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How To Build an Open Source House?
An anonymous reader writes "I'm starting a project that I hope that the engineers, makers and general DIYers in the Slashdot crowd can help out with. The full story's on the website, but the short version is as follows: my aim is to make a cheap, recycled, sustainable building, to document the process fully and to release anything that would help others to do the same. I intend to use an old train carriage as the shell, but the ideas should extend to shipping containers, aeroplane fuselages or anything similar. I know I'm not the first to do this, but I can't see anyone else who's provided a detailed step-by-step account of the build, complete with plans and the rest. Before I start, though, I'm trying to draw on as much collective experience as possible, and to head off mistakes before they happen. My question to Slashdot is simple: what do you think I need to know before I begin?"
If you don't have personal experience, find someone who does to help you. Especially where code is involved.
Get the blessing of whoever signs your permits before you choose a site.
As an engineered structure if you want to use it in your design you might have to have some kind of plan for the tube car. ISO shipping containers can probably sometimes sneak around this because they are designed to spec, but your tube car was designed for something wholly different and if it's not getting grandfathered in then you may well need its blueprints. But this goes back to the previous point; you may not.
Make sure to use a shared water wall so that you need as little plumbing as possible. You probably want an on-demand electric water heater. It's popular to mount such a thing to the wall inside the house as near the kitchen sink as possible, and to run all hot water lines outward from that point.
Insulate, insulate, insulate. And at the same time, ventilate, ventilate, ventilate. In your situation I would want to install HEPA and carbon filters on an intake fan, but I'm a country dweller, all I have to worry about is spray days. Seems like if you need a heater an underfloor unit will be easy.
I have many grandiose plans for shipping containers but first I need someplace road-accessible to site them.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
We had a french TV show here in Quebec called "Les citadins du rebut global" (loosely translated to "Citizens of the Global Trash"), which is part home building show, part junkyard wars. They have four seasons up to now, each in which they build a house in a different setting and from different found materials. It's quite a good show actually, it won a few TV industry prizes. The website also has a few interesting blurbs of video sprinkled in the "reportages" section.
http://www.citadins.tv/
In one season they have to build a house with only 15000$, in another they renovate an abandoned industrial space, in the third season they build a house supplied only with alternative energy sources.
I dont know if english subs are available for it, but the process of building a house being very graphic by nature I assume you could grasp quite a few concepts just by watching it. They used to sell the show in boxset format, but it might be obtained from "other sources" too. Just sayin'...
-- Home is where you eat your heart out.
I'll second this. I'm an architect and have a friend who is also an architect who had a plan to add to his existing house using some shipping containers. After drawing the detailed plans, the city refused to permit (I'm not sure exactly why, but he scrapped the idea). You'll want to put together a fairly detailed set of drawings, calling out the shipping container (or other shell), how it is finished, insulated, how the electrical, mechanical, and plumbing systems interact, the windows and exits (for life and safety code), etc. I would make sure to have all the decisions made before I started, and consult with the various engineers (MEP, structural, civil) before going to the permitting authority. The biggest deal (depending on your location I suppose) is the insulation. If you can rely on passive solar for heat and you can find some good heat storage mechanism (I'd recommend water) then you may be able to get by with less insulation but it depends on the climate. Shipping containers seem like a great idea (as do A/C fuselage) but are very hard to insulate, esp given the limited interior size which a fur out for any reasonable insulation would make even smaller. I think you'd be better off with using recycled wood products with integral insulation (like SIPs for instance), or even rammed earth or earth block (like adobe) and doing the majority of the labor yourself.
I have built 4 small houses/cabins, a couple barns and other structures. Your main expenses will be for utility hookups.
I have a ranch, so my experience is somewhat different since I don't have to pay much heed to local permits and regulations. I just make sure I build above code so everything works well.
Building costs are not much for a simple structure. Your major costs are going to be a septic system or sewer hookup, water and electric hookup. I can build (and have built) a small cabin with bedroom, bathroom, closet, living room, kitchen and porch for under $5000 in materials. But a small septic system, a well and electric hookup will cost over $10,000 in my area, and that's if I build the septic system myself. Just sewer hookup in a city can cost anywhere from $5000 to $20,000 or more. Electric hookup can be between $500 and $3000. Not sure about water hookup, but a well ain't cheap.
So first concentrate on the utilities. That will let you know if you can afford it.