Believe in Magic

Homecoming

2009-08-28T17:00:00.004-04:00

When you wish upon a star

Makes no difference who you are

Anything your heart desires

Will come to you

When you wish upon a star

Your dream comes true

Jiminy Cricket
Pinocchio, 1940

There is a custom among southern Protestant churches called Homecoming, when past and present members of a church gather together on a Sunday morning for the church service followed by an incredible and bounteous meal. Homecoming is a special time and takes a lot of preparation. Usually, the choir has learned a new piece of music, the church is freshly groomed and flowered, and anyone who has a favorite dish or a specialty is called upon to provide it. The closing prayer for church is often the blessing for lunch, which saves time in getting down to the serious business of doing one’s duty by the folks who brought the food. Tables are laden with every kind of southern food from squash casseroles to fried chicken, barbecue, potato salad and corn pudding, with plenty of sweet iced tea and lemonade to go around. The best part of the day is dessert, because there is always banana pudding and cakes and pies of every kind, with no limits placed on seconds. Homecoming is a celebration, a time when the old and the new come together to acknowledge what holds them together. Hugs and tears are exchanged over greeting old friends and meeting new babies as well as learning about those who are no longer among the living.

For Vince and me, coming to live in this house has been a kind of Homecoming. We have been planning this life and putting the pieces together for a long time, so there is both newness and a sense of the familiar in our surroundings. This first summer in the house has been a celebration and a recognition that something amazing has been brought to fruition. We come home to this house with that same joy in greeting an old and dear friend that is also something new and wonderful. Vince and I know this dream and its many moods quite well. We have watched over it as something dear and precious. It’s odd to think that now, the dream has done its job and has become a real house. We are thinking of getting a new dream, especially since we have plenty of room. (!)

So, here we are at the beginning of “Happily Ever After.” Daily life is unfolding as a kaleidoscope for the senses. What we see here is as much about the sky as it is the sea, and the wind is the potter that shapes each day into whatever it is going to be. For us, this will be a time for discovery. There’s no way to know what the next chapter of the story will be, but we can’t wait to turn the page.

It’s hard to think of what to say in ending this tale of building a house on the beach. There were so many lessons learned not just about construction but also about people and places and most of all…myself. There’s always more to talk about, but that will be a different story. It’s time now for this one to end.

We named the house Believe in Magic. I have such gratitude towards my husband for his belief in this particular magic. I was afraid to believe, but Vince never for one moment doubted that this big project was not just possible but would be wonderful. Not only that, he worked hard…really hard…to make sure that the house would be strong and the work would be good and all the pieces put in place as they should be. Vince is a man who will do whatever it takes to accomplish what he knows can happen. He really is the wizard who makes dreams come true, and I have learned from him not to give up.

As children, many of us we dreamed that we could fly and wore our senses of wonder wrapped around us like a snuggly sweater. Heroes and heroines were people that we, too, could be when we grew up, and there was a secret knowledge that each of us was truly magical and wonderful. I remember believing that very thing. Somehow, along the path to growing up, many of us either forget that we can fly, or become convinced that the dreams weren’t real, or that it’s just too hard to be magical. The truth is that each of us has within us the gift of promise. Even when life becomes very hard and very dark, that promise is still there…waiting to get to work on the dream.

The funny thing is that everyday life in 2009 is filled to overflowing with things that would have been thought fantastic, foolish or even crazy in another era, and much the same thing was true in our parents’ times and in the times before that. For every wonderful invention or discovery, there were probably hundreds…no, thousands…of people who never thought it possible. Wouldn’t it be great to hear, “You know, I hope that you are right. Go for it!” Want to know a secret? It doesn’t really matter what other people say. What makes the difference is what you know to be real and possible and how hard you work to make it happen. Vince tells me that as long as the physics works, anything you can think of is possible in time.

So there you go…dream your dream, and then make it come true. Better get busy, because life goes by fast!

Thank you for reading this blog. Come to see us up on the beach!

Thank you!

2009-08-28T10:25:00.000-04:00

Moving IN!!!

2009-08-27T15:53:00.000-04:00

Finishing Up the Details!

2009-08-26T15:54:00.000-04:00

Ground Cover

2009-08-26T15:51:00.002-04:00

Gotcha Covered: Seabrush Painting

2009-07-30T21:03:00.003-04:00

“I dream of painting and then I paint my dream.”

Vincent van Gogh 1853-1890

Although we used very low odor “green” paint by Pittsburgh Paints, the remarkable thing about the interior painting was not the painting itself but the young men who did the work. These young people really give me hope for the future. They work hard and well all day. They are thoughtful in the literal sense of the word: Considering life and behaviors, goals and dreams, and the difference between right and wrong / good and bad. I got to know two of the guys, Josh and Mike, rather well. Kyle was here fewer times, so I wasn’t able to talk as much with him, but I would like to. There’s something about the three of them that makes you want to sit down and hear what they have to say.

Mike and Josh have a band called Atriumantra. I heard some of their music online and liked what I heard. Theirs is not a genre that is in my vocabulary, but I definitely heard some good musicianship and a lot of intriguing variations in rhythm and sounds. These guys have something of value to tell the world, and Vince and I are listening.

HVAC and Electrical Trim-Out

2009-07-30T17:18:00.002-04:00

No explanations needed here. Take a look:

We're Floored!

2009-07-30T16:54:00.002-04:00

“Opportunity dances with those already on the dance floor”

H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

Life’s Little Instruction Book

When we long ago began to think about what to use for flooring, Vince and I discovered that there were a lot of Issues to discuss. Even though this beach is extremely humid with an average humidity about 76%, I like to have doors and windows open when the weather is nice. That means the floors need to be made from something that will remain dimensionally stable, especially since it is common to have the problem of wood floors “cupping” in humidity. This discussion ranged for many years, until Vince and I agreed on using engineered flooring, which has worked out well both in appearance and in function and will allow me the freedom to have the house open from time to time without dire consequences.

SO, what exactly is engineered flooring?

Engineered wood flooring is comprised of two or more layers of wood that are attached in the form of a plank. Laminate, vinyl and veneer floors are often confused with engineered wood floors, but are categorically not an engineered wood floor - laminate uses an image of wood on it's surface, vinyl is plastic formed to look like wood, and veneer uses a thin layer of wood with a core that could be a number of different composite wood products (most commonly, high density fiberboard).Generally, each engineered wood board consists of three or four layers of real wood, which are fixed together in a cross-ply construction. This means that it is more stable than one solid piece of real wood, and will withstand varying temperatures more effectively than solid wood.

After reading up on different manufacturers and speaking with some of the technical folks about the beach environment, we chose Wilsonart as the engineered flooring that would be most likely to survive the humid environment, the dogs, and sandy feet. The Wilsonart flooring is beautiful and looks like a natural hardwood floor, and that was as important to me as the performance. Other issues to consider were scratch resistance slip resistance stain resistance, and strength. Just as with tile, engineered flooring has been tried and tested to specific requirements for business and residential use. The measurements are available from any manufacturer, but it sometimes takes some effort to either find the information on the web-site or to speak with an engineer or technical support person who can clearly related the answers that you need. Just like anything else, it makes a big difference if the homeowner does his homework before venturing into asking questions about a product. After all, there is a need to know what to ask. This product is a floating floor that is glued together but not glued down. Each piece is fitted together and glued with a specific adhesive both for strength and also to help maintain the dimensional stability. Additionally, the flooring was not installed until after the air conditioning was turned on and the planks had been acclimated for 72 hours. We have every reason to believe that the floor will not cup, and we will see how it wears over time.

Once the decision about the type of flooring has been made, the next step is to find a knowledgeable retail store that uses excellent installers. The most wonderful product imaginable can be ruined by a poor installation. After a few bad experiences on the beach, Karl recommended that I sit down with Elizabeth at A and B Carpet One in Kitty Hawk. When I went to the store and asked her about Wilsonart, she said, “Honey, they call me Mrs. Wilsonart around here, because I love the stuff.” Elizabeth has attended several corporate seminars and knows the product and its applications well. When the time came to do the on site measurements for the flooring, Elizabeth came up the beach with Karen, who calmly measured and explained about how long the runs could be before there would need to be a break and which way the flooring should go. She also had some great ideas about products that we could use in the rooms that will have Wilsonart later on. I very much appreciated both of these ladies, both for their great personalities and approaches to me as well as for their knowledge and expertise. This Carpet One store has been owned by Frank Adams for about 35 years. His son, Chris, works at the shop. They were both supportive and helpful when working around the inevitable issues that come with building a house. This is definitely a great place to go for flooring.

Our Wilsonart, carpet, and vinyl flooring was installed by A and A Custom Wood Flooring, owned by two brothers, Art and Andy Garza. I was so impressed with these men. They did beautiful work, but the best part of meeting them was simply that they are such good people. I have said that same thing so many times while writing the blog, but it has been true for so many pieces of the house. Vince and I have met some truly wonderful people, and I am so pleased to have that kind of positive energy throughout the thousands of pieces and parts that have made up the house.

What can I say? We’re FLOORED!

Measure Twice, Cut Once: Finish Carpentry

2009-07-13T18:25:00.004-04:00

"Some days you're the hammer, and some days you are the nail."

From time to time during my early childhood, my father worked as a carpenter. Even when carpentry wasn’t his paying job, our garage was filled with wood, tools and a project in progress: Bird houses for the Cub Scouts, shelves for my bedroom, furniture for Barbee, a cabinet for a friend. My grandfather worked as a carpenter all his life, and though I never met him, I have seen a child’s doll cradle that he made in the late 1920’s for his neighbor’s daughter at Christmas. When I started working on the family tree, I found from an early census that my great-great-grandfather started work at age 18 as what he called a “tinker,” and he later listed his job as farmer and carpenter, so I have about 150 or so years of sawdust in my history. I love the smell and feel of wood and am always entranced by all that can be done with different types of wood and a capable carpenter, so I was very interested to meet Brent Slosser and his crew at Outer Banks Finish Carpentry.

The hardest part about deciding on the style of trim work to be done was learning what to call the images I had in mind. I wanted something simple enough to effectively “disappear” but distinctive enough to add shape and texture to the spaces. After an afternoon of hunting through books about trim work, Vince and I decided on a Craftsman style finish, and that turned out to be a good choice for this house. As it is, the work is lovely and can easily stand on its own merit, and the simplicity of the design will allow the addition of other textures or ornaments in time.

Like so many other things, this trade has its own vocabulary. I didn’t have any real knowledge of what to call the pieces and parts that would fit together around the windows and doors or those that would comprise the stairwell. It is hard to understand the difference between a window sill and a window stool, but the most interesting term was a “plinth block,” which sits at the bottom of the door casings. Brent asked me early on if I wanted to use plinth blocks, and I simply had no idea, though the answer turned out to be “no.” “Plinth” sounds like a term that someone mispronounced and forever created a word that sounds like a stifled sneeze!

Take a look:

A Place for Everything

2009-06-30T16:20:00.010-04:00

A place for everything and everything in its place.
original quote by Benjamin Franklin

used by Isabella Mary Beeton in The Book of Household Management, 1861

If someone working on a house might want to have everything just so, the person who can make that happen is Jeff Granitzki, his brother and sister, and the team at Island Woodcrafts. Jeff can fill a given space with as many drawers, cubby holes and shelves as you can possibly imagine, beautifully organized and in all sizes, colors and finishes, made by hand in the cabinet shop or ordered from a reputable commercial cabinet shop. Island Woodcrafts has been on the Outer Banks since the early 1970’s and has three locations: The plant in Wanchese, the showroom in Kill Devil Hills, and the original office with showroom in Manteo. I visited all three sites and met Jeff’s brother, Cliff, and his sister, Linda. Island Woodcrafts is a true family business, with the elder Mr. Granitzki only releasing an active role in the late 1990’s. (He will be 90 years old in January!) Mrs. Granitzki also played a key part through the years, and she passed away in 2002.

Island Woodcrafts was founded by Gus Granitzki after he fell in love with the Outer Banks while vacationing on Sandpiper Trace in the family Airstream trailer with his wife, Evelyn, and their children. At the time, Mr. Granitzki was the founding owner of Country Cabinet Shop in Skillman, New Jersey. As a young man in the 1940’s Gus had been a tool and die maker and was later working for RCA Labs when he began making furniture and cabinets at home. That sideline became a successful business, and the Granitzki children grew up with Dad at home in the cabinet shop, Mom helping Dad and making things run smoothly, and kids reared to do chores first and play later. Having grown up during the Depression, Gus was one of those people who never forgot the lesson that consistent hard work can make all the difference between successful survival and utter failure. The decision to sell the business in New Jersey and move wife and younger sons to North Carolina came when Gus was in his early 50’s, and the concept of beginning all over again in a new place was a huge change for the family, especially Mom. In the early 1970’s, Manteo was still a sleepy little coastal town with a big history…quite a change from the Princeton, NJ area. As the cabinet shop grew, the family began to feel more at home and gradually put down North Carolina roots. My romantic side thinks the idea of having Dad at home all the time and the whole family involved in supporting his job sounds like the American dream come true, but I can also imagine that some free and easy time would have been welcome. Cliff told me that having grown up in the '50's and '60's with work being all important in his home life, he never doubts that he can find and keep a job, so that was a good lesson.

When Island Woodcrafts was new, all of the cabinets were custom built in the cabinet shop on Ananias Dare Street in Manteo, first in the family garage and then in their shop next door. In the last 15 years or so, as factory cabinets have improved both in quality and value, more and more people have chosen those cabinets. Island Woodcrafts still makes custom cabinets and is fully equipped as a custom shop, but now about 90% of the cabinets are factory ordered to Jeff’s specifications. I visited the shop in Wanchese and was given demonstrations for the machines by Cliff. It made me wish that I could have afforded to have our new kitchen built to the exact shapes and sizes of the needs that we wished to fill. Island Woodcrafts does beautiful work, and it would be a very special experience and a true family legacy to have that type of special kitchen. Maybe someday…

The guys all tell me that Island Woodcrafts is a great place to work. Most of the craftspeople and installers have been with the Granitzkis for 20 or so years, and the two men who put this new kitchen together for me were the same two who installed the cabinets in our house in Duck. It was great to see them again! These are all good people to spend time with, and it is a treat any time they come out to work at the house.

Vince and I had been hoping to have a big dining room table, 54” by 96”, so that Vince can prepare feast for our friends and family. After shopping for one in our price range with no luck, we asked Jeff and company to create a maple table with a top that would match the counters in the kitchen. I was hesitant, but the table is ideal for what we need here. It was fun to have Island Woodcrafts do the work. As we live in the house, we want to add more cabinets and shelves and special places, and these are the people that we want to provide these pieces for us. Can’t ask for better! Take a look! This is great!

