/diy/ - Do It Yourself

I'm not a fan of cordwood for one simple reason. as the wood swells and shrinks cracks form.

It is, literally, impossible to draft-proof a cordwood house. In upstate ny, that's like begging for massive heating bills.

>>379752

What would you suggest as an alternative cheap building material?

>>379755
You might wish to look into building with Cob, we have houses in the UK that are more than 300 years old and made from cob, durable stuff if built right.

>upstate new york
very very stupid

go out west

Also related i think:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timber_framing

>>379837
>>What would you suggest as an alternative cheap building material?

Geodesic style. Your house will be made mostly from fire-retardant polystyrene. Other components will be metal bits for the "nodes" and 2x4s for the "edges". It will take less materials to build your entire exterior than it takes to make two sides of a traditional house.

Spend the extra money on amenities.

Stupid idea - only because it is NY. Shit tier state.

Go west or further north into NH or VT.

>>379940
thus guy is sort of right but mostly wrong. His problem is economies of scale. You can't go and buy a sheet of sheetrock or plywood to cover your geodesic dome. You have to buy a normal 4x8 sheet and mangle it. You just lost 1/3 if your sheet to the geometry of the dome. If you had built it square, you could have used the whole sheet.

then there's all the fucking joints to tape in drywall and they're all fucked up angles, and you have to design the entire building around your chimney and sewer exhaust because of building codes designed for square houses. And your roof is going to leak because there's a billion more joints than on a square house...

geodesic... Rly?

hope your not in fulton 'city of the future'. you'll freeze to death. southern places like laffeyette or the onondaga res wouldnt be SO bad. you wont die at least

>>379970
also doors don't work right and there's lots of useless floor space because of it

>>379755
The cheapest way to build a house is to build them like every other house you see that is less than 10 years old.

If there were a more economical way then that you best believe the corporate house building companies would be doing that.

>>379995
There is, its called a "factory home". Problem is that no one but white trash and niggers want to live in trailers.

>>379995
and while the materials used are incredibly cheap the amount of waste created from the construction of just one typical single family home is substantial.

read into underground homes, there is a book 'the $50 and up underground house book' in the diy homsteading torrent

I roofed one of these once out in CO. It was in the mountains so it saw temps ranging from 100 to around -20 F; granted, it stays pretty dry here year round. They actually stucco'd the house and it seemed to be holding up really well.

>>379970

Every problem you've mentioned has already been solved. Those criticism may have had merit 30 years ago, but not today.

>>379970
FUCK drywall. problem solved.

>>379995
Er...you are a fucking moron.

>>380055
And that book should only serve as an introduction. You should move on to more recently published books, with updated material costs, availability, and knowledge, as well as build a variety of sources anyhow.

>>379746
>>379995
Look at rammed earth, straw bale, adobe, or my personal favorite, cob. They are all alternative and in many respects better to current prefab housing, with pricing as low as a few grand. The big downside and they reason these are not seen more commercially is that they take time and cannot be reasonably rushed often taking months to complete.
Here is the cob builders handbook if you're interested.
http://www.weblife.org/cob/pdf/cob_builders_handbook.pdf

>>380157
Please stop recommend people use strawbale construction. it's one of the most idiotically unsafe concepts out there. a few drops of water starts black mold production and slumping rot.

>>380161
I just said to look at it, I recommend cob but I'm all about choice.

I'm pretty set on upstate New York. I grew up on long island and don't want to be terribly far from family, etc plus I really like a few of the areas. A few more questions,

How exactly does one go about building a more intricate house? I understand to design one, you'd probably have to get into some heavy architecture. Log cabins also interest me quite a bit but if I were to go that route I'd probably try and build the house that I've always wanted rather than compromising some things for a cheap house.

also
>>380055
>>380128

Is what REALLY interests me but I never dreamt that it would actually be financially feasible.

Also what is the deal with building codes? Say you wanted to build a house underground? What would the town have to say about that?

>>380161

sigh, NOT IN CLIMATES WHERE HUMIDITY IS NOT A PROBLEM.

all building materials are local to the geographicl area. adobe is great in the southwest, stupid in New England. Stucco over framing is great where it wont freeze. Bricks insanely expensive in the southwest desert, cheap in Detroit.

there is no universal building material (other than money).

>>380055
Could somebody link me to all of the DIY torrents that used to be stickied?

>>380161
Because water doesn't cause the same issues in any other conventional building materials. Never ever.

Moisture issues have been though of and can be compensated for with proper building. Straw bale can be adapted for many climates, and if you aren't a fucking retard about building it, the homes can turn out really damn well.

>>380000
>>380001
>>380110
>>380157

fair enough for some of your points so let me focus my answer when I say "cheap".

Cheap while still:
-meeting existing building codes
-relatively quick construction time
-appealing to the broadest consumer in a particular area.

If you want to save money, you have to sacrifice one or more of those facets listed above and there are more that Im too lazy to think of.

>>380161
>>380254
>>380214
Yeah, strawbale, adobe, and cob are used in temperate climates everywhere. If you have a moisture and mold problem with any of those then you'll have the same moisture and mold problem with any other building material because you obviously built the structure so that water can either get in or moisture from normal living conditions (cooking/showering/etc) are being trapped and nothing can breath out that trapped moisture.

>>380761
Cob can answer all of those.

For the, "-appealing to the broadest consumer in a particular area." part you need to merely show examples of it working well (like any other building method).

However, you talk like you are allergic to work.

>>380799
>However, you talk like you are allergic to work.
Not him, but:

time == money

It's not about the effort, it's about the time it takes to put in that effort, or the money it takes to pay others to take that time to put in the effort.

>>380761

but you dont have to say 'cheap' in that context.

you figure out what you need to do, FIRST, and whats needed for the job. THEN you cost it out. it may be too expensive, or not. then you decide based on that.

saying "cheapest" first is distracting, at least and often (not necessarily you, here) means OPs aren't serious.

>>380798
>If you have a moisture and mold problem with any of those then you'll have the same moisture and mold problem with any other building material
Not really, no. The thing about cob, adobe, etc. structures is that they're generally not finished (as in, coated in a special substance) and thus are much more susceptible to moisture than structures of other materials which ARE normally finished. Adobe is great when you're living someplace hot and dry (and I'd know, I've helped build several adobe structures down in New Mexico), but if you tried to make a typical adobe house innawoods in Washington or Oregon you'd run into serious issues because they're not intended, at all, to deal with excess moisture. Rammed earth and cob generally do better, but there are still much better ways to build in wet climates than mud and straw.