House Building Materials

[Edwin]

When we lived in the National Park at the head of the Lake with only access with an airplane or boat, or barge for everything from small to extensively large we saw this guy build a house out of stray bales! They did a little preliminary construction, like footing/foundation, and then some framework, and then up went the staw bales. Where we live we have about 12 or so inches of precipitation a year. This place where we used to live in the Cascade Mountains between where we live now and Seattle Washington USA has over 50 inches a years, so it is a kind of wet place. Lots of rain, but more wet snow! Anyway straw is not considered the best construction material for wet climates. They do more straw houses where it is not so wet. But it seemed to work there. I think they used the large bales. They stuccoed and plastered the walls; I think stucco on the outside; plaster on the inside. Anyway it turned out really nice!

[Edwin]

There are many houses built out of concrete blocks, and I saw a lot of them in the Philippines. I pay $1.32 for each block i buy. Carol's brother told me that he paid 25 cents each in the Philippines for the blocks he used to build his house. I used about 500 of them on my cellar walls, and probably close to the same number, or maybe a few more on the short wall on the bottom of our house to take the place of the shabby metal skirting which was cheap metal roofing, and now it has nice concrete blocks. I didn't mortor them in, just placed them with plastic behind to keep out the wind, and it has good enough insulating so that everything under the house is safe from freezing. Also, I used concrete blocks under our back yard fence to keep the heavy wire panels off the ground, and also to give the fence a little more heighth. I used a bunch of them building my two room chicken house. I didn't mortor them either, but just sat them one on top of the other overlapping one block with the other, like you would do if you were mortoring them in, in a real construction situation. For now I have somewhat decided just to leave the pallets at the back of the house for the small landing and steps down, but if I change me mind it will take 32 blocks to build those steps. I just need to build a small room, probably eight foot square to put garbage in. That should finish my need for concrete blocks for the time, anyway.

[Edwin]

My older brother worked laying bricks, blocks, and rocks, building fireplaces and other such construction while he was attending University. He knows a lot about all of that, but I never had any experience with it until this cellar construction. We used rebar in the concrete for the footing/foundation. I also mixed concrete and small rocks, and I poured that mixture in every fourth hole in the blocks, so I have a concrete column every other concrete block with rebar from the ground level to the ceiling. I will be breaking out a door way going into the cellar when I dig a walkway into the cellar. Breaking them out is going to be sad after we worked so hard to mortor them in, but its okay, and that is life!

[Edwin]

The first church I Pastored was built of concrete blocks. They had a full basement, concrete walls, wood floor on top of that, and then concrete block walls in the sanctuary, up to the ceiling. It was a good old building, but I don't know if they put rebar in, and poured concrete inside the blocks as we did or not? In that town there are many buildings built of concrete blocks. There was a guy who had a business of making concrete blocks in the neighboring town, when I was a little boy, and he sold them cheap, and I think that is the reason so many buildings in those two towns are built out of concrete blocks. They make very good building. I am not sure why so many buildings in the Philippines are built out of concrete blocks, but if anyone knows, would you tell me why in the Philippines they like to use concrete blocks for house construction? Thank you!

[Edwin]

Most of the buildings in this part of the country are built of wood frame construction. Sometimes they use 2 by 4s, and at other times they use 2 by 6s for the wall studs. Then usually the ceiling or up stairs' floor joices are larger 2 bys, and the roof often is made of 2 by 8s, 10s, or 12s. The roof on this house is not built nearly sturdy/heavy enough to support snow weights year after year, and so we are going to replace it, because it is sagging. 2 by 4s, 24 inch centers, 1/4 inch sheeting is not enough in this part of the country. Then I don't think the roofing shingles, 3 tabs are rated for very many years, and it is about done!

[Edwin]

Sometimes home walls are built out of logs; either rough cut or factory peeled, and cut down to specifications. Where we lived in the National Park a school teacher and his wife hauled rocks from nearby, and there are a multitude of them there, and they built a beautiful house just out of round river/creek rocks! I think it was a lot of work for them to do that, but in that isolated valley there is not a whole lot of things going on, so they had lots of time to do their work. This was many years ago, and both of them are dead by now.