A Creative Touch for the Tile

2009-06-29T14:36:00.005-04:00

“If there is one spot of sun spilling onto the floor, a cat will find it and soak it up.”

unknown

There was a time when I thought choosing tile meant deciding which colors would look best in the kitchen and bathrooms. People at the beach would explain that tile works well in a beach house in terms of cleaning but does of course scratch and is slippery when wet. Actually, both of those assessments can be true but are not necessarily true. Floor tile carries with it more than 4,000 years of technique, trial, error, and success so that the intricacies and varieties of choice and quality are nearly endless…and yes, there is tile that will not be scratched by sandy paws nor slipped on with wet feet. Each of these aspects is measurable by the Mohs scale of mineral hardness and the coefficient of friction for slip resistance.

The Mohs scale of mineral hardness was devised in 1812 by the German mineralogist Friedrich Mohs (1773-1839). Mohs selected ten minerals that were readily available and based the scale on their linear order of scratch resistance. Conveniently, Mohs’ name also works as an acronym for “measure of hardness scale,” making it easy to remember. The Mohs characterizes the scratch resistance of various minerals through the ability of a harder material to scratch a softer material. Minerals with small atoms, packed tightly together with strong covalent bonds throughout tend to be the hardest minerals. Qualities of hardness are generally consistent because the chemistry of minerals is generally consistent. A scratch on a mineral is actually a groove produced by micro fractures on the surface of the mineral. It requires either the breaking of bonds or the displacement of atoms. A mineral can only be scratched by a harder substance. A hard mineral can scratch a softer mineral, but a soft mineral can not scratch a harder mineral. Therefore, a relative scale can be established to account for the differences in hardness simply by seeing which mineral scratches another, which is the essence of Mohs’ work. The Mohs Hardness Scale starts with talc at 1 and ends with diamond at 10 and is universally used around the world as a way of distinguishing minerals. Simply put; the higher the number, the harder the mineral. This method is actually ancient, having first been mentioned by Theophrastus in his treatise On Stones in ca 300 BC, followed by Pliny the Elder in his Naturalis Historia, written about 77 A.D.

Understanding the hardness scale is important when selecting tile for a beach house, because sand (quartz) is 7 on the moths scale. If the tile has a higher Mohs than seven, it will not be scratched by sand on the floor…really, no matter how hard you try. There are now more sophisticated scales and methods of measuring hardness, but the Mohs remains a reasonable tool for basic applications. Most ceramic tile manufacturers use the Mohs scale to test the scratch and abrasion resistance of the glaze that is applied to the tile and / or the body of the tile. Tile hardness is affected both by materials used and by the firing process. The amount of alumina (aluminum oxide) in clay determines the hardness of the tile. Alumina occurs naturally in some clay, like kaolin, but can be added into other clays to produce a harder tile. During the firing process, a longer and hotter firing eliminates oxygen and slightly shrinks and condenses the tile, which is another factor in tile hardness.

Coefficient of friction is used to measure slipperiness or the lack thereof. The coefficient of friction is a measure of the amount of resistance that a surface exerts on substances moving over it, equal to the ratio between the maximal frictional force that the surface exerts and the force pushing the object toward the surface. The measurement is not always the same for objects that are motionless and objects that are in motion. Motionless objects often experience more friction than moving ones, requiring more force to put them in motion than to sustain them in motion. In other words, a grandson running across a slippery kitchen floor in socks is more likely to fall than the person standing washing dishes at the sink. The static COF is the measurement that applies to objects that are motionless. The kinetic or sliding coefficient of friction is the measure that applies to objects that are in motion. In a COF measurement, a higher number indicates a less slippery surface. A higher COF is created by adding insoluble crystalline materials within the glaze. Textures in the surface of the tile also increase slip resistance. In our house, because we can often have wet surfaces from wet people coming in and out, the tile floors all have a wet COF of about 0.6. We all know when a floor “looks” and “feels” slippery, which is another reasonable first cut at slip resistance.

The important thing to remember about tile hardness and coefficient of friction in household applications is that tile is created with intention to be used in certain areas with given sets of parameters. Wall tiles are not the same as floor tiles, and tiles for outside patios and pool areas should not be the same as those inside the house. Tile manufacturers have developed processes for longer and hotter firing and for adding materials that affect the final product’s performance and durability as well as its beauty. Even though a tile sales person may say that these factors are not important, they are. If in doubt, have a conversation with the technical support or engineering personnel at any given tile manufacturer. The contact information is readily available online.

Once the tile and design has been chosen, which grout and underlayment to use are the next choices to be made. Without question, the grout choice for us was an epoxy grout, rather than the old style cement grouts. We specifically chose Laticrete Spectra-lock, because it is non-staining, non-cracking, helps to prevent leaks between tiles, and doesn’t require sealing. Epoxy grout is more expensive and requires a skilled installer, but the overall addition to the cost is minimal compared to the results and the performance. It is important to keep the comparative cost in perspective as well, since the old style grouts are extremely cheap but require yearly sealing and frequent cleaning. There is definitely an overall cost increase for epoxy grout, but when considering the house costs across the board, the additional amount is minimal for a permanently beautiful and maintenance free floor. As a plus for the aesthetics, epoxy grout has a luster and depth of color that truly outshines the old grouts, especially with glass and stone tiles.

Because cracked ceramic tiles are difficult to repair, it is important to try to prevent cracking. The familiar underlayments like Durock and Hardi-backer do the job of supporting the tile, but they can't prevent shifting and cracking. Because the tile is adhered to that substrate and subject to stresses from building movement or uneven applications, shifting and cracks in both the tile and the old-style grouts will occur. A relatively new product offered by the Schluter company addresses the issues of underlayment using both historic and current data applications. Read this excerpt from the Schluter web-site to get the idea, and then take a look at this video to get the picture:

Ceramic and stone tiles are durable, easy to maintain, and hygienic, representing the ideal surface coverings. However, today's lightweight construction methods can make the installation of hard surface coverings particularly challenging. In order to protect the integrity of the tile assembly, an underlayment that performs multiple functions is required.

Schluter-DITRA is a polyethylene membrane with a grid structure of square cavities, each cut back in a dovetail configuration, and an anchoring fleece laminated to its underside. Schluter-DITRA is bonded to the substrate using thin-set mortar. The anchoring fleece on the underside of Schluter-DITRA is fully engaged in the mortar to provide a mechanical bond to the substrate. Tile is installed over Schluter-DITRA using the thin-bed method in such a way that the mortar becomes mechanically anchored in the square, cutback cavities of the Schluter-DITRA matting.

Designed specifically for ceramic tile and dimension stone installations, Schluter-DITRA serves as an uncoupling layer, waterproofing membrane, and vapor management layer that accommodates moisture from beneath the tile covering. Further, DITRA performs all these functions while still providing adequate support/load distribution for the tile covering. Tile has been successfully installed for thousands of years by incorporating an uncoupling layer, or forgiving shear interface, within the tile assembly. Schluter-DITRA provides uncoupling through its open rib structure, which allows for in-plane movement that effectively neutralizes the differential movement stresses between the substrate and the tile, thus eliminating the major cause of cracking and delaminating of the tiled surface.

Once all the key decisions have been made about the structural aspects of the tile, then the design process can begin. Great tile that has the perfect hardness and slip resistance, installed with epoxy grout and ditra underlayment can still look perfectly awful, so it is important to find a creative and experienced tile designer and installer to make the ideas work. Here on the Outer Banks, the best company to pull everything together is Creative Touch Tile. Pete Sandfort, the owner of the shop, loves tile in all its many varieties and applications. Pete has a wonderful ability to envision and enhance the ideas that his customers bring into the shop. Because he keeps up with the tile industry, Pete is excellent at offering suggestions and tangential ideas that make his designs unique in both style and energy. He’s also fun, and that is priceless! Because Pete has been in the tile business for a long time and has years of installation under his belt, he knows how to create designs that are intricate but also doable for the installer. Our house is very simple in style, so Pete’s challenge from us was to create something simple but beautiful, and we think he succeeded. Pete’s office manager, Kathy Lucia, adds her ebullient personality and knowledge to the choosing process.

In the end, the most important person in the process is the tile installer. If the installer isn’t meticulous and knowledgeable, the project will lose its appeal. Our tile installer, Brian de Pedro, who owns T and T Tile, has the experience and expertise for the job, and he works to make the job beautiful as well. Brian and Tom, another “tile guy” who works with Brian, did a nearly perfect job with our floors. Vince and I have other tile projects that we hope to add over the years. I hope these guys are around to make those ideas come to life when the time comes.

Hanging and Mudding

2009-04-19T09:53:00.012-04:00

“A house is made of walls and beams;

a home is built with love and dreams.”

unknown

One of the oddest things about the end of the drywall installation was saying good-bye to the profusion of wires, pipes, vents, brackets, adhesive fillets, flitch plates, and the myriad of little things that we will never see again if we are lucky. Watching me looking at the drywall and hearing my comments on the job, one of the guys reminded me that in a few days this, too, will be completely hidden. There are many layers to completing a house, and this one was a “biggie.”

Our drywall company was Seabreeze Drywall owned by J.D. Crawford, who has been “hanging rock” on the Outer Banks for many years. There were some choices to make in the types of drywall used, with a few compromises along the way. For the generator room, the workshop, and the mechanical room, Type X was specified because of its fire resistance. (Type X paperless was used in the mechanical and generator rooms.) The presence of crystallized water makes all wallboard fire retardant to some degree, but Type X is formulated by adding glass fibers which increase the resistance to fires, especially once the hydrates are spent and the gypsum is left in powder form. Type C drywall is also fire resistant and considered to be a better choice than Type X, depending on the thickness of the board and other factors. Given our remote location, using Type C drywall throughout the house would have been a wonderful safeguard against fire. Because of our ceiling heights and the standard sizes of Type C drywall, that choice became cost prohibitive, leaving us with Type X in critical areas and standard drywall in most of the house. We also used paperless drywall in the bottom of the elevator shaft and purple XP drywall as an increased moisture barrier in the bathrooms. As a precaution against "pops" and for added wall strength, all of the drywall was glued and screwed.

Although I had heard stories about rough drywall guys, I found our two crews to be great folks. The first crew: Scrounge, Bubba, and Roland, came to cut and hang the “rock,” getting that big job done in just three days. That’s amazing, given the glue/screw appliaction, the size of the house and the height and angles of some of the ceilings. The second crew, Steve and Johnny, did the taping, mudding and sanding. Steve and Johnny are brothers who work well together and take tremendous pride in their craft. The impressive thing to me was that they both know a lot about the materials and the history of their trade. Steve explained to me that the bazooka, a mechanized tool that applies tape with “mud” and has a built in cutting tool, was originally made with left-over bazooka parts after World War II, hence the name and the appearance. When I asked Johnny if he knew anything about how long drywall had been used on the Outer Banks, he explained that a lot of knotty pine had been used through the years prior to drywall, because houses shifting in the winds and sand would cause plaster to crack. I wish that I had asked more questions, because this is a subject that is deeper than one might expect! Our specifications called for a Level 4 finish for drywall, which means that all joints and interior angles have tape embedded in joint compound, two separate coats of joint compound applied over all flat joints, and one separate coat of joint compound applied over interior angles. Fastener heads and accessories are covered with three separate coats of joint compound. All joint compound should be smooth and free of tool marks and ridges. It is recommended that the prepared surface be coated with a drywall primer prior to the application of final finishes. In our case, the painter will use a high solids primer prior to painting, which will complete this step for Level 4 and bring the finish up to a Level 5. Because the walls will have a slick finish rather than the textured “knock-down” finish common to this area, the extra care provided by Steve and Johnny will make a big difference.

The many uses of gypsum would make a terrific category on a game show for people who know a lot about unusual topics. Gypsum is used as fertilizer, a soil conditioner, as a binder for fast-dry tennis court clay, a tofu coagulant, a calcium supplement, blackboard chalk, an ingredient in Portland cement, a medicinal component in Chinese medicine, in foot creams, hair products, and is well-known for both plaster and drywall. Gypsum is an amazing and plentiful resource, but whose idea was it, anyway?

The word gypsum is derived from the Greek word meaning "chalk" or "plaster". Gypsum is a common mineral found in sedimentary rock formations in a crystalline form known as calcium sulfate dihydrate. Gypsum is found in layers that were formed under salt water millions of years ago before the water evaporated and left the mineral behind. The oldest traces of plaster renders (likenesses) are 9,000 years old and were found in Anatolia and Syria. Five thousand years ago, the Egyptians burnt gypsum in open-air fires, then crushed it into powder, and finally mixed this powder with water to make jointing material for the blocks of their monuments, such as the magnificent Cheops Pyramid. The ancient Egyptians also created models of plaster taken directly from the human body. Because gypsum from the quarries of the Montmartre district of Paris has long furnished gypsum used for various purposes, this material has been called plaster of Paris.In 1775, the prominent French chemist Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier discovered the chemical formula for gypsum: CaSO4,2H2O. The discovery that gypsum consists of calcium sulphate and crystalline water paved the way for the industrial processing of gypsum. Plaster results from the calcination of gypsum, which partially dehydrates to produce a hemi-hydrate (CaSO4 , ½ H2O).

Modern gypsum board has as its predecessor a product called “Sackett Board,” a composite material that was made of layers of thin plaster placed between four plies of wool felt paper. This board was patented in 1894 by Augustine Sackett, the man considered to be the grandfather of the gypsum board manufacturing industry. A sheet of Sackett Board was approximately 1/4 inch thick and 36 inches square. It had open edges, which tended to erode and the felt paper did not provide for a satisfactory wall finish. However, it was an excellent base for the application of gypsum plaster and it soon became a replacement for wooden slat lath in many places. To demonstrate the potential of gypsum plaster, the Alabaster Company used a mixture of gypsum plaster and fiber to finish the exterior of the 1893 Chicago World Columbian Exposition, thus filling the largest single order of gypsum plaster that had ever been completed to that date. In 1894, Sackett patented his manufacturing process for Sackett Board and opened several production facilities over the next eight years. By 1901, he was producing nearly 5 million square feet of board annually. Sensing the promise for the material, a group of small gypsum producers combined to form the United States Gypsum Company. By the end of 1902, the company had a total of 37 operations in the United States. In 1907, the Canadian Gypsum Company was formed, providing access to gypsum deposits in Nova Scotia.In 1909, Sackett sold his company to USG, where he served as a director until he died in 1914. In 1910, a process for wrapping the board edges was created, followed by the elimination of the two inner layers of felt paper, the replacement of the exterior felt facing with a paper-based covering, and the production of board in standard 4-foot widths. By 1916, Sackett Board had evolved into a ready-to-finish panel, and within a year, the production of the original product was discontinued. The demand for gypsum board accelerated during World War I. The first call-up of U.S. troops in 1917 created an urgent need for temporary military housing, both at home and overseas. The military used a variety of building materials to meet this need; however, a barracks fire led military specifiers to prefer gypsum board as a naturally fire-resistant material. Even so, wallboard use for residential housing was slow to gain popularity. After World War II, various industries seemed to simultaneously discover U.S. Gypsum Company and their amazing product, which they called "drywall" for obvious reasons. After the war, many builders were reluctant to return to the time consuming task of plastering walls, when the quicker completion of housing with the use of wallboard was more efficient and definitely more profitable…and homeowners liked it! Through the years, drywall has continued to evolve as the many uses and modifications of gypsum become apparent. From an inauspicious beginning as a basic building material, gypsum board has become the preferred interior finish material in North America. The ability of the basic gypsum mineral to adapt to a variety of circumstances has allowed it to be recast and reformulated over many centuries into a variety of different materials. Adaptive uses for gypsum are still being sought and its future as a building material remains bright. Very interesting!

