Building a new house and shop (1 Viewer)

[1911]

Bought a bigger piece of land; going to build our last house ever and hopefully die there (eventually).

Until we bought the land and built a road, it was only accessible by 4WD. The trees are so thick, it took a while and lot of brush cutting just to see what we really had. The land was part of a family's large homestead from 1853. We bought it from one of the direct descendants, but most of the original homestead acreage has not been ranched, worked, or managed in at least two generations, so it is pretty overgrown with trees and wild. It has two creeks; one of them has several waterfalls:





The most open part part of the land is up here:



Cutting brush (juniper/red cedar trees) I eventually found a great home and shop site in a valley created by one of the creeks:



We're going to build an earth-sheltered home in the side of the hill behind my Cruiser.

More to follow as progress allows.

 

[firestopper]

Congratulations! Thats a beautiful place to call home.

 

[micruz60]

Do a Feng Shui approach to the project.

 

[1911]

Got the water well drilled on Wednesday:



Gauged at 75 gallons per minute! The state water board will only allow 20 gal/min. so the pump is sized to make 18-20. Ten is plenty to run a house on, and we will have a 10,000 gallon cistern cast into the back wall of the house so it really won't matter at all.

 

[1911]

Congratulations! Thats a beautiful place to call home.

Thanks!

Do a Feng Shui approach to the project.

Not a bad idea. Might be hard to find a Feng Shui practitioner in rural north Texas though. At least this will be the first time in our lives that we can build the house we want, the way we want it. For one thing, it's not going to have a yard, as in lawn grass to mow - I hate mowing a lawn and I'm not going to do it anymore.

 

[micruz60]

You can diy fengshui...
Try mini-hydro to generate power either from the well or the creek, over insulate (earthshelter is easy). A ground source heat pump, with hydronic tubes in floor, toasty when climate is cold, can also be a cooler in hot months, but your climate is probably tolerable most months.
Passive solar, even solar water heat...
Have fun!

 

[dad4x4]

what a beautiful place!

 

[Rugy]

Living the dream and hope you get what you want.
We are building a place off grid on an Island that is only accessible by private boat or water taxi.
Heat from the sun via hot water solar panels, wood gasification fireplace with a water jacket, and power from the sun and micro hydro.
Ground source heat pump requires lots of electricity, if your tied into the grid fine but electricity doesn't come cheap.
Insulate like crazy and get the best windows so it won't take much to heat your home.
I'm sure you know all this and wish you success with your project.

 

[1911]

what a beautiful place!

Thanks!

You can diy fengshui...
Try mini-hydro to generate power either from the well or the creek, over insulate (earthshelter is easy). A ground source heat pump, with hydronic tubes in floor, toasty when climate is cold, can also be a cooler in hot months, but your climate is probably tolerable most months.
Passive solar, even solar water heat...
Have fun!

Living the dream and hope you get what you want.
We are building a place off grid on an Island that is only accessible by private boat or water taxi.
Heat from the sun via hot water solar panels, wood gasification fireplace with a water jacket, and power from the sun and micro hydro.
Ground source heat pump requires lots of electricity, if your tied into the grid fine but electricity doesn't come cheap.
Insulate like crazy and get the best windows so it won't take much to heat your home.
I'm sure you know all this and wish you success with your project.

@Rugy , you should do a build thread too! That would be the ultimate in privacy, which is one of the big reasons we are building ours (on 92 acres, which surrounded on 2-1/2 sides by large 1,000's of acres family ranches).

We are open to all ideas for our place; the only things for sure (so far) are earth sheltering, passive solar, solar cells, and in-floor radiant heating. We will have grid electricity available (I had to pay to run the poles and wire in this far) but I don't anticipate using a geothermal heat pump - it will be so well insulated (and the climate is mild here) that it wouldn't be cost effective. Our insulation is going to be 9+ feet of soil behind and on top of the house. With all the thermal mass we will have (concrete, soil, and the big water cistern I mentioned above) the year-round temperature in the house should stay very close to 70 degrees, all by itself. Very little heating or cooling will be needed to keep it comfortable. There will be a lot of windows (mostly facing east). I haven't investigated the kinds of insulating and strong glass available yet. We will have a pellet stove or similar (that does not use air from the room) in our family room.

Latest update - the only permits we have to get for the entire project are for the water well and the septic system. Got to love Texas; no zoning, no building permits (in most rural counties), far less over-reaching government than almost anywhere else I can think of (except maybe Alaska). Anyway, the water well permit was a rubber-stamp deal I did myself at no cost, approved in less than two days. The septic system permit was a little more involved; you must have a licensed inspector, approved by the county, to dig a couple of 4-5' deep holes and say that the soil is permeable enough for a conventional leach field. If it's not permeable enough, then you have to go with an aerobic system, which is a much bigger PITA to use and maintain. A properly-designed, built, and used conventional leach-field septic system is maintenance-free. The one we have where we live now has not been touched in 13 years.

