Our Passive Solar Home

Paint Is On the Inside Walls

2011-05-21T15:31:00.000-07:00

It's coming together! The house inside walls are now painted. Next step is the electrical trim (putting in the switches, outlets, coverplates, etc.) and installing the cabinets. The garage/shop has been wired and next step there is to insulate the shop area.

The Accent Wall in Living Room

Kitchen Area

The Garage/Shop Getting Ready for Stucco

Drywalled!

2011-05-08T17:21:00.000-07:00

The ceiling and walls all have drywall now. The drywall crew came through and put the wallboard up in two days. It was quite something to watch them whiz through the rooms, wasting no time and being very efficient of their movements, as if it were choreographed. Next will be taping, then painting.

The garage trusses are mostly on, and plywood is on the exterior walls.

Putting the Trusses on the Garage/Shop

Drywall In Progress

Messy Process!

Interior Work and Start of the Garage/Shop

2011-04-19T20:34:00.000-07:00

Wow! There was alot going on today. Central Valley Plastering has begun putting the stucco base coat on the exterior. Current Concepts has nearly completed the electrical wiring, SAR carpenters were busy inside the hosue and pouring the footing for the garage shop. The Heat Recovery Ventilation ducts are installed and the plumbing is almost complete.

Interior Walls!

2011-04-04T21:33:00.000-07:00

The SAR crew is putting in the interior walls this week. It is easy to visualize the rooms now.

Cal quickly builds a stud wall.

Cal and Jose building the stud walls - it goes quickly with the right tools and the proper training!

Windows!

2011-03-30T23:08:00.000-07:00

SAR is back to work on the house and today the windows went in!

Chris and Cal are installing the south-facing windows with the high solar heat gain glass we need for our passive solar house.

Roofed and Floored and Drained

2011-03-11T21:45:00.000-08:00

The colored concrete floor was poured today. We want the four inch thick insulated concrete floor to be our main thermal battery in this house. The floor will absorb heat when the floor temperature is cooler than the room temperature and will give off the heat when the room temperature is cooler, helping to stabilize the room temperature. This is one of the key design features of a passive solar house so we wanted a concrete floor that looks good. I think this floor will look great when it is all finished!

Our Faswall house has a finished roof, completed septic tank and drain field and with the concrete floor poured today SAR Construction will soon be able to start building the interior walls!

Greg and Jose from All Weather Roofing putting on shingles and solar tubes.

Gil from SAR Construction compacting the gravel, preparing for the concrete.

SAR's Gil and Jose installing the insulation below the concrete floor.

The Gil Concrete crew pouring the concrete floor.

Nearing the end of the concrete pouring.

Power Trowel in action!

These guys are amazing to watch in action!

Grading and Draining and Roofing

2011-03-05T13:47:00.000-08:00

Today the underlayment is going on the roof, to be ready for the shingles on Wednesday. RJ and Son Excavating is busy putting in the drain line from the foundation French drain, grading all the excavated areas, doing a bit more cut and fill on the east side of the house to make an area for the future garage/shop, and creating drain areas along the driveway and down by the transformer pad. With the grading done in front of the house it is easy to visualize the future landscaping. It is fun to watch Bob and Ron work the heavy equipment, skillfully moving heavy rock and yet carefully placing just the right amount of soil where it is needed.

View looking up the driveway at the front "yard" and south side of the house.

Robbie (3rd generation in RJ and Son Excavating) is compacting the drain area near the bottom of the driveway.

Bob and Ron busy grading the excavated areas.

Roof Decking and Backfilling

2011-03-04T11:28:00.000-08:00

Today the crew from SAR (Jose, Gil and Cal) are putting up the fascia board and finishing up on bird blocking and the excavators (Bob and Ron from RJ and Son Excavating) are back filling around the house. The plumbing and electrical that will be under the floor is complete so that the floor can be poured on schedule.

You know you have a hardy crew when you hear Gil comment on the weather being nicer. It was 36 deg F while I was there this morning, but I guess that is nicer than the earlier colder temps and the sleet, snow and wind.

Bob is working on back filling/grading near the transformer pad.

Twenty foot fascia board ready for cutting and placing over the sub-fascia.

Grandsons Miles and Ansel are inspecting the underground plumbing.

Ron is back filling on the north side while Cal is working on the bird blocking.

Below Freezing And Still Working

2011-02-24T21:33:00.000-08:00

Today the temperature was in the 20's and there was a wind chill, too, but Jose, Cal, Gil and Chris were up on those roof trusses putting on the plywood decking. That is some serious dedication to getting the job done!

