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Good luck! Whereabouts are you located?
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Mar 6, 2016 22:08
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Personally if I were going to have a secret passage, it'd be an additional way to get from one room to another, rather than the sole entrance/exit. My only reason for this is that in the event of a fire or something, I wouldn't want the house to be difficult to navigate. I guess if you're more worried about having armed burglars invade than about your house catching on fire then you'd go the other way.
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Mar 7, 2016 01:42
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Keep in mind that you're going to end up excavating a fair amount of dirt for your foundations. Might as well put it to use regrading your driveway.
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Mar 7, 2016 17:10
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This is good, IMO. I've always been curious about this process, and while I'll want to see photos of the site as the house gets built, it's important to cover the bits that aren't so photogenic as well.
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Mar 11, 2016 16:26
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Why would the planning board deny the plot? Just for aesthetic reasons? Or are there legitimate issues you need to sort out with your plot?
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Mar 18, 2016 15:18
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For reference, property values in the San Francisco Bay Area have literally doubled over the past ~8 years, and you better believe that's not because the houses on them are worth twice as much. In fact if you get homeowner's insurance, it's typically just for the value of the improvements on the land, not the land itself -- because what kind of disaster is going to destroy your land?
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Mar 25, 2016 15:56
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OSU_Matthew posted:and run plenty of multimedia/cat5e lines (wireless sucks for reliability/speed and the spectrum is always getting more crowded). Instead of running specific cables (or in addition to, rather), install conduit so you don't have to rip the walls open to replace your cables with whatever the new hotness is.
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Apr 1, 2016 20:42
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Oh yeah, I would stay the gently caress away from any "smart home" or "Internet of Things" devices. Everything I've read about them indicates the developers give precisely zero shits about security, and you're just leaving yourself open to abuse / loss of privacy by installing them. You may think "okay, but how important is that really?", but if an attacker can just figure out when you're not in the house, then they can burglarize you. There may be a time when it makes sense to install smart appliances/lights/etc., but that time is not yet here. The risk profile vastly exceeds the benefits.
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Apr 1, 2016 22:00
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xwing posted:To me at least it doesn't seem like financially it makes sense over insuring your home well. I guess people who bring it up are more about the not dying part though... Yeah, it's not so much about saving the house as it is about giving you a few extra minutes to get out, and in some cases allowing the fire department to actually go into the house to perform search and rescue. I'm pretty sure I've seen Motronic say that if your house has engineered trusses supporting the roof, the firefighters often aren't allowed to go into the house because it's too easy for the roof to collapse. This kind of thing is all about deciding where you stand on the spectrum of risk vs. investment. At one extreme, you live in a nonflammable structure with a commercial-grade sprinkler system installed just in case...on the other side, your house is made out of matchsticks, insulated with sawdust, and located in Southern California. Thing is, right now is the best time to be deciding where you stand on that spectrum; you don't want to later decide you want a sprinkler system, only after the plumbing and water storage has been figured out (let alone after the walls have gone up).
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Apr 11, 2016 16:37
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Gounads posted:Plans call for studs 16" why would you want wider? better insulation? which brings us to... what insulation values should I be looking for? Can't speak to the R values you'd want from your insulation, but wider spacing of studs does indeed confer better insulation. Every stud acts as a "heat bridge" because they're made out of solid wood, which conducts heat much better than insulation does. Wider spacing also means lighter walls and less material used, which is good for the environment, cheaper, etc.
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May 12, 2016 21:38
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slap me silly posted:Jesus. You know, I used to think it would be fun to organize the building of my own house. Getting less and less sure about this You just need to find a cheap, flat lot with good packed dirt, no protected habitats to worry about, and good access to services. How hard can it be?
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Jun 3, 2016 03:57
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stupid puma posted:A difference in 20k is real money to you but probably only like 600 bucks to them comparatively. Studies have shown that when realtors sell houses that they personally own, they get better prices than when they sell houses for other people. The value of that extra $600 (and thus the extra $20k to you) vs. the value of getting to move on to the next property is not hard to balance. EDIT: not that I'm necessarily suggesting that you try to sell the property yourself, though.
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Jun 3, 2016 14:21
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Congrats! Hopefully that's the last of the bureaucracy you have to deal with. Good luck with the build!
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Sep 14, 2016 01:32
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Motronic posted:Opening permits is certainly not the last bureaucracy you need to deal with by basic definition. But this is great news and very good progress. Are there more permits that will need to be acquired after this point? Or other things that he has to get approval for? Obviously he's still going to need to get inspections taken care of, but I don't really think of that as being bureaucracy. I'm not familiar with the process of building a house, mind you. I'm just drawing comparisons to what I went through to build my workshop.
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Sep 14, 2016 02:04
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There needs to be a  equivalent with a claw hammer and hard hat.Good luck!
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Oct 25, 2016 16:25
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Goddamn, that's a nice-looking site. Good luck burning out all the screaming buttweed.
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Nov 3, 2016 16:46
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Gounads posted:It's just scary that I theoretically don't have a way of paying right now. It's the one thing that's currently completely out of my control. This always sucks. Best advice I can give you is, since it's completely out of your control, worrying about it doesn't really do you any good. You do what you can to expedite things on the bank side and to smooth things over on the work side, and beyond that, you just let whatever happens, happen. Not that I've usually had much success achieving that state of mind myself. It's more an aspirational goal than anything else.
