A Log-End Cave
A pair of cordwood-construction pioneers go underground with this dwelling, including building for strength, waterproofing, keeping it livable and cutting the cost.
January/February 1981
By Robert L. Roy
 |
A sturdy post-and-beam frame, combined with a plank-and-beam roof,supports the heavy loads that wet winters place upon this earth- sheltered, log-end home.
|
A pair of cordwood-construction pioneers have gone underground, in...
RELATED CONTENT
The Environmental Protection Agency’s Energy Star energy-efficiency program gave its certification ...
Buying or building a small home is a great way to significantly reduce your energy use, and you don...
There are thousands upon thousands of abandoned farmhouses scattered throughout the U.S., at bargai...
I'm renting an old Finnish homestead near Nolalu, Ontario....
A community canning center is the answer....
Folks who read "The Return of the Cordwood House" (in MOTHER NO. 47, page 29) may recall that—back in '75—my wife Jaki and I built a stackwood cabin, within a post-and-beam framework, that we called the Log-End Cottage.
Well, in February 1978—after two years and two months in that structure—we moved 100 feet west into our new cordwood, earthsheltered home . . . which we have since dubbed the Log-End Cave.
We had several reasons for building a new dwelling, primary among which was our craving for more space, privacy, and energy efficiency. But—though we were starting over—we simply couldn't build without including cordwood in the construction. The fact is that we're totally enamored of the warm and beautiful appearance of log-end-paneled walls.
LIVE AND LEARN
Though our little cottage hadn't been difficult to heat, we knew—from research and experience—that we could build a roomier house that would be more ener gy efficient. Our goal was to go from heating 700 square feet on seven cords of wood a year to warming our proposed structure of 924 square feet (1,050 square feet gross) on three cords. Since we plan to homestead on our piece of land for a long time to come, the potential saving of four cords every year could mean the elimination of a lot of work over a lifetime . . . and even eventually provide an income from the sale of the "surplus" firewood.
When we began the construction of our earth-sheltered dwelling in 1977, there wasn't much literature available on underground buildings ... just as there had been little practical information on cordwood construction when we built the cottage in 1975. We figured, however, that there were three obvious major considerations in planning any earth-sheltered housing: structural strength (to support the heavy roof load and pressure on the walls), waterproofing, and livability (an all-inclusive term I use to describe both a home's atmosphere and its practicality).
Our friends feared that underground living would be dark, damp, and likely to induce claustrophobia . . . but, in truth, our finished "cavern" is much brighter inside than our aboveground cottage (or most surface houses, for that matter), and—thanks to our site selection—it has a better view and allows us to feel closer to the natural world around us.
BUILD FOR STRENGTH
Any structure should be built to withstand the worst possible conditions that can be anticipated. Let's suppose, for example, that March finds a four-foot snow accumulation on a 6"-thick sod roof. Then a warm spring rain pours for two days . . . the snow compresses . . . and the sod becomes soaked. Under such a circumstance, we estimated that the roof load on our home could approach 120 pounds per square foot . . . so normal framing, which is designed to handle only 40 pounds per square foot, wouldn't come near doing the trick. Our alternatives were to go with a reinforced concrete roof (an option not especially suited to the owner-builder on a low budget) or a heavy post-and-beam framework combined with a plank -and-beam roof.
Page: 1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
Next >>