Jose Pounding Nails In the Below-Freezing Cold and Wind

Gil and Cal Working in the Cold

Roof Trusses

2011-02-18T19:22:00.000-08:00

It's really starting to look like a house now! Today the roof trusses came and the SAR crew (Chris, Jose, Gil, Cal, and Jim) got all the main regular trusses on in short order. Then they started working on the hips and end trusses, to be fnished up on Monday.

The view from the street below

Jose, Gil, and Cal at work

View from the West side of the house.

Walls Are Up!

2011-02-16T19:52:00.000-08:00

The Faswall walls are up and the last concrete in-fill was done today. The cement truck was very late getting to the property and that left Chris, Gil, and Cal working late and into dusk to finish up.

Looking up the driveway to full-size walls!

Waiting for the cement truck to arrive

Chris starts pouring!

And Chris is still pouring...It took two cement trucks to carry all the concrete.

Decisions on Electrical, Doors, Roof

2011-02-10T22:29:00.000-08:00

Today was an exciting day. Our friends Paul and Judy arrived from Puget Sound and we got to show them the construction. Paul was in the construction field for much of his life and was curious to see the Faswall getting installed. He was as impressed as we are with the care being taken by all those working on it - the carpenters from SAR Construction, Chris, Jose, Gil and Cal and Brett, the electrician from Current Concepts.

Paul and Judy discussing the construction with Randy

We also met with our contractor, Rick (SAR) and the electrical subcontractor, Mike (Current Concepts) to get some of the electrical items/locations finalized and located. We decided on our front and back doors and the color of our roof shingles and that feels like great progress! Everyone is working hard to finish up installing the block and putting in the electrical so that the wall can be in-filled with concrete early next week.

Brett, the Current Concepts electrician is taking great care in adding outlets to the kitchen

Window Bucks In Place

2011-02-09T21:43:00.000-08:00

The walls are starting to grow today! Backfill inside the walls has been done, with gravel added and compacted. That allowed the SAR crew to put up scaffolding so they could work on stacking the block up higher. Excavating has been down to bring the power and water trench up to the house, and around the back up the house over to the future site of the garage/shop.

Looking at South-facing Window Bucks

Why We Are Using Faswall Block

2011-02-09T21:30:00.000-08:00

Faswall is the name of the stay-in-place form we are using for our walls and foundation. We chose it because it is fire-proof, termite-proof, quiet, allergen-free, strong, easy to use ( can be cut, nailed, etc.), manufactured locally (near Corvallis, Oregon) and will help provide some thermal battery for our passive solar house. The blocks look something like concrete block with the two vertical chambers, but the resemblance ends there. Faswall is 85 percent mineralized wood chips and about 15 percent Portland cement. There are channels that run horizontally to hold rebar or conduit, and the two vertical channels in each block also can hold rebar and conduit. There is foam insulation added to the inside chambers, at the exterior wall of the block. The blocks are dry-stacked (no mortar), and after rebar and conduit is in place, the stacked blocks are in-filled with concrete. The poured concrete then forms a reinforced concrete grid throughout the walls. The standard Faswall block is 2 feet wide by 1 foot thick by 8 inches high, however, the blocks can be cut with the same tools used to cut wood.

My preliminary house design, prior to handing it off to Winter Sun Design to get it made into a workable and per code design, was designed for the Faswall block to minimize trimming of the block. In reality, some trimming is inevitable due to items like standard sizes for door height, for example, which does not neatly fit into a multiple of 8 inches. For the most part, though, this house was made for Faswall. I can imagine that designing a house without much consideration to the dimensions of the Faswall block would add alot of extra work to the carpenters and crew building with the blocks.

Foundation In and Walls Going Up

2011-01-29T20:54:00.000-08:00

The footing has been poured and five levels of Faswall have been installed. That includes the stem wall and the first 16 inches of the house walls. Conduit is in place for electrical wiring and outlets and we are waiting for the first concrete infill of the Faswall blocks. The contractor, SAR Construction, has done a very neat and careful job so far, and each row of Faswall is straight and level. They have taken care to ensure straight and even walls, including fastening plywood to the Faswall at each corner for extra support during the concrete infill.

Rebar in place

Having a Dream

2011-01-23T10:55:00.000-08:00

Randy and I have dreamed for some years now about having a passive solar home. We bought 2.47 acres on a south slope in central Washington and sat on it until we could both retire, sell the house in western Washington and move. We designed a basic house and turned it over to Winter Sun Design to have it designed into a code-worthy home. On November 29, 2010 the western Washington house sold and on Dec 1 we were living with our kids and grandkids in their small central Washington home. On Dec 2 we had a signed contract with our contractor, SAR Construction, Inc. Soon the excavation started.

Our new passive solar home will be built with Faswall block. The Faswall material is ideal for this environment and will help keep us cool in the summertime and warm in the winter. It will give us strong, fire-proof walls and a quiet interior.