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Nov 14, 2016 20:16
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 I'm loving these day-by-day photos. Keep 'em coming.  (EDIT: last page has a photo of the freshly-poured foundation)
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Nov 15, 2016 19:20
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peanut posted:Kawaii. I hope your basement is well sealed! As I understand it (and with the disclaimer that I live in California, land of no basements because they'd collapse in an earthquake), sealing is the less-important factor; drainage is more important. Not that sealing isn't valuable, but water's gonna get in somehow anyway, and you need a way to deal with it.
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Nov 22, 2016 17:56
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Gounads posted:
Because he wants to be as far away from everyone as possible, and surely nobody will ever want to develop the adjacent plot in the same way, right?
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Dec 8, 2016 22:00
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Video link doesn't work.  But hey, progress!
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Dec 11, 2016 04:32
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cr0y posted:This was the closest thread I could find possibly relating to this topic so like don't ban me or whatever. You want the Fix It Fast thread.
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Dec 14, 2016 02:32
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OSU_Matthew posted:
I've also read about using 2x8 sole/top plates, with staggered 2x4 studs so that no stud bridges the entire width of the plate, but that seems like it's a lot of effort.
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Dec 29, 2016 03:40
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Safety Dance posted:I predict you'll soon grow to hate the happy little song they play when they're done washing/drying. My dad gets that song stuck in his head and then putters around my parents' house, unconsciously humming/whistling it over and over again.
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Jan 3, 2017 19:48
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At least in my own neighborhood, I have literally never seen anyone look through the bigass window my house has, at ground level and facing the street. I'm in a suburb but it's a moderately busy street. Hypothetical perverts with binoculars are I guess a separate issue, but I don't generally think that people care about looking in through your windows.
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Jan 11, 2017 16:40
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I don't understand those little roofed bits under the eaves where they meet the soffits. Why not use a soffit birdbox? It looks less busy to me, and is less to maintain / probably more reliable at keeping water out. Otherwise, looking good!
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Jan 17, 2017 22:05
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I still want to actually actually build my own house someday, like, draw up the plans, do the framing, etc. How else can you know that it's been done properly?
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Jan 19, 2017 03:10
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TheMightyHandful posted:Please pay in small change next time It is so not worth getting into a piss fight with the city. Clerks have little power, but if you piss them off and you need something from them, they can make your life a living hell.
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Jan 19, 2017 06:02
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KKKLIP ART posted:This makes sense, but for a standard cast iron or fiberglass insert tub, as long as the pipes are hooked up right (which might be its own code related nonsense), I would think just a plain tub is like a sink- no code just installer error Adding a tub on a second floor without reinforcing the floor to take the extra weight. Adding a tub too close to an outlet or non-wet-rated light fixture. Improperly-installed (or missing entirely!) tile. Insufficient clearance around tub creating trip hazards. Inadequate ventilation. I'm not familiar with the code, but I'd expect that all of those would be in there somewhere.
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Jan 26, 2017 23:15
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Looks like a house to me! When are you moving in? 
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Feb 7, 2017 17:47
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sharkytm posted:It's highly regional. Where I am (Cape Cod, MA), plaster is about 75% of what's on the walls of any house pre-1990. Contractors usually offer both options, it's just a matter of what material gets hung by the first crew (blueboard vs drywall), and who comes in to do the finishing (plasterer or a drywall crew). Would you characterize plaster as being more or less effort to finish compared to drywall mudding?
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Mar 14, 2017 21:33
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Pissflaps posted:Wouldn't a curved bannister be the most elegant solution? Probably, but also more expensive.
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May 2, 2017 15:57
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Gounads posted:Plumbers and the electricians both want to go first since the second one has to run their lines around the first. You forgot HVAC.  (from the Crappy Construction Tales thread)
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May 3, 2017 18:42
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ElCondemn posted:I'm sure if you had some curved pieces it would be up to code, not sure why they didn't just do that. Where are you going to get the curved pieces that are the right diameter for this specific use case? How much are you willing to pay for them?
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May 5, 2017 18:08
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ElCondemn posted:I don't know about this specific case but I have friends who make railings and things of that nature. They seem to figure out how to bend wood and metal just fine, I guess a few feet of bent wood is too expensive though... Yeah, it's not that it's not possible, it's that it's a hell of a lot more expensive to do a custom-fit job than it is to assemble a slightly clunkier solution out of prefabricated parts.
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May 5, 2017 18:35
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H110Hawk posted:I'm really curious what the plans showed for that section, or if it was just a generalized small square showing "bannister | -- X" -- | stair" as the code requirement. I doubt that the plans are so detailed as to show the bannister. At most they'd say "bannister on this wall installed according to code", but I think even that is basically implicit in submitting plans that have a staircase at all.
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May 5, 2017 18:55
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What I wonder about that bannister is how does it feel to use? If it feels fine I'd just leave it, personally. It looks a little weird, but there's so much other stuff to get done that something that just looks weird is really not any kind of priority.
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May 7, 2017 14:50
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Gounads posted:Should I be disappointed that we essentially filled the panel? Barely any room for easy expansion later. It's not too hard to replace two adjacent breakers with a tandem breaker, to free up a slot or two for a subpanel.
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May 16, 2017 15:08
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Slugworth posted:If I'm understanding you through the different terminology, gfi breakers are becoming more common in newer homes here. They're still noticeably more expensive than using standard breakers plus a GFCI outlet, though. But I personally like breakers better than outlets, because there's only one place to go when an outlet stops working, and you don't have to know where the first receptacle is in the circuit to ensure that everything's protected.
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Jun 12, 2017 18:18
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Do you have reflectors on that wooden fence thingy at the turn?
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Jun 13, 2017 17:02
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