Decisions! Decisions!

2009-04-08T21:07:00.002-04:00

Brabble Insulation Fills the Gaps

2009-04-06T13:35:00.008-04:00

Who has seen the wind?

Neither you nor I,

But when the trees bow down their heads

The wind is passing by.

Christina Rossetti

Writing this entry about insulation and its effect on the comfort of the house evoked some wonderful memories of growing up in North Carolina in a time before air conditioning was the norm. I do remember living with storm windows when I was a teenager, but I can’t think when it was that we first had air conditioning at home. In the summer, it was common to close the blinds against the heat of mid-day, opening them again when the sun was lower in the sky. At my own childhood home, summertime meant that the windows were always open, and the sound of the screen door slamming cheerfully meant that the arrival of summer was official. We had oscillating fans and cardboard fans and community pools…all of which worked fine for my home town. I remember waking up to the sound of my neighbor trimming her rose hedge and the smell of mown grass. During summer evenings, the grown-ups sat outside drinking sweet iced tea and talking while we children ran the neighborhood and played. That was a wonderful time, and I miss the freedom of having the outside and the inside blending together.

In the early years on the Outer Banks, most houses were summer homes and had no insulation. The houses were built to stay cool with balloon framing, which also contributed to their being able to dry out. The first cottages in Nags Head were faced with either juniper or cypress shingles, and interior walls would be made of knotty pine. Although things might get wet over and over again, the sea air and the sun dried it all again. I sometimes wonder if it is crazy for us to want to live by the sea all the time and to do all of these things to make that life possible. From my personal perspective, I often think that simpler is better and that most of the time we can be fine with what’s what, but at the same time we want to house to stay in place with us in it for a very long time.

Our house is now fully insulated, thanks to the great guys at Brabble Insulation. They used a combination of closed cell spray polyurethane foam and unfaced fiberglass batts to get to R50 in the roof, R40 under the house, and R28 in the exterior walls. Unfaced fiberglass batts were used alone between the floors and in the interior walls, primarily for sound reduction. For the exterior shell of the house, we would have preferred to use only foam insulation, but that would have been extremely expensive for not an incremental gain in insulative value.

What is spray polyurethane foam, and why is it such a good idea for a coastal environment? For our application, Brabble used InsulStar, a 2 lb/ft3 closed-cell foam from NCFI, a North Carolina company based in Mt. Airy, NC. NCFI produces spray polyurethane foam by “mixing two chemicals, polyol and isocyanate, in the presence of catalysts and other additives using a specially engineered spray applicator system.” When the chemicals are mixed, they expand to form adhesive foam that sticks to everything it touches, hardens, and seals the surfaces. The foam expands 20 to 30 times its liquid state to fill cracks and crevices, providing a solid air and moisture barrier that “stops air leakage in and out of your home, reduces noise, and blocks dust, pollen and other airborne pollutants.” For us, the application of a moisture barrier was the primary reason for choosing the closed-cell foam, especially since we sealed the outside of the house with the Grace Perma-Barrier House Wrap. Not following through with a low permiance barrier inside the house would have risked the integrity of the sheathing, knowing that any moisture that penetrated the sheathing would be stuck there rotting the wood.

An equally important benefit of SPF is that it reinforces the exterior sheathing and studs, increasing resistance to “racking” from hurricanes and other strong wind events. Racking is a structure’s response to a shearing force, causing the house to distort its shape from a rectangle to a parallelogram. For example, a strong wind blowing hard against the front wall of a house applies a shear force to a side wall, literally pushing or pulling it out of shape so that the house can topple over. Simply put, SPF makes the walls harder to push or pull. That is an amazing benefit!

Because there are no penetrations in the roof and a conditioned attic, Vince wanted to use 3 ½” of SPF covered by 10 inches of unfaced fiberglass batts. This specification for insulating the roof deck became quite a challenge. It was important that the two types of insulation abut, both for the accumulated R value and to be sure there was not an open space to accumulate condensation. Since the roof was constructed of open web trusses, there was no good way to attach the batts. Karl had the great idea for Currituck Construction to fur down the rafters to provide a support web, and Brabble used nylon webbing to strap the batts in place. It was a terrific system. There are alternate methods for doing a job like this, as in long stick pins that go through the batts and adhere to the roof deck, but this was a much easier and cleaner method. Vince and I really appreciate Brabble’s willingness to do this extra step to give us what we needed in the roof. As in so many of the house systems, not being able to have the correct R value in the roof would have resulted in stressing the HVAC system, skewing the application of Steve Jenkins’ Manual J calculations and leading to less energy efficiency.

Because of his particular interest in energy efficient homes as well as in the quality of his own work, Pat Brabble offered to conduct a Blower Door Test on the house, even though the house was newly insulated and neither drywall nor woodwork had been installed. Pat is no longer a credentialed Blower Door test GUY, but he is trained in its administration and able to “score” the results. A Blower Door Test is basically an energy audit to determine a home’s airtightness. Establishing the building tightness shows how to lessen energy consumption due to leakage, avoid moisture condensation problems, and eliminate uncomfortable drafts. Basically, a Blower Door consists of a frame and flexible panel that fit in an exterior doorway, a powerful variable-speed fan that mounts into the frame, a pressure gauge to measure the pressure differences inside and outside the house, an airflow manometer and hoses for measuring airflow. The fan either pulls air out of the house, lowering the inside air pressure OR pushes air into the house, increasing the inside air pressure. Pat did the test for us both ways. Here’s how it works: If the house is DE-pressurized, the higher outside pressure pulls air in through all the unsealed cracks and openings. If the house is pressurized, the higher inside pressure forces air out. Auditors sometimes use a smoke pencil to detect air leaks, but Pat’s guys were happy to use lit cigarettes instead. By following the smoke and listening to the sound of the air flow (it’s LOUD!), the leaks can be found and then sealed. Blower Door Tests can be either calibrated or uncalibrated. An uncalibrated test only detects air leaks but doesn’t measure the overall tightness of a building.

The Blower Door Test measures the air exchange rate for the total volume of the house, expressed as Air Changes per Hour (ACH). A good score for a completed house is .35, which means that all of the air in the house is exchanged with outside air every 3 or so hours. That is roughly the equivalent of having a small window open all the time. A good score would qualify a home as an Energy Star House and make available various tax credits. Our test results came back as .08, which is phenomenal, especially considering that the house is not complete. Pat will come back and do a “final” Blower Door Test for us when the interior is finished just for his own satisfaction, but BC Custom Builders may also want to have an official test done by Dominion Power to help in green building qualification assessments. Having a score of .08, which will surely be less the next time, lets us know that the house is very tight, which is good, but also that the use of the Energy Recovery Ventilation system is really important in providing good indoor air quality.

Here’s a little video that shows the Blower Door Test:

Vince and I would highly recommend Brabble Insulation for any job. These people were just great to work with, and the work was beautiful and neat. They even put straps on the fiberglass batts under the house so that it would stay in place until the underpinning could go on. There was a level of hard work and professionalism that is gratifying to see and to enjoy.

Lights, Camera, Action!

2009-03-26T19:05:00.003-04:00

Light Bulb
by Joan Bransfield Graham

Thomas
Edison didn’t
hesitate to let
ideas incubate, and
try again, if they
weren’t right. One
day to his intense
delight, he squeezed
his thoughts
into a bulb
and then
turned
on the
light
light
light
!!!

Imagine for a moment that you are fishing the Nile River in Egypt around 2750 BC and catch a fish that delivers an electric shock. What would you do? Would you tell someone or pretend it didn’t happen? Would anyone believe you? What if you lived in the Mediterranean 2,000 years later and noticed that rubbing an amber rod on a cat’s fur could attract things like feathers? (My guess is that a five year old boy discovered that one!) Would that lead you to try other things might work on different kinds of fur? For thousands of years, people have used their curiosity, intelligence, and ingenuity to both delve into intriguing observations and invent solutions to nagging problems, and that’s pretty much the story of how electricity was developed. First one thing was noticed, explored and added to, and then another and another, until finally that power was harnessed and refined into something that most of us consider to be a vital necessity.

Fast forward to the 1940's in Currituck County on North Carolina's Outer Banks, where electricity was scarce and a young man named Jesse Owens was just starting out in life. After working as a merchant marine and learning something about electricity and the electrical code aboard ship, Jesse came home to Currituck to work, be with his wife, and raise a family. At that time, many houses on the Outer Banks had little or no electricity, and there was already an established electrician in the area. This made it hard for young Jesse to get enough work to make ends meet unless there was a job that the other electrician did not want. According to his younger son, Nathan, Jesse would and could do a lot of different kinds of work: Painting, plumbing, electrical or carpentry…anything that would pay the bills. Back then, one crew would build a whole house from start to finish, unlike today’s situation where all the trades are separate companies. During that time, Jesse was contacted by a local furniture company that sold appliances. Even in the '40's, appliances required electricity to operate, which was a problem. In order for the furniture company to make sales, an outlet needed to be provided so that the appliance could be plugged in…hence the call to Jesse. The idea was that when the traveling salesperson would try and sell the appliance, enough money would be included to pay Jesse to add the required outlet. As Nathan explains it, “Once that got him in the house working ... the home owner would ask about adding other outlets or lights. In some cases the house had no electricity at all. That would require adding the service with the panel (fuse) box along with the outlet. At the time water heaters were a luxury as well. A 100 amp service on a house at the time was a large service. Most had 60 amp service, and when they would add a water heater that would be metered separate. Now most houses have a 400 amp service with two 200 amp panel boxes.”

Jesse went on to raise his family and a very successful business in Currituck County, which his sons have carried on in both electrical work and HVAC. Both Owens boys worked in the family business growing up, and they each do different pieces of that same work today. Nathan remembers going out on the job with his dad by the time he was 10 or 11 years old, working after school by the time he was 14 years old, and leaving school mid-day to work during High School. Here’s what he told me about working up where my house is being built:

“At that time doing a job in Corova was a big deal. You watched the weather and tide charts, you would check the truck over more so than normal, and plans would be made weeks in advance for the trip to Corova. So, I would be the one sent to Corova, leaving the shop in the dark. I would do the HVAC and then also the electrical. Most nights we would load the truck to come home by the truck headlights. If you remember back then the road above Duck was sand, and there was a guard gate at the Dare/Currituck line and no cell phones so it was up to you to get in and out. You carried extra clothes and food just in case you had to spend the night. To back way up ... Daddy did jobs in Corolla that it was quicker to go by boat because he did not have a vehicle that could make it up there. At that time the road was a dirt path beside the power lines (everyone called it the pole road). He would get someone to run him over and then come back to get him that afternoon. Back to me .... I would be the one sent to Hatteras, Elizabeth City, Knotts Island. "

It is Nathan Owens and HIS son, Randy, along with Ernest Meekins, who are doing the work at my house, and the company is called Jesse N. Owens Electric Company. Randy has the wonderful energy of being a young knowledgeable person, and he goes about the job with calm and obvious competence. Randy is endlessly patient as well, even when faced with unending rows and rows of wire that all have to be connected to the right things. I teased Randy once as he stood on a ladder with wires everywhere, saying he was probably excellent at putting the lights on the Christmas tree. He grinned and replied that was a job he really didn’t much care for. These guys are excellent at their work, and they are such great people to talk to that it makes you want to break something just so they can come out and fix it for you. Any time you can get Nathan to tell a story is time well spent.

The remarkable thing about the electrical installation in our house on the beach is not so much in the technology of electricity itself or in the differing functions of LED vs. incandescent light bulbs. It is more about the fact that there is electric service out there at all and the hard working company who did the work on the house. Of course, Vince did a lot of work planning and deciding what kind of lighting and which appliances to use in the house. The main goals were/are to use less energy and to plan for the systems of the house to work together well, which is really the same thing, isn’t it? This is really the only big technology in the house that was not “engineered,” but then it was, because Nathan did it. Vince addressed concerns about power outages and power surges and appropriate grounding and protecting the house and its parts from lightning strikes, noting that there are some key differences between what the building code requires and. what Mother Nature does, but the majority of the planning was in regard to how the house will be used. Where will the lamps be plugged in, and how much light will be needed in the guest bathroom? Will it be better to stand to the left or the right of the stairs to turn on the hall lights? For me, those decisions were honestly difficult, not being a person who really notices her own behaviors, but Nathan is very astute and detailed and leaves nothing to chance. Here’s what he said about part of his early experience:
“Back then you had to do the job in your head and imagine every piece that was needed and then make sure you have it. If not it had to be ordered, so you could not wait until you realized you didn't have it and run to the supply house or Home Depot. I was not the one that would be sent to do what people called the beach boxes (rentals). Daddy would send the other guys. I would do the bigger home owner houses. I guess that is where I learned to pay so much attention to detail.”

Well, thank goodness!

Randy’s wife, Candace, is a gifted artist. I was recently introduced to her work, but I haven’t yet met her in person. Vince and I both love the pieces that we have seen. In particular, I am intrigued by the expressions on the faces of the animals that she paints. There is a wonderful intensity in Candace’s work that gives the paintings life and vitality, especially combined with the vivid colors that she often uses. I absolutely want Candace to do a mural or a piece for us, and I can’t wait to find out what ideas she may have for our house. Here’s a video of some of her paintings. I wanted to post this here, because finding her work is much too wonderful to keep as a secret. Take a look:

The Believe in Magic Gazebo

2009-03-24T08:51:00.001-04:00

Down in the Hole

2009-03-21T20:59:00.004-04:00

Down in the hole

Lord, it's deep and the sides are steep

And the nights are long and cold

Down in the hole

Light and love and the world above

Mean nothing to the mole

Down in the hole

James Taylor

What would the answer be if this question were asked of a group of four-year-old children: “What do you think you would find if you dug a hole at the beach that was 200 feet deep?” In my experience, the answers would range from the fantastic, “an underground sand creature that has a secret passage to the ocean”, the whimsical, “a special land where fairies had a magical kingdom,” to the mundane, “worms and dirt and maybe some dead stuff.” In truth, after watching the guys drill the holes for the ground loops, I think the answer is really just “more sand.” How about this one: “How deep is 200 feet?” Since the average American four-year-old child is about 3.3 feet tall, it would take 60.6 children standing on top of each other to make a tower 200 feet tall, even if the boys were standing on tip-toe. Put them down instead of up, and that’s a really deep hole!

