Today, Tim, Billy and other volunteers installed a ground loop, which will be connected to the Energy Recovery Ventilator in the Mechanical Room. These pipes will be filled with water, and will allow the ERV to take advantage of the constant temperature underground while supplying fresh air to the house.
Click here to view the entire Nauhaus Prototype Construction Chronology.
Ground Loop
These lines will connect to the ERV.
Safe Emulsion Agar gel is one of the least dense solids. Agar is a sugar from kelp or algae. SEAgel starts as a mixture of agar and water. It’s freeze dried to remove the water leaving a matrix of agar filled with air.
Today the underslab plumbing was completed.
Click here to view the entire Nauhaus Prototype Construction Chronology.
Ground Loop, Sewer and Greywater Lines
Washer, Tub Drain, Vent, Wastewater Heat Exchanger Stub-outs in Mechanical Room
That’d be cement.
Also, OMG! Look at Asia (really China).
The chart is from an excellent article about the basics of cement at Seeking Alpha
Two manufacturers are close to offering vacuum insulated windows:
Guardian is currently developing its technology for a partner window seller that Russo says could have a product to market by early- to mid-2010.
“We have proven the technological principles, and are in the process of securing funding to upscale,” reports Ken Bettger, Eversealed vice president and chief operating officer. “The next step is to demonstrate our laboratory results on a full-scale size, in a prototype.”
Vacuum insulated windows will be much thinner than today’s windows because the space between panes only needs to be 0.25mm rather than 12mm for glass insulated with air, 9mm for argon, and 6mm for krypton.
American window manufacturers need to step up and make frames that are at least as good as the glass they’re buying to put in them. Double pane vacuum glazing has an R value between R-10 and R12. Right now good triple pane window have a center of glass R value around R-7 to R-9, but the very best American frame you can buy is only about R-4. Good German frames weigh in around R-8.
Read more at windowanddoor.com
Guthrie Masonry came today to install the AAC and Concrete blocks.
Click here to view the entire Nauhaus Prototype Construction Chronology.
The 12" AAC blocks are installed on top of the concrete footers.
The 12" concrete blocks create a retaining wall on the East side.
This posting concerns Cordwood Maintenance, specifically about log loosening. Air infltration is not a good thing to have in a cordwood home (or any home for that matter), but sometimes a log loosens in the wall. There is a most excellent remedy for log loosening out there in ‘log home land.’ Permachink (and Log Jam) are water based, acrylic co-polymers that are easily applied to the mortar and wood. They are elastic and move with the log ends as the seasons change. Orignally designed to be used for chinking on horizontal log cabins, Permachink and log Jam work wonders to eliminate air infiltration in a cordwood home. See www.permachink.com and www.sashco.com for further information on their products.
This posting is taken from the most wonderful blogsite My Amazing House by Maria & Toby http://tobiascrawley.net/house/ There is a co-joined blog site about all things herbal and home by Maria called Dirt Under My Nails http://dirtundermynails.com/ Both are very good reads. Positive, earth affirming and energetic.
Here is their latest post.
Winterizing
September 9th, 2009
This weekend we got started on the project we’ve been dreading for the last year… winterizing the house. With a cordwood house, there is a lot of shrinking in the wood that goes on the first year. So, after the first winter, you need to go back and seal the nooks and crannies that have opened up. We weren’t looking forward to this large amount of detail work.
Well, I’m happy to say that it’s not nearly as bad as we thought it would be!
We purchased some Permachink (a sealant often used on log homes) from a dealer not too far from us. It comes in huge tubes that you squeeze onto the wall. Toby would squeeze the ‘caulk’ around each log end and I would go behind him and smooth it out. The color is an exact match to the white of our walls… unfortunately, the lower part of the exterior walls has some red mud splash back from the rain… so the caulk really stands out here. I figure I’ll get Kaia to go splash in puddles near the house next time it rains and that caulk should be nice and dirty in no time
permachink on left, none on right
Smoothing it out
We were able to do almost 2 sections (out of eight) this past weekend (with many interruptions!) So, we will hopefully be able to finish this in a few weekends. Then, it’s on to the chicken coop!
Thank you Maria & Toby.
flato@aol.com
www.daycreek.com/flatau
715-212-2870
Cordwood Bookstore
http://www.daycreek.com/dc/html/dcrflatau3.htm
