Thursday, May 31, 2012

Testing

The big news today is that we had the blow test performed. To give a sense of what the numbers mean, MOST American houses leak 3 to 5 THOUSAND CUBIC FEET A MINUTE. This means that every minute an average American is paying to heat about 4,000 cubic feet per minute. The standard for Energy Star is 669 for a house our size (~2000 ft2) The standard for a very good result is 446 for a house our size. The toughest standard, from Germany called Passiv House, is 268 CFM. Our test involved putting a temporary door in the opening and exhausting the air in the building and attempting to suck the air INTO the building. The tester used a thermographic camera to identify where the air was leaking into the building. Our result, first try, was 328! We identified where we can tighten the building performance by caulking and yet even more red tape. We are convinced we can hit the Passiv House standard on the next test in a few weeks. We did not know if our work and attention to detail would work but it appears that it has. Passive solar and air sourced geothermal only work when the building is tight, tight, tight. I would recommend getting this test done for everyone. The cost is about $250 and is hugely informative. Matt

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Convergences

Good evening! First of all, many thanks to those who have continued to express an interest in our rather large undertaking - building an energy efficient retirement house on the lake. The final stages of the project are imminent. Plumbing is roughed in and approved (today), HRV (heat recovery ventilation)system is about half installed, partitions all up and staged for the drywall contractor, garage is DONE with drywall, paint, all doors of all sorts, windows trimmed, metal roof layout done and ordered, and rough in electrical started. Plan is to release the building to the drywallers by June 15th - an aggressive target. We are doing the blow test tomorrow testing the entire house for leaks by applying pressure to the interior and scanning with thermographic instruments. All these disciplines are "converging" onto the site. At one point we had 6 distinct disciplines on the site in addition to us the owners and the building inspector. Part of my role is to help them all play well in the same sand box we will call our home. On other related fronts, we now have the aforementioned garage to store our 'stuff' in so that process starts on Saturday. My brother and son are coming to assist. This initial move is all boxes and we are leaving the HEAVY stuff like the piano to the movers who arrive on Wednesday June 6th. June 6th will be the first night at our friends the Reed Ericksons. We clean the 7th, turn the house over on the 8th. And then our presence at 163 Estes Road will be history in the past...not the present. We closed on the sale last Friday. All for now... Matt

Thursday, May 24, 2012

A few momentus days

Wow...The pace has quickened but the road has also lengthened. The now infamous windows are now installed and no one died in the process and no windows were broken. To get a scope of the work here one must realize that these windows had to be installed at an elevation of about 12 feet, weighed in excess of 500 pounds, were unwieldy in the extreme (12feet x 9 feet), fragile and hugely expensive and also critical to the project since they are also energy generators. The long and short of it is that the whole BIG process - the installation of the major front 5 windows took about 3.5 hours and used the efforts of 9 men and 1 woman. Risk was ever present and all hands were watching for it. In one situation, the window that included two french doors and 2 casement windows as one unit, the margin of tolerance to slide the window into the building to then slide it onto the scaffolding was less than 1 inch....in a 12 foot span. Moreover, once slid onto the scaffolding with the efforts of said 9 men, the tolerance into the opening was 1/4 inch in the 12 foot span. That meant that the window basically had to be slid into the openning horizontally - no easy task when one is on scaffolding 12 feet above the ground with a window weighing over 500 pounds. At any rate, the take away is that contractors NOT associated with the specific work being assigned (Jason Parker, Randy Maddock from Brocks), friends (Alan Reed Erickson and Dan Cassidy), and the extrodinary efforts of Ryan Bilodeau (lead contractor / carpenter extrodinaire) and his CAPABLE assistants were instrumental in making all this happen without injury or other bad outcome. In addition, the site had gas contractors, gas stove installers, plumbers, the building inspector and of course, the owners (Karen and me) all in the same general space working intently. One of the interesting aspects that I personally have enjoyed is the HUGE amount of detail in combination with the comraderie of various contractors, sales personnel from local vendors, the Loewen vendor, architects, and regulatory agencies. Everyone seems turned on by this interesting project and is sharing information with me that I dearly need and use. The vast majority of this information is free and is often coached in the "if this were my house, I would".... While some is not what we want or can afford, MOST is "oh, yeah, good point". AND all this in the context of closing on our own house tomorrow morning, managing the costs, enjoying life, packing to move and building a consultancy and working as a nurse (Karen) and a consultant (that would be me). I also found out today that the drywall will take a lot longer than I expected and hence the road has lengthened somewhat. In addition the drywaller will be on vacation the first week of July so if he is not done by then, it will automatically mean a week delay. Here are some pictures, more come tomorrow. Matt
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Tuesday, May 22, 2012

A big day tomorrow

Tomorrow promises to be a big day. We hope, with assistance from friends (Alan and Dan), contractors and others associated (willingly or unwillingly) with the project to hand the three big windows on the front of the house. In addition to this major event, we have the fireplace contractors, insulators for the garage, the plumbers, and finally the HRV system (heat recovery ventilation) installation starts. The heat system, air sourced geothermal, installation started with each week. We did a design upgrade in the front LVL beam to stiffen it significantly. This is where reality meets design. Interesting process to pick this piece of .25 inch x 3.5 inch steel plate from Novel Steel company in Greenland. It was a lot like the industries I used to intervene with when I was with Tyco and a step back into the 18th century. The front entry portico has been roughed in, the breezeway with bead board fir and fir beams is complete and orders placed for the siding. Pictures tomorrow!

Sunday, May 20, 2012

Progress but less...