On Valentine’s Day, Steve Van Horn and his Chesapeake Wells crew began the installation of the vertical loops for the geothermal heat pump. Vince and I took the dogs up to the house and sat on the walkover to watch the process. As Steve had told me earlier, his is one of the world’s dirtiest jobs. I would add the adjectives “cold”, “wet”, and maybe “tedious” to that description. Digging a deep well hole is definitely hard work!

At the beach, a geothermal heat pump requires a closed loop system, meaning that the fluid, in this case water, circulates through the loop fields’ pipes and does not pull in water from a water source. (Open loops would be subject to salt water intrusion.) The pipes run through the ground, but there is no direct interaction between the fluid in the pipes and the earth other than the heat transfer across the pipe. There are four choices for the shape of the ground loop system: Vertical, horizontal, and slinky (coiled), and pond. Because the beach environment is sandy and subject to erosion and overwash, vertical loops offered the best opportunity for damage control, and they obviously take up less horizontal space, so that was our choice. The length of loop required is determined by the ground formation, the ground temperature, the heating and cooling power needed for the house and the balance between the amount of heat rejected to and absorbed from the ground during the year. This determination was done our mechanical engineer. Steve dug eight wells that are about 200 feet deep, so there are about 1600 feet of pipe. (A well in this definition is a deep hole, rather than a place to fill your water bucket.) Although the tubing can be made from various metals, these pipes are polyethylene, also a common material for this use and more appropriate in the corrosive environment of the coast. The pipe pairs in the hole are joined with a U-shaped cross connector at the bottom of the hole. Oh, wait! That makes it 3200 feet of pipe!

Anyone who has tried to build a sandcastle knows how hard it is to create any kind of hole in the sand that will stay open, and the idea of a 200 foot deep hole seemed laughingly impossible, though I knew better than to say so. As it turns out, the borehole is commonly filled with drilling mud, a sodium bentonite clay that does a multitude of jobs in the drilling process. In the end, the clay surrounds the pipe both keeping the borehole intact and providing a good thermal connection to the surrounding sand for maximum heat transfer. Steve uses a product called Quik-gel, a sodium bentonite clay found in Wyoming. This is really neat stuff, and it can be used in outside stock ponds or lagoons, to prevent leaching in land fills, for waterproofing, on and on. Steve adds soda ash to the mixture when digging in a saltwater environment.

So, what happens, exactly, to make this possible? The well drilling rig uses a diesel engine to power an hydraulic pump. The hydraulic pump spins the drill string, a column of drill pipe that transmits the drilling fluid (via the mud pumps) and rotational power (via the top drive) to the drill bit. The drill string is hollow so that the drilling fluid can be pumped down through it and circulated back up the annulus (the void between the drill string and the formation). The drill bit has holes in it to allow the drilling mud to be at the site of the scour. As the hole is dug deeper and deeper, the clay coats the walls of the borehole. The bentonite clay is also a viscosifier, keeping the bits of shell and debris in suspension until they can be pumped out into the mud pit. The mud pit, in this case a horse trough, works as a settling tank for the debris, which is shoveled out before it can be re-circulated through the system. Thus, the mixture of clay and water is continually pumped down into the hole and the debris brought back out of the hole until the proper depth is achieved.

Finally, the ground loop pipes are fed down into the hole along with the same length of rigid CPVC pipe, which acts as a sort of guide for the flexible pipe. The CPVC pipe is then pulled back out, leaving the loop in place. After all the loops are installed, the loops are connected together in the form of a manifold, and the loop field is established. Finally, the loops are trenched in and fed into the house where they will be connected to the Water Furnace heat pump system. Voila! Oh, if it were only that easy…

Take a look at the guys in action:

How Will We Get to the Beach?

2009-02-11T10:53:00.009-05:00

“Sponges grow in the ocean. That just kills me. I wonder how much deeper the ocean would be if that didn't happen.”

Stephen Wright quotes (American Actor and Writer, b.1955)

There is a wonderful children’s book called, How Will We Get to the Beach? (Luciani & Tharlet, 2000) that is a puzzle story about a young woman named Roxanne and the five things she wants to take with her to the beach. It’s a bright, delightful book that is fun for young kids, and the evolving story clearly shows how solving one problem doesn’t mean that all the other problems will politely follow suit. When thinking about the outside spaces for the house, there were similar things to consider: How will we get to the beach, and how does that impact where to put the doors or where the outside steps might land? We decided on big screened porches on the upper and lower floors on the south side, a porch with a shed roof over the entry on the west side, a small screened porch off the master bedroom upstairs on the north side, and an unscreened porch off the studio downstairs on the north side. There is a deck area between the first floor porch and the walkover on the south side, a walkover that travels from that deck to the beach, an outside shower off the walkover, and an octagonal gazebo down near the dune line. Each space and the pathway to it brought a series of different problems to solve and issues to consider.

Our decks and porches have been built primarily by Jim Berge, who works for Currituck Construction. Jimmy is really a deck specialist. He is absolutely meticulous in the way he puts materials together, and that pride clearly shows in his workmanship. On some sections, especially the walkover and gazebo, Jimmy has been working with Stuart, another excellent carpenter from Currituck Construction, but he seems to prefer to work alone. Both men take the time to do a great job, and they are good folks, too. We appreciate them and look forward to enjoying the spaces they have created for us.

Screened porches were a given from the very first conversations about the house. The climate on the Outer Banks lends itself to spending time outside much of the year, and we wanted ways to dine al fresco, for visiting children to have a place to play and for my Aunt Earlene to be able to smoke cigarettes without worrying about mosquitoes. We have envisioned the porches as places for puzzles, snacks, cups of coffee in the morning, glasses of wine in the evening and a lot of good conversation all through the day. The Currituck Beach Lighthouse is visible from the upper porch on the south side, and that will be a friendly beacon to watch in the night. Deciding to add porches off the north (i.e. stormy) side of any ocean front house can be problematic, so those are something of a calculated risk. Vince worked with Rick House on the structural bits and pieces to keep out the wind-driven rain and to protect the main house if the porches are lost. There will be many sultry summer days when the cooler breezes on the north side will be much appreciated. Admittedly, the north side porches were long a part of our imagined life while dreaming of the house, especially the one off of our bedroom with its image of the perfect place to start and end a day. The porch off my studio will not be screened, because I wanted one place to step outside in the shade without being closed in even by screening. We have one neighbor who is planning to call me every time there is a nor’easter to say, “I told you so,” regarding those north porches, and I am planning to call him with my own, “I told you so,” when the delicious north breezes turn that beach into paradise.

For many years prior to building our own house, Vince and I spent time a lot of time driving around looking at different styles of beach houses to get ideas. We also rented houses in the area where we are building both to be sure that our decision to live there was viable and to look carefully at what works well in a beach house and what doesn’t. We rented a house called Bear Inn that had a level walkover from the house out to the dune with an octagonal gazebo at the end. That was wonderful! Both things were integrated into the house plans, with the walkway and the gazebo as high off the ground as the first floor of the house. That will be fun! In the years of looking around, I began to notice a common quality in many houses that became a pet peeve: Lovely houses had oddly rough decks with rusty nails poking out. Vince began to look for a solution to that problem and finally found a product called Timbersil (http://www.timbersilwood.com) made from a process that combines yellow pine with glass. One huge advantage is that anything made from this material should continue to look good and function well for many years, especially with this use of Type 316 stainless steel screws. Timbersil is Class A fire retardant, unaffected by seawater or insects, and it is GREEN! Sounds too good to be true, but it’s real and a good choice for our environment. The budget for Timbersil ran out at the end of the deck, so the walkover and gazebo are made from double-treated MicroPro. (http://www.osmosewood.com/micropro/micropro.html)

Take a look at these videos to learn more about Timbersil:

One problem in attaching decks to houses is the gathering of moisture between the house and the deck at the point of attachment, causing rot. It is important to have an offset between the deck and the house to provide airspace. This airflow allows the house and the decking to stay dry, providing a much less vulnerable spot in the structure as well as a much less habitable place for insects. Maine Deck Bracket makes an effective product that all of the guys on our building site really liked. The bracket is made of a highly corrosion resistant tempered aluminum that will not rust and is securely bolted to the house. The number of brackets, type of bolts, and spacing of the brackets is determined by the load they must carry, so care must be taken in both the decisions and the installation. Here’s the link: http://deckbracket.com/

My two most important personal dreams for the house were the octagonal gazebo and a bathtub…both thoughtful spots. I know there will be other places to be comfortable with a book , a camera, or a journal, like the porches, the window seat, or even sitting on the steps at the window wall. I hope that will be the gift we can give our friends and family: a place to breathe easy and think good thoughts...and Vince’s wonderful food.

Up on the Roof

2009-02-03T20:08:00.002-05:00

Tevye: A fiddler on the roof. Sounds crazy, no? But here, in our little village of Anatevka, you might say every one of us is a fiddler on the roof trying to scratch out a pleasant, simple tune without breaking his neck. It isn't easy. You may ask 'Why do we stay up there if it's so dangerous?' Well, we stay because Anatevka is our home. And how do we keep our balance? That I can tell you in one word: tradition! Without our traditions our lives would be as shaky as, as... as a fiddler on the roof!

From the play, Fiddler on the Roof
1964

The main reasons for having a roof on one’s house are obviously to keep the weather out and to have some control over the environment it covers. Although time will tell, our trussed hip roof is designed to be a secure system. The completing step is to use an outer skin that will do the job of preventing heat, cold, wind, or wind driven rain from leaking in and heated or cooled air from leaking out. In a High Velocity Hurricane Zone, it is important to use a roof covering that will not blow off or puncture during a storm, as well as an underlayment that provides a sealed skin over the roof deck in the case that the covering fails. Essentially there are two parts to a roof system, with the outer skin and covering protecting the underlying framework. The wooden part of the roof structure was put together by the framing contractor, Currituck Construction Company, and the outer layer will be completed by the roofing company, JBH Roofing, Inc. However, even the very best contractors can’t prevent storm damage if the roof design and the systems within the house are not carefully planned to maintain the integrity of the roof.

A primary goal for the roof on one’s house would be that it not have a hole in it, but that simple concept turns out to be quite a challenge. In fact, most roofs have more than one hole: dryer vents, roof vents, plumbing vents, range hoods, fireplaces, heating system vents, left-over pump-jack holes…lots of possibilities, including vented soffits. Our house was designed to minimize or eliminate any possible roof penetrations, and Vince worked with the sub-contractors to find ways to vent the house systems either through the west wall or through the south porch roofs…so far, so good. Using the spray polyurethane foam insulation applied directly to the roof deck eliminates the need for venting the roof by taking away any heatable air space between the roof deck and the insulation, so there will be no penetrations for roof vents and no vented soffits. A resulting benefit is conditioned storage space above the ceiling. The porches are built to be sacrificial, meaning that if they are lost in a storm, the main house will remain intact, including the roof.

The next task was to decide which underlayment and which outer covering to use on the roof. Metal roofing is a great choice in a hurricane prone environment, but for us (i.e. at our age) the costs outweighed the benefits. We chose the GAF-ELK Timberline Armorshield II shingles, which pass ASTM D3161 wind test Class F at 120 mph and ASTM D7158 wind test Class H at 150 mph. These heavy shingles are also rated Class 4 for impact resistance (that’s the highest) and Class A for fire resistance. They pass muster for Miami-Dade and the Texas Department of Insurance, so there’s good reason to expect them to do well in North Carolina. Oddly, these shingles are not sold in North Carolina, so we bought them from Texas. There are several different warranties available, but the testing was much more significant in this decision that was the warranty.

Vince wanted a continuous membrane for the roofing underlayment and chose Grace Ice and Water Shield. This membrane is composed of two waterproofing materials – an aggressive, rubberized, asphalt adhesive backed by a layer of high-density, cross-laminated polyethylene. The adhesive bonds tightly to the roof deck, creating an impermeable surface. The rubberized asphalt seals around roofing nails, resisting leakage. Our specifications called for Type 316 stainless steel ringshank nails, so that corroding fasteners would not create a gap in the underlayment. Ice and Water Shield is also slip-resistant, so I felt better about the guys walking around up on the roof.

The biggest frustration in trying to protect the roof from penetrations has been from the use of pump-jack scaffolding when siding the house. A pump-jack scaffold consists of a platform supported by moveable brackets on vertical poles. The support braces for the scaffold are screwed into the roof, with approximately four screws per support. That’s a lot of holes! Generally, the pump-jacks are attached through the shingles near the edge of the roof, so there are holes that go through the shingle and through the underlayment into the roof deck. Unless those holes are carefully repaired, wind-driven rain will easily find a path into the roof structure. On the east side of our house, the pump-jacks were removed before the shingles were applied, and each hole through the underlayment was sealed. On the west side of the house, the pump-jacks were removed to apply the shingles and then put back through the shingle after the roof was completed. I have asked for that row of shingles be replaced and the holes in the underlayment to be resealed. From the perspective of someone just observing the process, I have to say that it a foolish system. It makes much more sense to finish the work with the pump-jacks and then to put on the outer skin of the roof. Why voluntarily punch a hole in the roof? Aagh!

The key to feeling assured that the roof will not leak is to find a certified roofer and to talk with him about the many different aspects of the job before that roofer is hired. The roofer recommended to us by our general contractor was Jason Hill, whose company is called JBH Roofing, Inc. Jason has really been “on board” with the goals that we have for the house. It was Jason who taught me about the pump-jack problem, and it will be Jason who makes sure the roof is intact. Jason and his brother, Brian, met with us to talk about choices for shingles and underlayments, and he has been carefully attentive to the specifications and details along the way. He is an authorized GAF residential roofing installer, so we felt confident that he knew the GAF product applications well.

In addition to being a great roofer and a good person to be around, Jason is a gifted visual artist. He has been a student of Glenn Eure, a veteran artist who owns and exhibits works in his Ghost Fleet Gallery in Nags Head, NC. Glenn has given Jason not only the gift of his teaching but also the gift of his friendship in mentoring a budding colleague. Vince and I have commissioned Jason to create a piece for the new house, and we also plan to purchase a couple of the paintings and prints that are now available. The work is what Glenn calls “non-objective abstract in mixed media,” because Jason begins without a specific goal in mind, allowing it to unfold as he works with the shapes, colors and materials. I took some photographs of a selection of his pieces and created a slide-show video from those that I saw. Take a look. It’s really beautiful work, and we are honored to have this part of Jason’s spirit within our house…and on its roof!!!

