This question certainly isn’t about fine homebuilding, and I hope no one minds the odd questions. That said…
A friend has some land on the Rio Grande that his family uses for hunting and fishing. The site floods every few years, but there isn’t much current over the property. They had a camp house, built as an unfinished shell, which survived the floods but was burned down last year. It’s likely that someone broke in on their way North and started a fire which got out of hand.
They’re planning to rebuild over the winter and their first choice was to pour concrete walls, but some of the family would rather have at least some insulation in the building. Can anyone suggest an inexpensive, durable way to insulate this place?
Also, how could they frame the roof to minimize the risk of fire damage in the future without having the place turn into a mess with the next flood? My suggestion was to cathedral frame the roof, use styrofoam to insulate and finish the ceiling with Hardipanel (the roof was and will be metal panels on stringers.) Can anyone suggest a better way?
Thanks
Replies
Yup.
I built a concrete and steel house for us. It used annual heat storage for heating and cooling. Insulated dirt provides the necessary mass. There's nothing to burn and the coldest it ever gets is 65º. We're elevated, no flood danger, but other than that we fit your needs. Oh, and it was inexpensive to build. As was the next one for a client.
Take a look: http://paccs.fugadeideas.org/tom/index.shtml Remember, concrete's a fluid. It can look like anything you want. The above is what I wanted.
PAHS Designer/Builder- Bury it!
Metal framing right round would be my thought, walls & ceilings. Bar joists for the rafters, too. Set up on stilts or pilings of some sort to define a "maximum" (or minimum, from a different perspective) flood plane elevation.
Now, and unattended structure that is good shelter in the RG valley will have an "erosive" current against it of sorts. I'm of two minds whether you're better off "going with the flow" or bulking up to "resist" it.
One way gives a vacation spot with all the comfort and elegance of a modern park structure. The other gives you something right up there with telephone switch control centers. May bear more thinking upon.
Thanks, guys, I'll forward what you said.
They're fairly confident that erosion and soild movement will not be problems; there isn't much current and the existing slab is surrounded by a walkway so udercutting probably won't happen.
The PAHS design kinda appeals to me. Is the earth that much better of an insulator than concrete? I live in a block on slab house, and while the insulation is terrible, the extra mass causes a sort of flywheel effect, where the house doesn't really heat up until around noon, but the AC may run nonstop until midnight after a hot day.
the extra mass causes a sort of flywheel effect
Exactly. Now envision that with more mass on an annual basis. Our place normally changes 13º maximum yearly (65º-78º) with us doing nothing. Not insulation, insulated mass. Hait got a 7º annual swing. Here's a book excerpt: http://www.axwoodfarm.com/PAHS/UmbrellaHouse.html
the house doesn't really heat up until around noon, but the AC may run nonstop until midnight after a hot day.
A classic example of poorly planned mass. If you don't insulate the mass from outside temps, you can easily get either too much or too little heating. Then the time lag for comfort may be considerable. We use a truckload of insulation, buried in the dirt, with sheet plastic for watershedding.
As to your flooding situation, I certainly wouldn't dig to go underground. Creating a hill over your above grade concrete structure would make much more sense. If flooding erosion truly isn't a problem, should work just fine.PAHS Designer/Builder- Bury it!
My guess is that the only thing that can meet your requirements is an earth-sheltered steel/concrete structure. Of course, that leaves the problem of how to get the water OUT when it floods.
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