[Edwin]

I was actually very interested in building a straw bale house here before we moved this doublewide here. Finding our house so reasonable I think is what made me forget about the straw bale house construction. With this house we paid less than the price of an old used car. It was a junk heap, but we have done enough work on it, so that most people would be happy to call it home. It is very comfortable, and getting better all the time. It is only about half as big as I wanted, but with Carol's declining health she says that she is glad that it is a small space. It is about 1260 square feet, with two bathrooms when I get mine finished, large living/dining room area, fair sized kitchen, and 3 bedrooms. We have put two new doors in it, and one sliding glass door, as well as all new windows, two new carpets, shortly it will have two newly renewed bathroom, one with a shower, the other, mine, with a tub/shower combination. I have two pianos in the house, one that works well, a little out of tune, but it plays nicely, 1968 manufactured. Then I have an old Steinway, cadillac of the pianos, 1872 manufactured, which needs to be rebuilt, but I will never have enough money to rebuild it, but if I learn the techniques which I might, then I will rebuild it myself, and it will be as good or better than new. We have our living room arranged so that we can easily watch movies, which seems to be our past time here lately. My love is still playing the piano, and if there are 4 minutes that I have to wait for a meal, I will play at least 2 church hymns! I have neglected my trombones for a long time, but each time I pick one of them up, I remember that I can still play them.

[Edwin]

When our kids moved on this 40 acre plot of land that at one time belonged to my great grandparents, was donated to the school district where they held school for many year, when my mother, aunts, and uncles attended here, then the land was deeded back to my mother, afterwhich she sold it to our kids for a very low price. They were thinking about building a straw house here, but my sis in law and her sister laughed and made fun of them until the gave up on the idea. They were told that the mice would get into the straw wall; not if it is sealed properly, with stucco and plaster. They were old told about the mold, but it just has to be dry when sealed, but now they built a huge 3 story house that was based on military housing that commanding officers live in. It is actually kind of out of place, and our neighbor calls it an eye sore on his view of the horizon. It is a big undertaking, and it may never be complete as there kids are all grown and gone, and there is really no reason for them to have that much living space, but they may live in a big old unfinished house forever!

[Chas]

Waiting to see photos of the chicken houses. Apologies if you have already posted some and I missed them.

Straw is good insulation. I remember reading somewhere that some places use sheep fleeces in the walls as insulation.

I am building a raised flower bed using bricks left over from the house extension. I am also building a sloping path so to the garden shed so it is easier to put the lawn mower away. There is something very satisfying about manual labour and being able to see the end results.

Replacing the roof is going to be hard work Edwin. I do not envy you that job.

[Edwin]

Chas, you are very correct about the work involved in replacing the roof. I put a metal roof on the house where we lived the longest time in our married life. it was hard work, but everything underneath was solid, except I could not keep it from leaking, so on with the metal roof. I was much younger then, and it was actually pretty easy. I didn't have to replace any sheeting or rafters underneath as is going to need to be done with this roof. On this one we made leave the 2 by 4 sagging rafters that are there and scab on heavier duty rafters beside them; I'm going to leave it to the people who help do that. I wasn't planning to do it even though it badly needs done, because with the other projects, as well as property taxes and rental insurance I am embarrassed to be out of money, well almost, low enough so that I am worried that I won't have enough money to do the job, so I wasn't going to do it. But, our youngest daughter's money situation improved and she told me as well as writing on facebood, "I am going to replace the roof on my Mom and Dad's house!" She informed me I might have to dig up a little money/use my credit card if she runs short on her funds, and that is okay, because as it was before I was going to have to pay for everything, and that would have been fine had I had the money. She has been very good to us, and I am so thankful. She is going to find people who know roof construction to come do the job, from replacing the rafters/sheeting, roofing, which I already have, mostly 50 year stuff, a little 30 year stuff, and roofing made to go on the peak. She will get all the help, including strong guys to lift and climb, and the way I understand I won't have to do anything except watch, and I am good at that! Anyway I won't be arguing with any of them either!

Okay, Chas, I will post pictures. I think I have them, just need to resize and put them on. Yes, straw is about as good for insulation as any gets! Sheep fleece would make wonderful insulation if someone had sheep ranch, so that it would be affordabe enough. I would prefer that over spun glass, or what's the other term for it? Anyway I don't like that insulation; it itches, and don't breath the dust! Fiberglass is what I was trying to think of. The raised flower bed suing bricks left over is a great idea, and I like the idea of putting our lawn mower away on a downward slope! Of course you will have to push it uphill when you get it out! But you will be strong getting it out, and you will be tired putting it away!

Yes, Chas, King Solomon, the Proverbs' writer, wrote about the satisfaction of seeing the completion of your work, and he said that there is nothing like seeing the work of your hands! It is very satisfying! I am wondering when I will ever finsish buying concrete blocks and setting them! I will!