The interior partitions are essentially done. The BIG wait is on for the roof of the garage. The roofers came yesterday to do it and it was STILL too wet to do the job. They are going to try again Monday before the rain comes in again on Monday afternoon for 3 days. Given that we are now HERE until June 8th, it is a bit less stressful but the schedule needs to be followed or other contractors will be held up doing their work. As it is, deliveries are being delayed as the 'storage' in the garage is not ready. Reviewed the electrical plan for the garage, did a lot of site work to allow the Genie lift to get around, stabilized the dock on the water and cleaned up the site. Some trim was done on the front of the house AND two of the windows went into place. The rest of the windows and the doors, yet to arrive on site, might well be in by the end of the week! IF all that happens, we might be ready for the 'blow test' where the house is pressurized to see if there are air leaks. That will be a big result as there is about 75 rolls of bright red sealing tape in the house on all the seams, junctions, wall and roof penetrations and floor openings. The new owners of our current house have started to store stuff in our garage (their garage) and to fill the wood shed. They are evidently burning dry pine...this is not a good sign. Matt

Friday, May 11, 2012

Windows and Floors!

We now have solid floors as the concrete hardens. The bottom floor - walk out basement was poured yesterday with the first pour at 6:30 AM. A real challenge for the guy who did the work as the specifications from the Architect called for 4 inches of polystyrene to insulate the floor from the cold earth. What was perhaps not fully appreciated was that polystyrene floats and concrete at the liquid stage is mostly water. The concrete guy had a real challenge to keep the polystyrene where it belonged as he swept his machines over the surface. In the end, he did great but at times it was a tad frustrating. We will have to trim some of the borders a bit tomorrow with a sawz all. The windows arrived today from Ottawa. A 70 foot trailer delivered them and it became quickly evident that he could not back down the driveway...he immediately got one set of wheels stuck. No harm done, we used the Lull (a cross between a forktruck and a crane) to transport them down our driveway about 600 feet. The challenge was really in handling these VERY heavy and expensive windows. I am hugely fortunate to have 4 friends to help out with their labor and their ideas on moving these to the actual site and into the building. At one point with the largest and heaviest window, we had Randy from Brocks, the three carpenters then on site, the Loewen window rep, Alan, Adam, Bob Brisboe and myself all lifting on this window and the best we could do was lift / slide it the 40 feet to its storage place. That is 9 guys lifting....and now somehow we have to lift this thing 20 feet into the air to the spot it will ultimately reside. Picked up an error I made for the garage doors...by overhearing Ryan mention the doors were not trimmed in yet...and I thought they were. I had given those measurements to the door vendor 2 days ago. Turns out we are losing 7 inches on the height. Called him straightaway and hope he can make the alterations before we buy doors that do not fit. Entirely my error. And today is my 38th wedding annivesary. Matt

Thursday, May 10, 2012

Framing is now very nearly complete. Inside walls up and the unique ceiling conceived and designed by Jesse Thompson of Kaplan Thompson Architects of Portland Maine is up and giving a very unique sense of space. As you know, the house faces the sun and a huge expanse of lake. The ceiling forces the views outward into the near by forest and the lake just beyond. It works really well in this smallish space. The bottom floor "floor" was poured today. The young owner of Creative Concrete was there at 3:30 this morning to prep the site and finish the details before the first cement truck rolled in at 6:30 AM. I was there at 5:45 and he beat me by nearly 2 hours. We got word that closing on our Rochester house will definitely happen May 25th. Wow...14 days away. Not sure how it is all going to play out in spite of the planning we have done. Some things are unknowable. See the pictures below for a sense of where we are at! Matt
Basement insulation. We have used a LOT of incredibly sticky red tape on this project. ALL seams, plastic, piping through walls, plywood sheets that touch, corners of building and countless other 'touch' points all need sealing with this red tape.
Fir rafters on the breezeway. These will have bead board ceiling installed. Another concept from Kaplan Thompson (Jesse) who envisioned coming into the landing area of the driveway and immediately seeing through to the lake. My addition was enlarging this space and exposed fir beams.

Saturday, May 5, 2012

Rainy but productive week.

The work continues in spite of the rain. The rain has delayed the pouring of the floors and installation of the roof however. The PLAN for this next week is: pour garage floor (critical to the move out date from Rochester) and pour the basement floor, pad for the gas tanks and the sonotubes for the deck supports. In addition, the breezeway materials are on site waiting for a sunny day which should happen Monday / Tuesday. Then WEDNESDAY we are scheduled to have the windows arrive on site. Several friends are graciously assisting us. Most of the windows will be far too heavy to lift from the truck so we will use the Lull we still have here. One of the windows is a combination window / door arrangement that is 12 x 14 feet so having extra hands to slide that one will be helpful. Inside partitions essentially done. Insulation guy, heating guy, roofing guy and building inspector were all on site this week. It appears that we will be able to use our garage as a SHORT term storage as it is detached and we guarentee that it will meet all local codes. I took a few more photos this week. Some may be hard to interpret so if you want a tour, let me know. We actually have a real work product to show for going onto 2 years of planning.
View from the master bedroom window looking at the lake.
If you look closely you can see the water trails of 2 loons swimming by.
Karens nook on the left back of photo and kitchen framing for wall oven and pantry. This all faces north away from the lake.
This is the eastern edge of what will be the curvilinear shaped ceiling. You can see Ryans template tacked into place. In the background is the entry closet and the laundry room and linen closet. At the far end is the entrance to what will be this next week, the screened in breezeway leading to the garage.