Residence & Wood Shop Under Construction -- Fall 2011 - Spring 2012
Slab
Framing
Miscellaneous
Sequential Photos
A front view of the building. It's basically a T-shaped building with a woodshop at the south (right) side and a living space at the north (left) side. The site slopes from north to south and the concrete block half-wall at the far left will be bermed into the side of the hill. The finished building will look much more "rustic" than this computer-generated rendering.
A view of the layout of the first floor, with the wood shop at the top and the apartment in the foreground.
(All pictures of the slab construction below are from roughly this perspective.)
Footing trenches dug.
Footing form boards added.
Footings poured.
Finished footings with forms removed.
Remaining vegetative matter removed. Perimeter concrete block installed to establish the edges of the slab.
Gravel base added. (Slinky approves of progress on new "dog house".)
Piping installed for potential radon mitigation.
Borate-treated foam insulation installed around building perimeter to slow migration of heat from the slab into the ground. In colder climates, the entire underside of the slab is insulated, but with our short winters and long summers it makes more sense to insulate only the edges so we can take advantage of the cooling properties of the slab during warm months. (Later in the constrution process, the outside vertical edges of the slab will also be insulated.)
Vapor barrier installed to prevent ground moisture from migrating up into the slab.
Wire reinforcing mesh installed and conduits added for electrical and communication lines.
Tubing added for radiant floor heating in the apartment. Solar hot water panels on south-facing roof of the wood shop will heat water that will be pumped through this tubing in the slab and in the walls of the upper floor. The wood shop itself will have three sets of French doors on the south side and be directly passive solar heated. The plan is to include a wood stove in the cabin for periods of usually cold weather and/or multiple consecutive cloudy days.
Concrete freshly poured.
The finished slab.