Splish Splash: Getting Ready for a Bath

2009-01-27T20:20:00.009-05:00

BATH, n. A kind of mystic ceremony substituted for religious worship,
with what spiritual efficacy has not been determined.
Ambrose Bierce,
The Devil’s Dictionary, 1911

I have read that some people as long ago as 3300BC and as far away as ancient India and Rome had plumbing systems and bathtubs and even flushing toilets, but my own North Carolina history is dotted with outhouses, hand water pumps, and homemade soap. My step-father, born in 1901, chuckled as he told us a tale about how he and some other boys turned over the outhouse at school around 1913, only to find that the Principal was inside! Turns out that tipping over outhouses on Halloween night was also a popular prank back in the 1930’s, but the kids had to be careful not to fall in! My mother grew up with an outhouse that was used during the day and a chamber pot to be used during the night. She can describe vividly how very cold it was to use one if you had to get up on a winter night in an unheated house. Anyone who has ever hauled a heavy, bucket of dripping water knows what a wonderful thing it is to turn on a faucet and have water flow from it like magic. Being near a water source is necessary for life, and being able to have a system of pipes that brings water into the house definitely makes life much more comfortable and convenient. Those pipes keep the world a cleaner place as well, especially since throwing waste out a window from a chamber pot was still common practice until the early 1900’s. Many of us remember hearing the old saying for a person who was either a n’er do well or had a poor economic background: “He didn’t have a pot to piss in, nor a window to throw it out of.”

The United States has made a lot of progress in plumbing in just a century, most of it since World War II. For a while, pipes were made from hollowed out logs, then came lead, ceramic, copper, concrete, galvanized steel, brass, ductile iron, and plastics. Sealants have been explored and modified, changing as pipes have improved from oakum (a mixture of pitch and hemp or jute fiber) to rubber gaskets, solder for copper, and now adhesives that fuse CPVC pipes together. Today, not content to simply have water piped in and waste piped out, we like for the water to be clean, tasty, hot or cold, with a sufficient amount of water pressure, and piped through a system that doesn’t leak, decay, or house bacteria…and that is also environmentally friendly with good conservation.

The system chosen for the new house is a Home-Run Plumbing System, and our plumber of choice is Gary Ballard, of Ballard Plumbing Company in Harbinger, NC. Although the Home-Run System is new to the Outer Banks and new to Ballard Plumbing, Gary and the crew did a beautiful job of putting it together well. Here’s how it works (with a nod of thanks to the Internet): Home-run systems act as control centers, or manifolds, for hot and cold water that feed supply lines to individual fixtures. They consist of a plastic or metal plumbing manifold and flexible plastic piping. Generally, home-run systems use cross-linked polyethylene piping (PEX), which is suitable for hot water use and resistant to temperature extremes, chemical attack, and creep deformation. Because of the flexible piping, home-run systems can be installed more quickly than rigid plumbing systems, with only one fitting at the manifold, one transition fitting at the fixture, and no need for piping tees and elbows. However, fittings and couplings are available for special situations, such as repairing damaged piping or creating changes in direction that are tighter than the minimum bend radius allowable for the piping.

A manifold plumbing system is similar to a breaker box for the electrical system in the home. The manifold provides a common location from which all the plumbing fixtures are supplied. Some manifolds feature fixture shut-off valves allowing the user to stop water flow to individual fixtures from one location. Others are termination manifolds, which may feed the plumbing requirements for a room or set of rooms and reduce the number of fittings required in the plumbing system.

Home-run systems equalize pressure, which allows for several fixtures to be used at the same time without dramatic changes in pressure or temperature. No more getting scalded in the shower because your spouse decides to brush his teeth at the same time! In addition, PEX piping can be sized 1/8” smaller in diameter than piping in a “tree” type conventional piping system for some fixtures. That means that hot water arrives at fixtures faster, and less hot water is left standing in the pipes after a draw. PEX piping can reduce heat loss from water in the pipe because it is a better thermal insulator than copper. Because manifolds are installed in easily accessible locations, plumbing upgrades and repairs are simplified. Each outlet from the manifold typically has its own valve, making repairs at the fixture much easier.

Some care must be taken with PEX tubing. It may melt, distort or crack if exposed to excessive heat, and should not be exposed to freezing or sunlight. Abrasive surfaces that can damage PEX should be avoided, and there should be at least 12” of vertical clearance and 6” of horizontal clearance from heat sources, like light fixtures and heating appliances. Manifolds should be installed near, but not too close, to the water heater, with minimum clearances of 36” vertical and 18” horizontal between a thermoplastic manifold and a water heater. Also, there is some concern that the closed-cell dense polyurethane insulating foam (containing isocyanates and polyols) may react with the PEX and cause premature failure, so it is wise to sleeve portions of PEX that may be exposed to that type of insulation. Take a look at: http://www.pexsupply.com/

If you are interested, there are several videos on You Tube demonstrating how to make PEX connections and install a manifold. Meanwhile, here's the Ballard Plumbing crew working on our house:

Air Supply

2009-01-11T17:03:00.005-05:00

When I was a young teenager in general science class, my teacher tried to explain that color exists only when there is light. At the time I had a pink bedroom that in my mind stayed the same color all the time, day or night. Since every time I peeked at it in the night with a flashlight, it WAS pink, then obviously just because I couldn’t see in the dark didn’t mean the room was not pink. Right? Wrong! Sigh. I still struggle with that concept, but now I do understand it. I don’t like it, but I accept it. Comprehending what Vince has planned for what could literally be called “air conditioning” has been a similar struggle. My experience with heating systems has been more in relationship to the location of the thermostat than in understanding exactly how the warm or cool air is produced, and my habit is to simply open a door or window when I am uncomfortable. See the problem?

There are three big goals for the Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning (HVAC) systems in the house: Climate control, efficiency, and air quality. This sounds simple, but there are a lot of factors to be addressed in each category. Temperature control is quite manageable most of the time, since the Outer Banks enjoys an average annual temperature of about 63 degrees and a comfortable indoor temperature would be around 72 degrees. There are fewer than 10 winter days of with temperatures below freezing and only a few weeks of weather that is 90+ degrees in the late summer. Controlling humidity is more challenging, with a high average annual humidity at about 75% and the comfort level for humans in a house between 40% and 60%. We humans make a habit of increasing that level in the house just because we breathe, move around, cook, do laundry, play, have pets, sit by the fireplace, on and on. As for efficiency, our only choice for continual power is electricity (with a back-up generator), because there are no sources for fossil fuels or wood in our area of the beach. Protecting the equipment is important as well, because being on the oceanfront exposes anything outside to a lot of variables, like heat from the sun, changing winds, exposure to salt air and a huge body of water that occasionally comes for an uninvited visit. In general the Outer Banks has very clean outside air, but maintaining good indoor air quality is a different challenge. Often, people don’t think about what they are breathing, but with the lack of air infiltration in a tightly closed structure and the amount of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) and other emissions that are a part of modern life, indoor pollution control is an essential idea. As with the siding, solving one issue impacts another, so that the whole house is really an integrated sum of its systems, rather than of separate parts…like a person, in a way. Given these constraints, Vince decided to use a closed loop geothermal heat pump system aided by a whole house dehumidifier. He added energy recovery ventilators (ERVs) to assure an efficient system for maintaining good indoor air quality.

Before this project, the only thing I knew about a heat pump was that it doesn’t produce its own heat. In a nutshell, a heat pump moves heat from one source to another, and that source can be the outside air, water, or the earth. An air-to-air heat pump system is the most common, but often the difference between the outside air and the desired household temperatures overwork the heat pump and cause it to be less effective and inefficient. In an air-to-air system, the work
that the heat pump must do is greatly variable depending on the vagaries of climate, which makes it difficult to correctly size the heat pump unit. Water-source heat pumps are much more efficient than air-source units and are often used in large commercial buildings, but they require a fossil fuel fired boiler system to produce heat in the winter. For our use, the geothermal heat pump makes the most sense, especially since the earth where we are maintains a constant
temperature of about 61 degrees Fahrenheit starting ten feet below the surface. Another benefit of a geothermal system is that the compressor and heat exchanger sit inside the house, where they will not corrode. Very important for a salty area. This article and illustration from the Consumer Energy Center has a very clear explanation of a closed loop system:

http://www.consumerenergycenter.org/home/heating_cooling/geothermal.html

Here's a video that illustrates how a heat pump works:

and another about the geothermal system:

Our choice for the HVAC sub-contractor was R.A.Hoy, one of the oldest HVAC contractors on the Outer Banks. (http://www.rahoy.com) In addition to being knowledgeable and experienced regarding the geothermal system, the guys are great to have around the work-site. They put in long days of continual work, but they are laughing and fun and happy to explain all they are doing in the moment. The installation supervisor for our job is Fred Marklin, with Toby and his apprentice, David, putting the ductwork together for the rough-in. It has been interesting to watch how something that looks like big Legos when it arrives in the truck comes out being neat and orderly installed. We had planned for the placement of the ductwork when we designed the house, but there still were challenges associated with feeding the hard ducting through the chase in the middle of the house and allowing space for insulating the roof deck on the top floor.

The ducting is rigid galvanized steel except for the last few feet of the branch runs, where the ducts are flexible aluminum. The rigid duct is harder to handle, but it prevents the trapping of dust in the system because it is smooth. To prevent air leakage and air infiltration, mastic was used where two pieces of duct come together, and in some places aluminum tape was used instead. The tightness of the duct lines also contributes to the indoor air quality, because the system remains uncompromised. In our house, all of the ductwork is internal to the house, so there is less opportunity for the growth of molds and mildew. Each duct is insulated with aluminum faced fiberglass batts.

The house will have two complete HVAC systems, one for the top floor and one for the bottom floor. Steve Jenkins, our mechanical engineer, determined the sizing of the heating and cooling systems using Air Conditioning Contractors of America (ACCA) Manual J-compliant software. Although the Manual J is a complicated calculation, it prevents the incorrect sizing of the system and lessens the possibility of an uncomfortable living environment and wasted energy. Steve also performed the Manual D calculations, which establish the correct sizing of the ducts. (These Manuals are actual books, which are alphabetically named technical instructions for many different HVAC calculations, both commercial and residential.) A temperature control system is generally sized to the maximum expected thermal load of the house, so that the system can handle the worst temperature conditions. Unfortunately, since the usual operation would not be running at peak capacity, the system can become sub-optimal in terms of function. Our response to this is to have a two-stage heat pump which can also operate as a smaller system that is a sub-section of the actual heat pump (about 50% capacity). In this case, the system runs longer but is better able to remove the humidity from the air. It is important to realize that an HVAC system in a temperate climate is cooling dominated. Vince decided to use the WaterFurnace Envision series geothermal heat pump (www.waterfurnace.com) based on his research and Hoy’s recommendation. Florida Heat Pump (http://www.fhp-mfg.com) and Carrier (www.Carrier.com) are also good choices.

Contrary to his Sicilian heritage, my husband has an avid dislike for humidity and decided to use a whole house dehumidifier. Steve Jenkins provided Vince with psychometric charts which graph the physical properties of moist air at a constant pressure so that he could properly size the dehumidifying units. The units of choice are made by Honeywell:

http://www.forwardthinking.honeywell.com/products/dehumidification/dehumidification_products.html

Basically, the dehumidifier is a small, self-contained HVAC system that takes moisture laden air from the return duct, removes the moisture from the air and then sends it back either to the return duct or to the supply duct. It functions like an air conditioning unit by compressing the working fluid which runs through the cooling coils. The moisture laden air flows over the cooling coils, and the humidity condenses on the coils and is drained off as water. Then, the newly cooled and dehumidified air is run over the heat exchanger from the compressor and rewarmed. As air is cooled, its moisture carrying capacity decreases, so the moisture can be extracted. Vince explains that the process is like that of thermal fog, when warm air flows over a cool body of water and can no longer hold the physical droplets of water. In the house, the humidity will be measured and adjusted by a humidistat, which mounts on a wall and looks like a thermostat but has a humidity sensing element.

To improve and maintain good indoor air quality, Energy Recovery Ventilators in two zones will be used to actively manage the intake of air from the outside and the exhausting of contaminants and humidity from the inside. An Energy Recovery Ventilator (ERV) is a type of air-to-air heat exchanger that not only can transfer sensible heat (temperature) but also latent heat (in water vapor). Since both temperature and moisture is transferred, ERVs can be considered total enthalpic devices. An ERV takes the heat from the current air and transfers it to the incoming air stream, moving heat between the two air streams whichever way it needs to go. These mechanical ventilation systems use fans to maintain a low-velocity flow of fresh outdoor air into the house (incoming air stream) while exhausting out an equal amount of stale indoor air (exhaust air stream). Fresh air is supplied to all levels of the house while stale air is removed from areas with high levels of pollutants and moisture. Models with heat recovery and moisture recovery transfer heat and moisture from the exhaust airstream to the incoming air stream during the heating season, and transfer heat and water vapor from the incoming air stream to the exhaust air stream during the air conditioning season. An ERV runs on a proportional timer that is set up and monitored by the person (in this case Vince) who determines the appropriate need for air quality control.

Here's a great video explaining how ERV's work:

In the next couple of weeks, the ERVs will be roughed in by Hoy, and the dehumidifiers will be added after the heat pumps are installed. The ground loops, obviously integral to the system, are schedule to be installed by Steve Van Horn at Chesapeake Wells later this month. We're getting there!

Not by the Hair of MY Chinny Chin Chin!

2008-12-18T13:02:00.009-05:00

The third little pig met a man with a load of bricks, and said, "Please, man, give me those bricks to build a house with." So the man gave him the bricks, and he built his house with them.
The wolf came, as he did to the other little pigs, and said, "Little pig, little pig, let me come in."
"No, not by the hair of my chinny chin chin."
"Then I'll huff, and I'll puff, and I'll blow your house in."
Well, he huffed, and he puffed, and he huffed and he puffed, and he puffed and huffed; but he could not get the house down.

The story of The Three Little Pigs is an English folk tale first written in the 18th century, but it is thought that the story and the lessons are much older. In the category of “Lessons Learned,” realizing that stronger materials make a stronger house is an important one to have on the list. On the Outer Banks, the material used to keep the house from being huffed and puffed away is not brick but fiber-cement board, and it is not only the quality of the siding but also the quality of the installation that keeps the wind outside. Our house is being beautifully “dressed up” by Lewis Babb, who owns a company called Exterior Specialists.