So, the inspector came out yesterday to dig his holes. We were a little worried, because there is a fair amount of clay and limestone in the soil, but out where we wanted the drain field, it was fine and he approved it right away. It just has to be 100' away from the water well and 75' away from the creek. Neither is any problem.

 

[Jdc1]

Beautiful property, congratulations. I'm not familiar with your temps but have you thought about replacing the pellet stove backup heat with a wood stove that doesn't require electricity to operate? Of course a generator would make that issue moot.

 

[Rugy]

1911

The gasification fireplace that we will be using requires a 6" air intake from out side. Using heated air to go up the chimney makes no sense.
Our house is sort of passive but on steroids.

Before I pulled the trigger on the the Waltherm gasification fireplace I visited a fellow up at 108 mile house which is a 8 hour drive north from here. Watching You Tube video vs seeing it in real life is so much better.
He has been using his Waltherm at his cedar log cabin for many years and demoed it for us. He is off grid as well.
The firebox measures 14"x14"x18" . When loaded with dry seasoned logs burns for 5 hours. He only needs to light it up once every two days in the winter and uses 2 large storage tanks. This is where the hot water gets stored before it's used for domestic hot water and heating.
The trick is having large and well insulated water storage tanks, we are using 2x 1000 Liter tanks as was he.
Hydronic in floor heated 6" concrete slabs and suspended slabs that are insulated with R24 and R12 on exterior walls.
Poured interior walls in concrete that will be exposed/feature.
These walls are heated as well as the mass for each wall ranges from 18000 lbs to 12000 lbs.
The target hot water temp of the heating system is 80F.
Triple glazed glass with 1/2 spacer bars, tempered and lami-glass for safety as we have lots of floor to ceiling glass.
Insulate, insulate and Insulate, no air leakage and you will be able to heat your house with 2 light bulbs and a fart.

Our back up system for electricity will use a diesel generator that is water cooled. With an integrated heat exchanger we can use the hot water to heat our hot water tanks. Will need the generator for our septic pump as our field is up hill from us.......

Wish you well with your project , should you have questions PM me.

 

[1911]

Thanks Rugy, that is great information. Will check out the Waltherm stove, but our winters are mild, it might be overkill. Heated walls sounds interesting; all of our outside walls and some interior will be concrete. Have not yet started to research windows, but that will be important to us also as we will have many tall ones.

 

[1911]

Beautiful property, congratulations. I'm not familiar with your temps but have you thought about replacing the pellet stove backup heat with a wood stove that doesn't require electricity to operate? Of course a generator would make that issue moot.

Thanks. The stove has not been decided on yet. The only thing I know is, we want is one that uses outside air, not room air to burn. All else is still open to ideas.

 

[Delancy]

The only thing I know is, we want is one that uses outside air, not room air to burn.

What?

Doncha' know, that thar ain't uh folk house in Tejas without and open fire pit!

Edited, although debatably semi-relevant.

I know you have to get to Tulsa, at some points in time. Should you have a spare moment to check out the local stoners, see the 'rock house' on Charles Page just east of Gilcrease Museum Road.

 

[Hornd]

Gasification Boiler is the way to go, then do Pex in floors. Initially expensive but cost to run cheap.
Insulate concrete with blue board.
I would do 2x6 walls and put Mylar faced on exterior. Structural insulated panels are nice as well.

This guys has some great ideas:
Build My Own Cabin
I followed his advice when I poured our counter tops.

I'm sure you already get Fine Homebuilding Magazine?
You doing Plumbing and wiring yourself?
You could not pay me enough to touch drywall.

 

[1911]

I know you have to get to Tulsa, at some points in time. Should you have a spare moment to check out the local stoners, see the 'rock house' on Charles Page just east of Gilcrease Museum Road.

Not your typical Okies from Muskogee I take it! Sounds like fun. Once upon a time, I worked for a Tulsa-based company and was there a lot, but that was 30 years ago. Always liked it though.

 

[1911]

Gasification Boiler is the way to go, then do Pex in floors. Initially expensive but cost to run cheap.
Insulate concrete with blue board.
I would do 2x6 walls and put Mylar faced on exterior. Structural insulated panels are nice as well.

This guys has some great ideas:
Build My Own Cabin
I followed his advice when I poured our counter tops.

I'm sure you already get Fine Homebuilding Magazine?
You doing Plumbing and wiring yourself?
You could not pay me enough to touch drywall.

Thanks for the info and suggestions.

I'll do as much of the plumbing and wiring as I can, but I will pay a plumber and electrician to do some things, because this will be a nice place and I don't want to screw it up! I'm right there with you on the drywall.

 

[davegonz]

That looks great! Nice location.

 

[1911]

Pad for the shop building is cleared of trees, leveled and finished:

 

[1911]

Work has been slow for a week because of heavy rain here. Got the forms set for the concrete slab foundation for the shop building; hope to start roughing in plumbing today.

Was out there last evening near sunset, and came across some visitors (sorry for the max magnification on the camera phone):