of our previous home and our savings. We build the 2400 sqft house for about $80 to $90 /sqft including 0.7 ac pond, $7000 lawn mower, 1800 sqft attached garage and 1200 ft driveway. All heated by geothermal floor heating. We installed all the plumbing, insulation, electric installation, air conditioning, ceramic tile and wood floors by ourselves. To put it in perspective average cost of a home in our area in 2004 was between $110 on low end to $160/ sqft for average family home.
Later on we learned from another owner of Morton home about "creative" classification of the building to satisfy the bank to get money.

We don't have a tornado shelter yet but we are planning to build an underground cellar near the house.

If I would do it again I would do concrete filled forms building.

 

[2manyrocks]

There's a certain risk factor of getting the blame in advising the inlaws on what to build if things go wrong or they get a bad contractor. There is also a risk factor if they don't know what they are doing and you don't help guide them if you have the expertise. I don't know what your situation is, but it would be good to be careful since you want to maintain a good relationship and house building can be a stressful situation.

It is possible to design a well thought out building, and then have a contractor who either doesn't know to or won't build it to plan.

 

[PA hayseed]

Styrofoam forms: Again, not all builders in our area are familiar with this building process. Would be extremely quiet and the entire house would be like a safe room; remember we are in tornado alley. Just in the last couple of years we have lost Greensburg Kansas and Chapman Kansas to mother nature.

From my personal experience derived in the central part of PA, if your builders don't know about it, then don't do it. You never want to be the house that they learn on. Take it from me, I know the hard way.

Good luck to you.

 

[scgargoyle]

If you can find an experienced contractor, ICF is by far the best way to go, esp. if you're worried about potential wind damage.

 

[patrick_g]

Be advised that most folks advocating an underground hidy-hole (storm shelter) haven't had one or used it if they did. The typical cast concrete box in the ground is damp, grows mold and is often partly filled with water since most concrete will leach water a bit or a lot depending on cracks (most concrete cracks) and typically occupied by creepy crawlies like spiders to eat the little bugs and scorpions to eat some of the spiders. Snakes are not infrequent visitors.

They can be made water tight (plastic septic tank) but a plastic septic tank underground will float up out of the ground during a wet period. Plastic septic tanks ARE NOT intended to withstand the forces of being buried AND empty. They are to be filled with water to offset the dirt forces. If you had one strong enough to take the dirt then it has to be tall enough to let you pour a thick concrete floor to weight it sufficiently to keep it from floating out of the ground shouild the soil get saturated.

I have built some above ground shelters that will survive a F-5 (max on the tornado scale) Steel reinforced concrete with HD steel doors with at least 3 HD deadbolts. My current house (documented on the sister site, countrybynet.com -- Oklahoma farm house in home building category) has ICF master suite with 8 inch thick steel reinforced concrete walls on concrete slab floor and has poured concrete ceiling. Interior steel shutters with decorative covers on the windows and super HD steel doors with tripple deadbolts complete the safe room requirement.

I have a simple DIY friendly design for an above ground safe room if anyone is interested. you don't need to be a mason to do a good job, just moderately handy with standard hand tools like a hammer and saws and have the ability to pick up an 8x12x16 inch knockout block (bond beam block), use a level and similar such primitive skills.

Pat

 

[Jeepnford]

How about a stick built with a reinforced concrete room in the basement if planning on that or on the main floor?

 

[Beavis]

Be advised that most folks advocating an underground hidy-hole (storm shelter) haven't had one or used it if they did. The typical cast concrete box in the ground is damp, grows mold and is often partly filled with water since most concrete will leach water a bit or a lot depending on cracks (most concrete cracks) and typically occupied by creepy crawlies like spiders to eat the little bugs and scorpions to eat some of the spiders. Snakes are not infrequent visitors.

They can be made water tight (plastic septic tank) but a plastic septic tank underground will float up out of the ground during a wet period. Plastic septic tanks ARE NOT intended to withstand the forces of being buried AND empty. They are to be filled with water to offset the dirt forces. If you had one strong enough to take the dirt then it has to be tall enough to let you pour a thick concrete floor to weight it sufficiently to keep it from floating out of the ground shouild the soil get saturated.

I have built some above ground shelters that will survive a F-5 (max on the tornado scale) Steel reinforced concrete with HD steel doors with at least 3 HD deadbolts. My current house (documented on the sister site, countrybynet.com -- Oklahoma farm house in home building category) has ICF master suite with 8 inch thick steel reinforced concrete walls on concrete slab floor and has poured concrete ceiling. Interior steel shutters with decorative covers on the windows and super HD steel doors with tripple deadbolts complete the safe room requirement.

I have a simple DIY friendly design for an above ground safe room if anyone is interested. you don't need to be a mason to do a good job, just moderately handy with standard hand tools like a hammer and saws and have the ability to pick up an 8x12x16 inch knockout block (bond beam block), use a level and similar such primitive skills.

Pat

I'd be interested in your DIY design. I currently have Morton building of my own that I'd like to build some type of "safe room" in.

THANKS

 

[JackMentink]

I would reccomend a stick built home on a walk out basement. If you have a lot that has a little slope, you just build it so the front of the home has a full basement and dig out the back of the house so the basement is frame walls on the back.

This way you get the full concrete basement rooms with no windows in the front side of the basement and you get regular frame construction in the back of the basement.

I built a 4400 square foot home that has 2700 sq. ft finished up stairs and 1700 square foot finished in the lower level. Lower level has all 9' foot ceilings, upper has 9 foot and some 12. Built the entire house for less than $90 a finished square foot which doesn't include the 1000 square foot garage

I used 2x6 construction with blown in cellulose R-22 walls, r-48 ceiling. We heat and cool the entire 4400 square feet and have never had the heating or cooling portion of our electric bill exceed $45 in any month.

We did install a ground source heat pump which really helps. Our house is brick and stone veneer on two sides and vinyl siding on the back two. It is a very attractive house which includes a 3 car garage.

It has a built in tornado shelter (back of basement) which is very nice for Mid Missouri which is in tornado alley. As far a the house withstanding a tornado, that really is not a reality without spending a lot of money. That's why I have insurance. We can be safe and the house is covered.

Having done much research, I have come to the conclusion that conventional stick built careful construction with a carefully designed and installed Geothermal heat pump is the most cost effective house you can build at the present time in regards to both first cost as well as on-going operating cost.