Before the siding is attached, the house must be wrapped and “weathered in”. The product choices for both the house wrap and the siding came by working through a series of causes and effects as each decision’s consequences affected the next. One early decision with impact on the siding processes was the choice of a dense closed-cell polyurethane foam insulation that is sprayed on the exterior walls inside the house. The foam expands, filling any open spaces to provide a continuous, protective air barrier that eliminates air leakage, a primary cause of energy waste. It forms a virtually airtight thermal, sound, and condensation barrier. Since the exterior walls are eight inches thick, there will be 2 ½ inches of spray foam with the remaining space being filled with fiberglass batts. It would be cost prohibitive (and not very smart) to fill the cavity with foam with no appreciable gain in the quality of insulation. Using the polyurethane foam prevents water and water vapor from getting through the sheathing into the house, which means that any water absorbed by the sheathing would be essentially trapped. Wet sheathing = rot and mildew = an unwelcome and far reaching problem. The question became how to either assure that the sheathing could dry when it became wet or to prevent the sheathing from ever getting wet. After looking at the more traditional house wraps, like Tyvek and tar paper, Vince decided to use an impermeable application and chose Grace Perma-Barrier wall wrap to keep the sheathing dry. This Grace product is a self-adhesive, rubberized, asphalt/polyethylene waterproofing membrane that is applied directly to the sheathing. Correct installation includes a specific amount of overlap and “rubbing” the material to provide secure adhesion, and the butyl rubber adhesive literally melts into the house. With this product on the outside and the foam on the inside, the exterior sheathing is sandwiched between two impermeable substances. That sounds ideal, except that there must be a way to assure good air quality and for moist air that accumulates inside the house (people breathing, doors opening, washing machines, etc.) to get out. The answer to this problem is an ERV (Energy Recovery Ventilator) that is a part of the whole-house HVAC system. The ERV recaptures heat from the air stream and replaces it with fresh, cooler air through the use of an air-to-air heat exchanger. (More on that later!) Applying the Perma-Barrier was problematic because it was something different to the crew, and it required a lot of time and patience to put it on smoothly and to go back and literally rub the entire house for good adhesion. That’s a lot more work than just nailing up tar paper! Grace makes another house wrap product that literally sprays on like paint, but that would have been even harder to apply correctly in our windy environment.

Years ago, when beach houses were not used in the winter, the issues of mold and rot were almost non-existent. Since there was little or no insulation in a house, anything that got wet would be open to the air and simply dry out. Over the last fifty or so years there have been a lot of changes in how houses everywhere have been made more comfortable. At first there was just sheathing and siding (primarily wood or brick), and then there was sheathing and tar paper and siding, and now there is sheathing, house wrap or tar paper, siding, and insulation in the interior part of the house envelope. Insulation solved the problem of keeping the interior of the house more protected from the weather, but it caused the secondary issue of not allowing the sheathing to dry by reducing the air flow through the wall. Moisture and reduced air flow causes mold and rotting, and that’s the “circle” of dominos to work through.

One solution came in the 1960’s, when the National Building Council of Canada began to address problems associated with the deterioration of sheathing and siding. It had been noted that the air inside various structures was becoming increasingly humid, which indicated high water absorption. It was determined that the increasing water absorption was caused by advancing deterioration of the sheathing, which was then transferred into the house. A process was developed to create a physical separation between the siding and the sheathing, called a pressure-equalized rain screen wall. The concept is to deflect water absorption into the sheathing by tackling the forces that drive water into the building shell. By neutralizing these forces, rain screens can withstand extreme environments. The rain screen wall is created by the use of vented or porous exterior cladding, an air cavity of a few inches, and a drainage layer on a rigid, water-resistance and airtight support wall. Rain screens effectively "drain the rain" by controlling powerful building wetting forces-gravity, capillary action, and wind pressure differences.

Here’s how it works: The exterior cladding deters surface raindrop momentum. It is typically porous with several air bypasses. An airspace separates the cladding from the support wall. The airspace decouples most of the cladding from the support wall, thereby reducing splash and capillary moisture transfer. Protected openings (e.g., vents, or weep holes) positioned at the top and bottom of the wall promote convective airflow, allowing moisture to quickly drain or evaporate from the air cavity. The exterior face of the support wall is protected with a drainage layer to further protect against any moisture that bypasses both cladding and air cavity. The wall air tightness (i.e., sealed assembly) buffers the remaining differential air pressure force. A “pressure-equalized” rain screen wall means that the pressure between the siding and the sheathing becomes equal to the outside pressure. The velocity component of the wind has been removed, preventing the wind from forcing water into the house. Since the siding and the sheathing are no longer in intimate contact with each other, the siding essentially absorbs the momentum of the wind. (That’s why face-nailing the siding with stainless-steel ring shank nails is so important!) Water that penetrates the siding freely drains down the membrane-wrapped sheathing, and any water that doesn’t drain evaporates. Cor-a-vent siding vents have been added to help promote air movement along the rain wall and to prevent various critters from colonizing behind the siding. Additionally, stainless steel drip edges were installed along the bottom of the siding to take the draining water away from the house and prevent the soaking of the foundation.

Our siding of choice is Hardi-plank. Fiber-cement board was chosen because it meets the requirements of a tough coastal area, and Hardi-Plank was chosen because it has a resume that backs up its qualifications. It has passed Miami-Dade testing for wind gusts of 150 mph and is rated to withstand both large small missile impact with tested design pressures of +53 and -53 (pushing and pulling). Hardi-plank also has FEMA approval for use in flood prone areas and is fire resistant. Those qualities provide a lot of assurance from James Hardie Corporation, but a key piece is making sure that the siding is installed according to the specifications for hurricane zones. That requires a siding installation crew that is patient and attentive to detail. We also specified that type 316 stainless steel fasteners be used, because no siding can do its job if the fasteners fail. Hardi-plank also comes pre-painted using a process called Color-Plus Technology. This application is particularly good for use oceanfront, because the paint is applied in a controlled environment before the siding is exposed to moist salt air or sand, and it has a 15 year warranty. In a cost comparison, the pre-painted product adds a small percentage of cost over the unpainted siding and is a big savings over having the house painted after installation. Louis has also made sure that the end cuts are painted before the boards are put on the house to prevent moisture from wicking through those vulnerable spots. Since the recommendation for hurricane zones is that the siding be face nailed, that also means that the nail heads have to be painted individually… one of the less desirable aspects of pre-painted siding. For this house, the trade-off was appropriate, and the siding will always have that first controlled paint application to protect it.

At the moment, Lewis and crew are close to finishing up their piece of the job, and each step brings us a little closer to seeing the exterior or the house as we planned it. Years ago, when we were up at the lot planting grass, I would take Vince’s arm and say, “Let’s pretend that we really do have a house here and that we have had a wonderful walk on the beach together. We would take the steps up from the beach onto our walkover and head into the kitchen for a cup of coffee or sit on the deck with a glass of wine.” And now, that vision is almost a reality!

I Can See Clearly Now: Installing the windows

2008-11-19T12:10:00.002-05:00

I only drink fortified wines during bad weather. Snowstorm, hurricane, tornado--I'm not particular, as long as it's bad. After all, any storm for a Port.
Paul S. Winalski

Even with a very strong window, there are two remaining concerns: 1) The strongest window in the world will not save a house in a storm if it doesn’t stay in its opening, so the way the windows are installed and sealed makes a big difference in the security of the structure. 2) Water penetration around the window from horizontal, wind-blown rain can wreak havoc in the forms of rot and mold in both the interior of the house and within the walls. Windows are designed for both positive and negative design pressures (DP). Positive pressures are those acting to push the windows in from the outside, and negative pressures are suction forces trying to pull the windows out of the house. Both types of forces need to be addressed to withstand a hurricane. Shwinco windows use a type of tie bracket that is screwed around the edge of the window and spaced to withstand a given load. These clips are screwed into the framing and prevent the windows from popping out. There is also a nailing flange that is made from a very stiff vinyl. A strong polyurethane adhesive is applied around the flange, and then the flange is nailed as the window is set. The flange faces the outside of the window opening and keeps the window from being pushed into the house. It is important that the rough openings for the windows be kept tight for this purpose. The window literally uses the house to push against as its support, so the integrity of the framing helps to maintain the integrity of the window system. The need to maintain structural strength reinforces the need for fasteners that don’t corrode, like type 316 stainless steel, so that any pieces that do get wet or damp do not weaken with time.

Different environments cause varying potential loads, which drive the decision for applicable design pressures and allowable window sizes. Since the windows are edge supported, the building envelope must be able to support given loads, determining the maximum sized windows that will still meet the positive and negative design pressures in a situation. A fixed window can be larger than an opening window and still uphold the needed DP, because the glass in a fixed window is incorporated into the window frame, which stiffens the frame and makes it stronger.

Preventing leaks in a high velocity hurricane zone is an entirely different beast to conquer. Prior to installation, the window opening is prepared and sealed. For this application, Dupont Flex Wrap was applied snugly around the rough window opening and OVER the house wrap to maintain a waterfall concept for possible water flow. (FlexWrap is a flexible, self-adhesive flashing tape constructed from a layer of tough Tyvek laminated on a layer of high adhesive butyl rubber.) Because it bends, this product goes around corners without having to be cut and fitted, lessening the chance for a leak in an awkward spot. To get a snug application, the FlexWrap should be “rubbed” into place for good adhesion to the surface. This flexible tape is tested for water intrusion both as a newly installed item and also after thermal aging.

Once the window is in place, a drip edge is installed across the top of the window. A drip edge takes the water off the plane, so that accumulated water falls beyond and not down across the window. The bottom of the window is not sealed and not nailed. Shwinco windows have a weep mechanism that allows water to drain out if it gets past the first seal, and the windows actually have three seals to keep water out of the house where the window meets the frame. If the window is designed properly and the path is not blocked, gravity will take any water out. The rough opening under each window has an added piece of sloping cedar under the FlexWrap as an added assurance that the water will run in the right direction and not pool in the window sill.

Here is a slideshow of some of the first floor windows being prepared and installed:

A note about casement windows versus single hung windows: Single hung windows are intrinsically more prone to higher leakage rates simply because the opening part of the window has to slide in a channel and needs clearance (space between the window and the frame) to do so. A casement window, in contrast, is closed up against the window opening and is locked down, eliminating virtually all clearance when latched.

When designing a house to a certain type of constraint, like withstanding a hurricane with 150 mph winds, it is important to realize that being willing and able to compromise in terms of design can mean the difference between saving and losing a house. In the end, the questions to ask oneself are those that begin with “what if,” or “when” a storm comes. We happen to really like casement windows, but even if we didn’t, it would be easier to accept the casement windows than it would be to face the loss or damage to the house.

With the window specifications that Vince ordered and Shwinco manufactured, and with the careful installation by PJ Stuart and Currituck Construction Company, we have given the house a good fighting chance in a big storm, though it will be perfectly OK not to ever test the house and the windows to their full capacity.

For what I have received, may the Lord make me truly thankful.
And more truly for what I have not received.
Storm Jameson

Better than a Crow's Nest: Wonderful Windows

2008-10-31T20:38:00.006-04:00

The world is so full of a number of things, I'm sure we should all be as happy as kings!
Robert Louis Stevenson 1850-1894

Learning about windows was a lesson in how one seemingly basic object can have many layers. The word ‘window’ comes from the Old Norse word, ‘vindauga’, from ‘vidr’ (wind) and ‘auga’ (eye). Long ago, someone weary of their dark surroundings poked a hole to let in light and air, and windows were born. Over the next 3 or so thousand years, man has been working to improve on the idea, so that now the simple hole poked in the wall can be framed and covered with materials to let in light but not heat, to be durable and lovely, and to be strong enough to withstand some of nature’s strongest events.

The data hunt began with FEMA’s Mitigation Assessment Team reports. From there, the trail led to the Florida building Code and Miami-Dade Notices of Acceptance and also to the Texas Department of Insurance’s Windstorm Inspection Program. Then, Vince began what he calls “peeling the onion” of information by contacting window manufacturers, reading web-sites, and talking to folks in the window industry.

First, the windows needed to be strong; because window failure in hurricanes has huge consequences. When a window fails under pressure (frames come apart, glass shatters) or is broken by flying debris, the structural envelope of the building can then be penetrated by the force of the storm which pressurizes the interior of the house. At that time, the house is acted on simultaneously by two different forces: 1) the Bernoulli Effect from the exterior, which is creating lift on the roof, and 2) the increased interior pressure, which is pushing from underneath the roof. When the combination of those forces becomes too great, the roof will pop off. If you lose the windows, you lose the roof, and you lose the house.

Window strength is measured as Design Pressure (DP), and is measured in pounds per square feet (psf). Windows can be engineered to meet various DP ratings, based on environment and usage. Design Pressure is the contemplated force per unit area that a surface is expected to see in operation. The total expected load for the surface can be obtained by multiplying the design pressure by the total surface area. In a hurricane, a window needs a certain DP to be able to withstand the force and pressure of the storm. Higher wind speeds mean higher pressures. This is a separate criterion from withstanding impact from flying debris. Increased DP requires thicker glass, a stiffer frame, and limited window size in given situations. (p.s. When testing for DP, engineers include a 1.5 safety factor, so a window that is sold as a DP 65 actually passed the testing for DP 97.5.)

Impact glass is laminated glass. It consists of two sheets of glass with an inner shatter-proof membrane between them. Different interlayers and thicknesses provide different levels of response to storm loads. This page from the Solutia web-site offers a great explanation for impact glass: http://www.keepsafemax.com/pages/ShowFile2.aspx?id=113 Our windows use Dupont’s Sentry Glass Plus and not Solutia, because SGP has a lower yellowing factor than the Solutia glass, but Solutia is an excellent product and often used by our window manufacturer.

It has been interesting to realize that most everything can be measured and quantified and that there are whole groups of people whose work it is to do that. For windows, there are many more things to be measured than one might imagine. The four big considerations after DP and the impact rating are Solar Heat Gain Coefficient (how well the window blocks heat from sunlight), Low U value (how well heat escapes through a material), UV Blockage (how well the window blocks the sun’s ultraviolet radiation), and Visual Transmittance (how well the window can be seen through). Additionally, it was important to find out how the specs were reached, exactly what materials are used for each piece, how those were tested, and what long term issues have been discovered. (Sometimes the laminate interlayer can yellow, or the gas fill can leak). This gets to be a bit mind-numbing, especially when each value is represented by a number and each component has a chemical.

Here are the specifications we started with for the windows:

General: The windows requested are impact resistant design for a coastal oceanfront application in a high hazard hurricane zone. Therefore, all windows must be certified to meet all requirements of either the Miami-Dade County Building Department Approved Products for the “High Velocity Hurricane Zone” and “Large and Small Missile Impact”, or the Texas Department of Insurance Windstorm Inspection Program for the Inland I and Seaward Zones and tested by an approved inspection agency to indicate compliance with the requirements of AAMA/NWWDA 101/I.S.2. The certification program label also includes a tab that references AAMA 506-2000 and that the product conforms to ASTM E 1886 and E 1996-02 with a missile level of D. All windows should be certified that they were tested to meet a Minimum Design Pressure of +/- 60 psf. All windows are to be labeled to certify that they meet all these requirements.

Mulling: All multi-panel window groups are to be structurally mulled in a waterproof manner in accordance with the requirements of either the Miami-Dade County Building Department Approved Products NOA or the Texas Department of Insurance Windstorm Inspection Program Certification Report at the full DP rating.

