An Under-$10,000 Ozarks Home

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• Passive solar heat. Large, south facing windows; brick floor for heat storage laid directly on earth beneath house. Foundation perimeter insulated.

• 10' X 12' greenhouse attached to south side of house (access from both inside and outside).

• 10' X 10' root cellar built from treated wood; access through floor.

• 10' X 20' patio with deck above, access from loft.

• Epoxy painted metal roofing naileddirectly to purlins running length ofhouse; 1-1/2' roof overhang for shading and pro tection of house.

• 6" fiberglass insulation in walls (R-19), 10" in roof (R-30). Small north and west windows; most windows fixed and doublepane; centrally located woodstove for backup heating.

• Venting large opening to loft in first floor ceiling; inlet vents low on north and east walls; outlet vents high on south wall and upstairs at gable ends.

WALLS AND FLOORS

Framing in the exterior walls was one of the most enjoyable parts of building our home. There are no load-bearing walls in a post-and-beam house, so no header beams are required over the doors or windows. I simply toenailed 2 X 6 framing horizontally (at 24" spacing) between the posts and framed up a door or window wherever I wanted one. Then I stapled tar paper to the outside of the framing and nailed pine siding over that.

For the first story, I nailed down vertical 3"-wide battens spaced about 6" apart from edge to edge; then I centered a vertical 8" board over each gap, so that it overlapped the batten on either side by an inch, and nailed it through to the framing. The result- reverse board-and-batten siding, with the boards spaced 1" apart—looks good and provides an extra inch of insulating dead air space in the wall. For the second-story siding (which in volved the gable ends only), I shiplapped 1 X 8s horizontally and then applied sealer to the bottom drip edge of the siding and to the exposed ends of the rafters. No other finish was applied.

With the exterior completed, I filled the walls with fiberglass insulation and stapled a 4-mil polyethylene vapor barrier over it. Then I paneled the interior with 1 X 8 rough pine boards applied vertically edge to edge (except for the paneling on the northeast and southwest comers, where I applied the boards at a 45° angle to provide additional bracing).

To install the downstairs floor, I covered the ground with 6-mil polyethylene and then laid treated 2 X 4 sleepers flatwise on top (spaced 24" center to center) and toenailed them at the ends to the foundation wall. Next, I nailed pine 1 X 3s to the sleepers at 8" spacing and then nailed 1 X 8 boards edge to edge on top of the 1 X 3s through to the sleepersthus, the 1 X 3s sealed the joints between the 1 X 8s. I laid a brick floor in the living room in front of the window opening to provide heat storage capability. For the upstairs flooring, I purchased planed 2 X 6 tongue-and-groove pine decking (at 35¢ per board foot) to span the floor beams.

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