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Building with wood? "You might wanna..."
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08-24-2008, 08:40 AM
Thank you,Jay!
It was helpful. About termites not eating a dead standing tree,but a milled one: I think,termites R us -we don't eat wheat on a stem either..
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08-24-2008, 09:53 AM
quote: Well not each gust of wind... but they are tipping into the streets and are being replaced by metal ones. ------- blog
08-24-2008, 11:03 AM
yep, i concur with damon about the telephone poles. big problem on the island of o'ahu.
"chaos reigns within. reflect, repent and reboot. order shall return." microsoft error message with haiku poetry
"a great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices."
w. james
08-24-2008, 11:24 AM
LOL
Ok, point granted. Anybody have any idea of what the service duty of a telephone pole is? It must be close to 50 years, or so I would guess. Man, retrofitting all that is one of those completely unaffordable sorts of things we're going to face. A steel pole probably costs 1000 bucks a pop. Maybe more. Actually, probably a lot more. Loved the clever suggestion about buried cable. That would be one heck of a ditch witch to grind that project out!
08-24-2008, 11:56 AM
quote: Another factor is the wood harvested now versus in the 1800's. The 1800's used a lot of old growth that had higher F strength. It was stronger than much of the lumber milled today, or even 30 years ago. One of the architects I use said that he increases the beam sizing in a garage door opening because the wood is "crap". His exact words. The loggers also made better choices in the 1800's on what to cut as it was plentiful. Now younger, poorer quality trees are cut so the wood has more warp and wain. In addition, this climate of Puna has issues with lumber dried on the mainland. It dries, it soaks up water, it dries again, etc all before you put it up. Any one bring an oak dresser over? You see what happens to oak especially if it came from Calif, Az, Nevada, NM ? In addition, quite a few houses in Hilo built in the late 1800's and early 1900's were built with heart redwood. You pretty much have to pay a king's ransom to get that if you even can find it. In dec, SB and I went to see the Gamble House in Pasadena. SB was amazed at the size of the beams (24" x 24" and 40' in a couple of cases). You cant even get that size lumber now. It would be a glue lam. Can you see how that would have changed those beautiful craftsman houses to have a glue lam instead of the beautiful beams?
08-24-2008, 12:35 PM
Kapohocat,did SB build your house ? What did he used to prevent termites? I looked up termimesh (thanks,Rob) - wondering if someone used it.
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Whatever you assume,please just ask a question first.
08-24-2008, 01:46 PM
quote: Absolutely not (build this house). This house is a disaster that drives SB crazy every day fixing, maintaining, repairing and correcting. Not two straight walls in this entire house. But that said, it is cedar and seems to have withstood the termite issues fairly well. But the bottom section is not wood. It is concrete filled cinder blocks with rebar. Still Hope, basically what Rob Tucker has said rings really true - if your worry is termites or fire, go with concrete product like Rob's. No matter what treatment you do, termites can get to it. They will eat (IMHO) pine or untreated Doug fir first, HiBor next, CCA treated after that, and ohia last. They dont seem to like ohia much because of the nasty oil in it. But eventually they do get to it. A concrete product will probably also withstand a hurricane fairly well although depending on wind speed may lose roofing materials. As for the earthquake issues, cracks can be of different kinds. There are structural cracks that are dangerous such as those found at the Mauna Kea Beach Hotel after the Oct 06 earthquake, and there a smaller cracks that are not structural but only the result of different heating and cooling and do not affect the buildings structural integrity. Slabs can get stress cracks from heating and cooling differently (like a slab poured half in the shade and half in sun). These cracks are usually only cosmetic. I also want to caution you about ballpark figures that someone mentioned. Is that ballpark Yankee stadium or the little league field down the street? You need a set of plans to get a ballpark figure. One caveat - unless you are doing a kit house with no changes that the contractor or builder has done recently. Then you can get a decent ballpark. Now with Rob's product, he estimates the material pretty regularly so he may be able to give you a decent SF price on materials but labor still it depends on your plans. it also depends on how soon you will be building - no one can forecast prices of materials and transportation too far in the future. This is the proverbial chicken and the egg - which comes first? Plans or costs. Now you all might just throw me out of the thread but if you estimate your costs at $150-175, you probably will be adequately safe unless you really go to town on finishes, or conversely do most of the work yourself. Take your budget, divide by $150 and then by $175 and that is your range of SF - so as an example say you had $100K to build - that is 571 to 667 SF range. You can bring the SF price down but based on the info you have provided in these threads the last few months - you may only be doing painting? (Pardon me if I am wrong on that.) Do what you really like - you will be living in it for awhile. And do it affordable for you. If you want to add on later on, have your draftsperson design it so it is easier to do an addition. Catherine Dumond Blue Water Project Management 808 965-9261 "We help make building your dream home a reality"
08-24-2008, 03:34 PM
quote: actually, the newer subdivisions on the island of o'ahu have buried cable lines. there are no poles around except for street lamps/poles. hawaiian electric is deciding on whether or not to do this along the west coast, namely the waianae coast, because of the problems (termite and storm damage) with the poles in recent years. however, the costs are phenomenal. i do know that steel poles replaced the wood ones along farrington highway, but at what cost? cat, very good advice. in another thread, i posted about our immediate neighbor whose home is supposed to be completed in 5 months with a budget of 500k @ $150/sft 5 bedrooms/5bath (i guess 5 is the magic number?). when speaking with the contractor about the price per sft, i mentioned that it seemed to be on the lower side. he agreed to build it at a "discounted" rate in exchange for advertising--sorta like this is a model home. "chaos reigns within. reflect, repent and reboot. order shall return." microsoft error message with haiku poetry
"a great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices."
w. james
08-24-2008, 04:12 PM
Thank you so much,Kapohocat!
For all your help here on the forum you already have your place in Heaven reserved! Seriously,I am very grateful for all your advice. When we first talked,I was in preschool and my favorite toy was a disposable portable cheap house. I am about to graduate,but the real road of life is still going to surprise me with a lot of bumps...
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Whatever you assume,please just ask a question first.
08-25-2008, 03:30 AM
Would be scary to live in a concrete house in Puna, you never know when or where the next big one will hit! I guess it's that way in California, too.
I'm looking into a steel-framed house from a company called Kodiak homes (found out about it here on Punaweb!). We are planning a p/p version with a seperate garage. A question I have is, is the no-paper drywall available on Hawaii? It is termite proof and highly mold resistant.
Puna: Our roosters crow first
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