Hardware: All frames are to be white µPVC plastic, with fusion welded corners. All operational hardware, including screws and hinges, is to be stainless steel, preferably type 316.

Exterior Pane: PPG SunClean hydrophilic glass (http://www.suncleanglass.com/)

Impact Glass Interlayer: Sentry Glass Plus (SGP) preferred; Polyvinyl Butyral with PET interlayer (next choice); Polyvinyl Butyral (lowest choice).

Optical / Thermal Performance: All windows are to have the following characteristics:
Visible Light Trans: 66% or greater
Summer U (day): 0.16 or less
Winter U (night): 0.22 or less
Shading Coefficient: 0.49 or less
SHGC: 0.40 or less
Relative Heat Gain: 100 or less
UV Blockage 99% or greater

Additionally, “warm edge” insulating spacer technology (preferably non-metallic) is to be used in all applications. Krypton gas fill should be considered, if required, to meet thermal insulation characteristics.

Information to be provided:
1) Copies of certifications from either the Miami-Dade County Building Department Approved Products List or the Texas Department of Insurance Windstorm Inspection Program.
2) A cross-sectional view of the proposed window glass buildup, identifying materials and thicknesses of each layer.
3) Model estimate of all of the thermal and optical properties of the windows proposed.
4) Air infiltration rate at specified wind speed
5) DP rating for water intrusion
6) Water infiltration rate at specified wind speed
7)Copy of warranty for the windows proposed.
8) Rough opening required for each window or mulled window combination
9)Detailed installation instructions to meet certification requirements
10) Recommended flashing instructions

Then the question: Who can make these windows? Vince had spoken at length with a company in Canada who could meet our specs and were competitively priced. Sadly, the owner died and the company closed literally on the day we wanted to order windows. Vince came up with a list of about 18 window companies who met our criteria and asked me to read web-sites and to call each one to talk with an engineer about putting our windows together. That was an intriguing process. I spoke at length with some excellent folks and was completely brushed off by others. Some sales people told me that I really didn’t need everything in the specs, which wasn’t the question. In the end, the competitive group became Jeld-Wen, Shwinco, Megrame, and Kolbe, both because their windows met our needs and also because of their responsiveness.

Lined up in the house ready to be installed are the new Shwinco windows! Shwinco is a family business based in the hurricane alley states of Alabama and Florida. When I was given the name and number of an engineer to call, it was Jerome Shipp, the founding engineer, who answered my call. That’s not just ANY engineer! His son, Craig Shipp, Sr., is the company president, and there are several other family members who work there, including Craig Shipp, Jr. Jerome and Craig, Sr. took a lot of time to speak with us, even though we are private home owners and not a big corporation. They make an impressive window but were also willing to do some things slightly differently for this application. Craig, Sr. even looked at our house plans and offered some suggestions for a stronger window plan on the east stairwell wall, which we were happy to use. The finished product is an amazing window that is very strong, very energy efficient, very beautiful and incredibly heavy. (They weigh in at 15-20 pounds per square foot, and some of the windows are 6’ x 6½’.) When the windows were delivered, Craig, Sr. actually called to check on the shipment. The Shipps obviously care about their products. They have worked hard and worked together, and the teamwork clearly shows in both the windows and in the service they offer. The only thing they don’t have is a distributor on the Outer Banks, and that would be a great asset to our community.

There is a video on the Shwinco web-site called the Baseball Challenge. It is an entertaining and truly informative video showing what happens to windows in hurricanes. Watching this, while fun, shows exactly how a properly designed impact resistant window can determine whether a structure survives or fails in a big storm. It involves trying to break windows with bats. Guess who wins! Take a look:

http://www.shwinco.com/videos/baseball.htm

If you want to learn more about Shwinco windows and other products, their web-site is at:
http://shwinco.com

Vince and I want to offer many thanks and a round of applause to the Shipps for solving a big and very important structural component for the house that will bring the beauty of the beach into the house. Of all the things that will make our house home, the windows will be what lifts our hearts every single day, and that is quite an accomplishment!

There has been a lot of wind on the beach this week, so the windows are yet to be installed. Just getting them into the house was quite an undertaking with a 25 knot wind. It took some good old OBX ingenuity and a calm and patient soul manning a boom truck, but all 35 windows are safe and sound without a scratch. Here’s the video of that dramatic afternoon:

"She's blowin', she is!" a note about nor'easters

2008-10-26T13:42:00.008-04:00

There is a lot of conversation about wind here on the Outer Banks. The strength and direction of the wind shapes the tide and the goings on for the day. A shift in the wind literally changes the life agenda on the beach, determining whether it is a good day to go fishing, which work gets done when, if the ocean is safe for swimming, or if it is a day to be spent tucked in at home. In any case, it is always a good idea to have a sweatshirt and a cap in the truck, because what feels like a comfortable breeze in Kitty Hawk could be a chilly wind out on the beach.

Jan DeBlieu, a long time Outer Banks resident who became the Cape Hatteras Coastkeeper in 2003, wrote a remarkable book about this force that keeps us always in touch with the weather. Wind: How the Flow of Air Has Shaped Life, Myth & the Land, is a wonderfully well-told story of both the art and the science of living with wind. Reading it, I am reminded of how nature’s elements often have many layers, each with its own set of influences over the way everyday life moves from morning into night.

When people hear that Vince and I are planning to live in North Swan Beach where there is no road and only the beach to use as a pathway, we are often asked what happens when the water is high and driving on the beach is impossible. The answer is simple, “We don’t go.” The truth is that with the right truck, it takes a lot not to be able to get back and forth if it is really important, but OBX common sense tells folks that risking the drive for ordinary things that will be the same tomorrow as today just isn’t worth it. If you want your vehicle to last, don’t drive it through salt water.

This season’s batch of early fall nor’easters has caused some delays for the house, with the first storm near the end of September blowing enough sand to cover the lumber piles on the job site, removing a lot of sand from under the house, and turning the road behind our house into a river. It seems that October has been one nor’easter after another, with many days of high surf advisories limiting the time the workers be up the beach and get safely back to the road. For us, it has been a bit frustrating and inconvenient, but we have had no actual damage. For the folks to the south in Rodanthe, the winds and the high water have brought situations that have been much more serious. A nor’easter is not something to be taken lightly, sometimes causing more damage than a hurricane largely because of the tenacity and duration of the storms. To live on the Outer Banks, the wind and whatever it brings must be accepted with patience and being prepared to hunker down for a few days at home.

Here is a little video that was posted on You Tube in September by neighbors just north of us, showing the surf coming all the way up to the dune line. Our dune wasn’t breached by this storm, but the tide definitely came up to its base.

There is a slideshow on the Local News Page on islandfreepress.org showing high water in Rodanthe. Take a look at what has happened from the nor'easter: http://tinyurl.com/58jabo
That is what we are hoping to avoid, though it could be any of us.

So now, a lot of tasks have been finished up: The cross braces and threaded rod tie-downs have been installed, the main roof is dried in, the window openings have been cut, and the Currituck County sheathing inspection has been passed. The next task is to get that west entry completed so that the windows can be delivered and installed!!!

Raising the Roof

2008-10-02T12:52:00.003-04:00

Compromise makes a good umbrella, but a poor roof.
James Russell Lowell (1819-1891)

All creatures take shelter from the storm. One of the feral cats who lives behind our house created a nest in the base of a bush near the back yard. Toads burrow snuggly into piles of sand near the walls of the house, and foxes make dens in hollow logs or trees. It is thought that more than 35,000 years ago, Neanderthal man created structural frames from mammoth bones and covered them with animal skins. Since that time, humans have made roofs using everything from “ready made” caves to sod over birch bark, sapling webbing covered with animal hides, and the ever popular thatching. Fired roof tiles were found in Greece as early as the 3rd millennium BC! Over the many years that people have been covering both heads and belongings with something installed over their dwelling places, man has learned to some degree which materials work better than others and also developed new ways to stay safe and dry. I remember hearing as a child, “As long as the roof doesn’t fall in, we’ll be OK,” in response to anything potentially dire. Simply put, it is common knowledge that a roof to call one’s own is both necessary and important.

The decisions about the roof for the new house were made before any other ideas were put in place. The plans for the strength and security of the roof made all other design decisions secondary, much to the frustration of the architects. To decide on the shape and pitch of the roof, Vince read all of the existing FEMA reports and gathered information from other sources like the International Building Code, the Coastal Construction Manual, Miami-Dade and the Texas Department of Insurance. From these sources, he learned that the roof pitch had to be between 4/12 and 6/12 to withstand the wind loading from a big storm. (A roof’s pitch is the measured vertical rise divided by the measured horizontal span, like slope in geometry.) A roof with the wrong shape and slope can literally become a giant wing in heavy winds, lifting itself off the house. If you lose the roof, you lose the house, so this piece of the design was critical. Our roof pitch is 5/12. It is acceptable to have a slightly different ratio, but it is more important to have the roof stay on the house than to have an extra foot of interior width. We had to be careful not to let this number slip too far from the appropriate range when planning the living spaces.

Roofs can be made in many different variations of angles and planes. This house will have a “hip” roof, which means that all sides slope downwards to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope. It is a house with no gables or other vertical sides. Since a hip roof is self-bracing, it does not need the same amount of diagonal bracing (wind bracing) that a gable roof requires. Our house is rectangular, so it will have two triangular sides and two that are trapezoidal. On a rectangular plan, a hip roof has four faces that are almost always at the same pitch or slope, which makes them symmetrical about the centerlines. (On a square house, a hip roof is shaped like a pyramid.)

Because they require a more complex system of trusses, hip roofs are somewhat more difficult to construct than a gabled roof. Although the roof itself is harder to construct, the walls that carry the roof are easier to build, being all one level. The triangular faces of the roof are called the hip ends and are bounded by the hips themselves. The hips (where the planes meet) sit on an external corner of the building and rise to the ridge.

One downside to a hip roof is the lack of space within the roof structure to use for other things. There was a recent change in the height allowance by Currituck County, allowing the 35’ maximum height to be measured at mid-roof rather than at the peak of the roof, and that extra footage allowed the ceiling heights to be at 9' with the roof pitch staying where it should be. Once the two main roof decisions (roof shape and roof pitch) were in place, the constraints established by them were concrete. End of discussion. This is why, as mentioned in the earlier, we will have a house that is a beautiful shoebox.

Here is the section of Vince’s specifications for the roof framing:

8) Ceiling and Collar Joists – Roof trusses provided by Universal Forest Products designed for 150 mph wind loads. End sections (extending beyond the walls) are to be pressure-treaded wood (Forest Products ProWood® Micro).

9) Rafters - Trusses will be anchored to the walls with type 316 stainless steel nailing brackets per engineered plans if there is potential for exposure to exterior moisture. Brackets that are completely internal to the envelope and insulation will be hot-dipped galvanized steel.

10) Sub Fascia - 2" x 6"

11) Hips, Valleys, and Ridges – Roof Trusses provided by Universal Forest Products.

12) Roof Sheathing - 5 ply, ¾” CDX pressure-treated (rated for ground contact), exterior-grade APA Structural I rated plywood, glued and screwed using 2 ½” long type 316 stainless steel screws. The first course of plywood is to be ¾” 5 ply, CDX pressure-treated, exterior-grade APA Structural I rated plywood, glued and screwed using 2 ½” long type 316 stainless steel screws, and completely covered by a “peel & stick” rubber membrane sheet (at least 60 mils thick). Provide adhesive fillets on interior of all roof sheathing.

Vince chose to use engineered and manufactured trusses to be assured that the roof could carry the wind loads. A stick built roof system doesn’t have the same series of checks and balances as those planned by a structural engineer. Johnny Ghee, who also designed the interior trusses, engineered the roof trusses. Johnny has to his credit a unique design feature for roof trusses, based on requests that he was frequently getting for a more authentic 1940’s beach cottage look. In the design of the truss tails, which should be treated for his application because they are exposed, the tail is offset ¾” lower than the actual truss. This leaves enough space for there to be an additional piece of plywood (usually a simulated bead board) to be placed so that the house has a more traditional look. To accomplish that look without Johnny’s innovation, the trusses would have to be stick built, and the roof would not be as strong. It’s a great idea and a way to add an interesting architectural feature within a structurally sound roof. Our house is more contemporary, so we aren’t using that look, but we wanted the treated tails anyway.

Because there are screened porches on either end of the house that are under roof, Vince designed the porch roofs as separate entities, so that the main house roof would not be damaged if the porches broke away during a storm. This means that the main roof will be built and sealed before the porch roofs are added. The trusses for the porches were to be designed as separate from the house. Unfortunately, the trusses and porch roof for the north side of the house were mistakenly designed as being integrated into the main house roof, so we now have had considerable delay while we wait for the new trusses and for the double galvanized truss plates that hold them together. This was much too important a part of the structural strength to let pass: “If you lose the roof, you lose the house.” So far, the two biggest mistakes have been because the trusses were manufactured incorrectly. It’s unfortunate, because even though Universal Forest Products replaces them correctly or helps with the field repairs, it costs us time and effort. Luckily, the mistakes have been caught while they can be fixed, but it definitely isn’t a good thing, and it’s hard to understand why it has happened. The new trusses will be delivered and installed next week (10/7), and then we can finally get the house under roof. Much to his credit, Vince did not “go through the roof” over this error. I could not resist adding that!

When riding along the roads of the Outer Banks, you see that most houses have little square vents all along the sides of the roof. There are also chimneys and skylights and exhaust pipes for one thing or another. Vince has been adamant all along that there be no penetrations in this roof, because wind blown rain can get into even the smallest space and cause a leak. In the end, there may be something that must be vented through the roof, but hopefully that can be avoided. The roof specifications call for 4” of closed cell polyurethane foam (2.2 lb per cubic foot) that is applied directly to the roof deck and covered with 12” of unfaced fiberglass batts, which as a side benefit leaves no room for there to be heat building up between the insulated space and the actual roof. This translates into a nice feature: No need for roof venting!

Once the framing is completed, the roof is tied to the house with tie-downs made of galvanized steel. The tie-downs have an important function, because they carry the load path from the roof of the house all the way to the pilings. When the wind exerts a lift force on the roof, it will in effect be pulling on those very deep pilings. The tie-downs that Vince has chosen are larger and stronger than needed, because…If you lose the roof, you lose the house!

