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Not my cup of tea but there has long been interest on Punaweb for shipping containers converted to housing.
This ABC News article in interesting and contains a number of leads, links and examples:
Home Sweet Shipping Container: Detroit Housing Project
By Karin Halperin
Nov 23, 2012 6:00am
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/business/201...g-project/
Some of them are quite attractive. At least one I can easily picture in Puna. The most pertinent quote however was:
"“A shipping container doesn’t want to be a building,” Case explains. “So you have to do quite a bit of gymnastics that cost money.”"
Assume the best and ask questions.
Punaweb moderator
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Some of alternate building methods make no sense except to be different for the sake of being different
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I resemble that remark. No, really. I am outfitting a container for both storage and as a crash pad. It is not easy to lay out such a long skinny space. Within minutes of the sun hitting the side of the container you can feel the heat radiating from the metal. That doesn't bother me so much since I am rarely sitting in there during the day, but it gets equally chilly at night. If you insulate the inside you lose even more space, while if you insulate the outside you are failing to make the most of what the container has to offer (ready-made durability and weather tightness). If you have to modify it very much to get what you want you should find another way to build.
In my case the major benefit is extreme cheapness for an extremely minimalist shelter combined with the ability to gradually convert the container from all storage to half storage and half living space. I am going with tiny slider windows with bars on them around the top of the habitable end of the container to preserve as much as possible the security aspect. It ain't pretty but it is relatively affordable and literally movable if need be. I see no point in taking multiple containers and cutting them up into something other than containers and having to deal with all the downsides of the container aspect plus all the work to modify them.
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Yeah, that news was lttp. Don't really understand the fascination with this kind of construction and it seems like high maintenance to keep it from rusting. There is a large shipping container beach home down by Seaview, very visible just off beach road. For a container house, it looks pretty good, kind of made to look miami vice style with about 4 or 6 containers. This guy is also doing container houses around the area, think he is based out of Oahu.
http://www.affordableportablehousing.com/newproj.html
*Japanese tourist on bus through Pahoa, "Is this still America?*
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To mitigate the heating-up problem, consider planting some trees on that side of the container to shade it from the sun. Visually, it will also soften the harsh boxy outline of the container.
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The container is oriented pretty much east-west, with one long side facing SSE. That side will have only a couple of windows high up. I am planning to build a greenhouse against this side by attaching lengths of PVC to the underside of the rafters and bending them down to the ground. This would normally aggravate the heat problem but I am planning to plant some kind of climbing plant like beans or squash that will create a screen.
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Having completed a permitted home made of four shipping containers here in Puna, I confer that it was no easy or cheap task. In the end, the method seemed to present more problems than it solved.
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The first shipping container I bought was for the ability to secure belongings on a vacant lot before we moved here part time and needed to secure belongings during long absences. It's a 40 footer. And it works really well for storage. For about $100 you can buy a locking mechanism that would make it easier for a thief to cut through the wall than access the contents through the door. While it was being used for storage I did a lot of research about what it would take to use part of it for a living space and what I determined was that the only way to make that feasible is to put spray foam insulation inside, which is not a DIY project. I still have that container on the property- we use it as our own personal storage building.
The 2nd shipping container I bought was a 20' on our second property. We weren't planning on having another one but the house that we bought has virtually no storage and no garage. I outfitted it with nice steel "costco" shelving and a work bench and functions very well for its intended purpose. It does turn into an oven during the day but with the work bench situated up front next to the doors it is barely bearable in full sun but just fine any other time. For storage the "cooking" seems to be a good thing because the contents don't rust or mold. At my last job in Alaska we had a 20' we used for storage and water would condense on the ceiling in the summer and in the winter it was ice. So far the ones in Hawaii are perfectly dry inside. When water does get in (for example, we forget to close the doors and a monsoon hits) it dries quickly in the sun.
Cost is roughly $15/square foot of storage building which is very reasonable for a one-time cost. Recommended upgrades would be a pitched roof to temper the baking including coverage over the doors (like a porch) so water doesn't get in when you leave the doors open and it begins to rain. I was thinking of going the cheap route and use the steel conduit/tarp method sold at HPM that is ubiquitous in Puna. The biggest downside is that the containers are ugly and don't fit in well with other buildings or landscaping. Our plan to solve that is to eventually relocate it towards the back of the property and obscure it with foliage.
People talk about rust. Corten steel is designed to have continuous contact with salt and moisture. It is not stainless steel but it holds up very well. Outside of the salt environment it lasts even longer. It is important to keep them off the ground (four foundation blocks does the trick). I don't remember why I think it had something to do with electrolysis or something. Most of the "failures" are due to application of the wrong types of paint and without proper treatment first which cause them to rust prematurely. Corten steel is SUPPOSED to rust and develop a patina. I don't remember the chemistry behind it but the rusty patina itself is what protects the steel underneath from rusting. Once you apply regular metal paint to it, without proper treatment, the corten steel becomes no more rust resistant than regular steel.
The biggest "plus" is that it's an instant building. If you make a couple of phone calls first you can buy it and have it delivered the same day. You can use it for a couple of years and when you are done with it, you can sell it and then it gets hauled away and recycled.