May you always have walls for the winds, a roof for the rain, tea beside the fire, laughter to cheer you, those you love near you and all your heart might desire

Irish Blessing

Oh, wow! Second floor framing

2008-09-22T09:07:00.002-04:00

Although there is still only a ladder to climb from the ground to the first floor, there are now steps inside that go up to the second floor. I have seen those steps many times in my mind's eye, but it was wonderful to walk up with the sea in full view and finally see our ideas coming to life. The second floor will be where we spend most of our time, with the kitchen, open living area and bedroom suite up there. In comparison to many things, our house isn't really high, but it feels like an aerie with the whole world in view. The thing that I found most wonderful was that my husband, whose incredible mind and talented eye for detail and space, had really taken all the things that we thought about for our home and made them real. I knew what I wanted to see and feel within the house, but Vince has the ability to translate an idea into inches and feet and places to sit and windows that go on forever. When he was able to go up to stand in that space, I walked with him over to where the kitchen will be and said, "What do you think?" He said, "This is what I wanted all along...to be able to prepare a wonderful meal and to be able to see." That makes it worth whatever it takes.

So much of what we have to say about this house relates to the specifiations and structural pieces that make the house strong. The heart of the house comes from our ideas about how we want our time together to be, and that's what makes it beautiful.

Catching up on the strengthened structure

2008-09-21T11:17:00.004-04:00

“Winston’s idea of foreplay was, ‘Effie, brace yourself!’”
(Robin Williams as Mrs. Doubtfire)

Those of us who grew up in the 1950’s south all knew this Sunday School song:

The wise man built his house upon the rock
The wise man built his house upon the rock
The wise man built his house upon the rock
And the rains came tumbling down.

The rains came down and the flood came up
The rains came down and the flood came up
The rains came down and the flood came up
But the house on the rock stood still.

This verse was followed by the part about the foolish man who built his house upon the sand, but instead of the house standing still, the foolish man’s house went “splat!” On the word “splat,” we would all clap our hands together as hard as we could and scream out the worst “splat” that we could manage. The lesson in the song was supposed to be about something religious, but the part about the rock and the sand is what I remember most. I can say without a doubt that I do not want to live on a rock, and thankfully mankind has come quite a long way in his ability to produce materials that can support even a foolish couple's idea of where they want to live.

It is certainly true that a house built on the beach has to withstand much more from Mother Nature than one tucked into a less vulnerable spot. Within a coastal environment, buildings are subject to both static and dynamic forces that impact the structural loads. A static force is one that does not change, like the weight of an elephant statue in the living room. The most obvious static force is gravity, so anything that has weight (water tanks, hot water heaters, pianos) will contribute to the static loads. A dynamic force is one that is changeable, like a living elephant on an irregular bingeing, diet and exercise regimen. The most powerful dynamic force on the coast is wind, which brings with it the potential for another dynamic force: Overwash (waves plus storm surge). It is the job of a structural engineer to analyze both the forces and the design and then to make adjustments in strength that foresee the structure’s survival response to different types of loads. Structural engineers come in many shapes and varieties, but Vince knew that we needed a studied and practiced professional engineer (P.E.) to help plan for the long term well being of our house.

Karl recommended Rick House of House Engineering. Rick is a professional engineer and a Hokie, with a background working with the Navy in the Norfolk ship yard. He also has the perfect personal name for the work that he does, which I envy. Rick worked interactively with Johnny Ghee, the engineer who designed our trusses, and both Karl and Vince continue to ask Rick for guidance on other structural strength issues as they occur. Part of Rick’s job was to design the piling layout and to check the foundation. It was at his suggestion that the steel flitch plates were sandwiched in between the girders in the sections of the first floor foundation over our parking areas under the house. Those pilings needed to be 12’ apart, rather than the usual 8’ spacing, and Rick wanted to be sure there was enough support despite that added span. Since the flitch plates are exposed to the elements, they were double-dip galvanized, which is marine grade. Steel was also added to the east wall that holds the stack of windows to be sure that those heavy windows would be secure. The haunch braces have been added to connect the pilings to the girders, adding lateral support.

On one recent journey up to check the progress of the house, I rode with Karl and his Chocolate Lab, Cookie. Karl checked on the progress of the house, and Cookie kept continual check on Karl, even wanting to climb the ladder to stay with him. We could all learn a lesson from her vigilant watching to make sure everything was OK. “Good girl, Cookie!”

I never thought that I would walk up to my house and see steel sandwiches, and it is very reassuring to know that extra strength is in the framework of the house. We hear the word, “steel,” used as the epitome of strength, like “nerves of steel,” and “abs of steel,” as well as “steel yourself” to an upcoming challenge, like trying to obtain abs of steel! The wind and the sea can be unpredictable forces beyond what we know, but based on a lot of analytical reading, FEMA reports on hurricanes, and understanding the history of our little section of the east coast, Vince (with nods from Rick) has made some judgments on how best to design a structure that can withstand the most of what we should endure. Luckily, he has a mind like a steel trap! (sooo sorry!)

Second Floor Trusses and an Oops!

2008-09-04T13:55:00.006-04:00

From August 27 - 29

Long ago, Vince decided that he wanted to have a chase between the first and second floors to hold the services for the house, like the ducting, wiring, and plumbing. In this case, a chase is a rectangular housing for mechanical things and not the same thing as running in hot pursuit after something else that is running away. The important thing about the chase is that it is a convenient and available passage that prevents awkward placements for ducting and pipes and gives back a tremendous amount of flexibility when designing the floor plan. The concept of a chase between floors works only if there has been a careful assessment of how large or small the systems of the house really need to be. There are two types of calculations to be done: One is called a Manual J Calculation, which analyzes the heating and cooling loads for residential use. The second calculation is called a Manual D, and it determines how much and how big the ductwork for the house needs to be to accommodate the Manual J assessment. Vince sent the details of the windows, the insulation, the roof, etc. to Steve Jenkins, a mechanical engineer who did both sets of calculations, spoke with Johnny Ghee about the truss design and also will work with Jesse Owens, our HVAC project manager at Norris Mechanical, to plan the installation. A lot of people consider the calculations to be an extra and unnecessary step, but these numbers work together as an important and valuable tool for saving time and money and also for providing a comfortable home. We are trying to be energy conscious, both because it is good, green thing to do for the planet and also because we want to have a sustainable lifestyle as we get older.

For this house, the chase was designed into the second floor trusses, which have a rectangle in the center and angled webbing on the sides. The rectangle is 20” high and about 22” wide. The most important aspect of the installation was to be sure that the trusses are perfectly aligned, so that the hard ducting can be fed into place. The second floor trusses, like those on the first floor, lay east to west and span the width of the house. They sit on girders that run north to south across the length on the house. The second floor trusses are taller than those on the first floor, and they include a series of 11 four foot trusses that run the length of the space over the hall. Jesse warned us to be sure to check the truss alignment, a suggestion that we took seriously. Vince and I headed up to the house to eyeball the trusses on Saturday afternoon. We weren’t able to climb up into the house to look closely, but it was obvious that, sure enough, there was a big “Oops!” in the truss alignment. Vince said a lot more than “Oops!” but thankfully the problem is solvable in the field. Vince and Karl went back up to the house and examined and measured everything, and it turned out that only one big truss was flipped, but all 11 of the short trusses had the interior rectangle nearly five inches off. The error was in the manufacturing, not in the installation, but the surprising thing was that no one noticed it. Since there is no elbow room in the chase, those trusses will have to be altered in the field according to Johnny Ghee’s plans for the repair, and they will be given an engineering stamp of approval for supporting the necessary loads. The flipped truss on the end can’t be moved, but because it is on the end it is acceptable to remove the webbing, put the ducting into place, and replace the webbing. Problem solved, thankfully, but it was good to find it before too many other things were put into place. As Karl would say, we are all flawed humans and mistakes will happen, but I am learning that finding them early stops one mistake from becoming a series of multiple problems and compensations instead of just one problem.

My son, Zach, and grandson, Ayden, were here at the beach last week. I took them up to see Grandma’s new beach house on Wednesday morning, and Ayden was thrilled to watch Stuart lifting the trusses up to the second floor with the forklift. Ayden is three years old and loves all things related to heavy equipment. He has watched all of the raw footage of any video that I have taken, and he knows the names of each guy who work with the trucks. I told him that the big truck with the crane and the augur belonged to Duncan, but that Steve was the man who worked the truck, and Ayden knows that Stuart drives the forklift. On Wednesday night, when it was time for a bedtime story, Ayden and I made up our own story, and he made sure to include the guys whose names he knows as the folks who save the day. His little story is fun and quite wonderful, so I am including it here. Like Ayden, I am hoping that the men with the trucks will make my dreams come true and save the day! I think they will, don’t you?

Here's the little video showing the trusses going up. Ayden's story is in the next post.

Stuart and the Happy Star, by Ayden and Grandma Phyllis

2008-09-04T11:30:00.001-04:00

Early one morning, when Ayden was staying with Grandma and Grandpa at the new beach house, Ayden and Grandma Phyllis went for a walk on the beach. “Look, Grandma!” whispered Ayden, “What’s that?” Near the water, something was glimmering brightly in the sand! Ayden and Grandma tiptoed carefully towards it for a closer look. It was a star! Not a sea star but a real, huge, nighttime star from the sky! What was it doing there?

Grandma Phyllis spoke quietly, “Ayden, its eyes are closed. I think the star is asleep.” Ayden touched it gently and said, “Good morning, Star! What are you doing down here on the beach?” The star opened its eyes and sighed sadly, “Oh my, I think I’m in big trouble.” “Last night I was playing too close to the beach, and I fell.” “I’m afraid I can’t get back to my home in the sky.” The star began to cry, “I want my Mommy!” Ayden said, “I think you are a little boy just like me! Don’t worry, Star! Grandma and I will think of something!” Everyone was quiet for a moment until Ayden said, “I know! I can blow bubbles all over the star, and the bubbles will float the star up to the sky.” “That’s a good idea,” said Grandma. “I have a bubble bottle right here in my pocket.” Grandma took out the bottle of bubble liquid and the wand, and Ayden blew and blew until bubbles covered the star completely. “This stuff is sticky and itchy!” said the star, “but maybe it will lift me up.” Soon, the star began to rise just the tiniest bit off the sand. “Hoorah!” shouted Ayden, “It’s working!” Just then, the sun began to shine more brightly. The bubbles dried up and the star dropped back in the sand, only now it was stickier. “Yuck,” said the star. “Now, what?”

“I know!” shouted Ayden. “Let’s call Stuart to help us! Stuart can use his forklift to pick the star up and put him back in the sky.” “That’s a great idea!” said Grandma, and she took her cell phone out of her pocket to call Stuart. In no time at all, they saw Stuart bumping along the beach in the forklift, waving hello. “How can I help?” he asked when he reached the star. “It looks like you have a friend in trouble here!” “I need to go home,” sighed the star. “I fell out of the sky, and now I’m all sticky, and I know my mother is worried about me.” Can you help?”

The star told Stuart that his home in the sky was in the sky up 7 clouds and on the left. Stuart gazed up at the sky and back at this forklift, and he shook his head sadly, “I have to tell you that this forklift is not going to be able to reach quite that high.” “I can reach up to the first cloud and give it to you for a blanket, but I can’t reach 7 clouds up.” Stuart reached up into the sky with the forklift and pulled down a piece of cloud for the star to use as a blanket, and then everyone was quiet again as they thought about what to do next.

“I know!” exclaimed Ayden. “Let’s call Duncan and Steve. They can bring the augur truck with the crane. Stuart can pick up the star with the fork lift, and Steve can pick up Stuart and the star, and then the star can get home.” “That’s a great idea!” said Grandma and Stuart at the same time. Once again, Grandma took out her cell phone to call Duncan, and in no time at all, they saw Duncan and Steve driving up the beach in the big augur truck. “How can we help?” asked Duncan, and Stuart explained the plan. Duncan and Steve looked up into the sky, trying to see how far it was to the seventh cloud. “That’s very high,” said Steve, and he turned to the star to ask, “If I can get you up as high as the third cloud, do you think you can climb the rest of the way home?” “I can try,” said the star, “I am a good jumper and a great climber once I am back in the sky.” “Hoorah!” said Ayden, “Let’s try it!”

Stuart gently wrapped the star up in the cloud blanket and carefully picked him up with the forklift. Then, Steve hooked Stuart and the forklift to the crane and slowly lifted them higher and higher. The forklift was a bit wobbly hanging on the crane, and the star was scared, but Stuart began to extend the arm until the star had passed first one cloud and then, two, and finally he set the star gently onto the third cloud. The star stood up and peered up into the sky. “I can see my mom!” he cried, “She’s coming to help me up!” “Thank you! Thank you!” Stuart carefully pulled in the arm of the forklift, and Steve carefully lowered Stuart back down to the beach. Up in the sky, the star jumped from cloud number three to four and then to five and then his mother reached down to help him up the last two clouds in the sky. Everyone cheered, and far away in the distance, the star twinkled, “Good-bye! Thank you!”

Grandma said, “That star was up way past its bedtime. I’ll bet his mother will put him right to bed.” “Well, I hope he has a snack and a story first,” said Ayden, “That’s what we do at your house. Right, Grandma?” Stuart and Duncan and Steve were ready to go home, too. They said, “Ayden, you really had a good idea for helping that star get back home. Good job!” “Thanks, guys!” laughed Ayden. “It was a lucky thing that you had those great trucks!” Stuart drove the forklift away, and Duncan and Steve drove the augur truck away, while Ayden and Grandma Phyllis waved good-bye. “Do you know what?” Ayden asked Grandma. “What?” she answered. “I’m hungry,” said Ayden. “I thought so,” said Grandma. “I think your Grandpa has made blueberry muffins for breakfast.” “Great!” said Ayden, and away he ran back to the house.

The end.

August 24, 2008: Setting the Stage for Act II

2008-08-24T15:34:00.003-04:00

Once years and years ago, I went up to the top of Mount Mitchell, the highest peak in North Carolina’s Black Mountains. Near the top, there are some extensive areas suffering sadly from deforestation, with the trees standing bare and gray like old arthritic fingers pointing to the clouds. There was a stark beauty in that desolation, even though it is a situation that may never be overcome by nature without help.As our house begins to take shape from the patterns of 2x4’s separating one living space from the other, it has the same look of bare beauty that I saw on Mt. Mitchell. The patterns are structured and orderly, unlike those of a mountaintop forest, but there is a sense of waiting and hoping for what comes next. I needed to look carefully to understand what I was seeing: This is the closet, this is the laundry room, on and on. Vince and I enjoy telling each other our own wonderful images of what those rooms will be like in time. We aren’t expecting the leafiness of spring, but we are surely looking forward to wall board and paint, books on shelves, and food in the pantry. I would guess that Vin is planning the first meal he will cook there, and it will be one of my many favorites! To me, this is like previewing a memory that hasn’t happened yet or standing on an empty stage before rehearsals begin for a new production: You know the play, the cast of characters, the setting, and what the words will mean once they are said, but the reality of the play is just an illusion until the curtain rises on opening night. No matter what may be expected, but the play itself becomes real when the audience is there listening. I think that Vince and I feel the life that will be in our house and have a sense of what will happen when this raw framework becomes home, but the magic will come when we unlock the door and go home for the first time.Now that the first floor of the house is completely framed, Vince and I were able to climb around and look at the spaces. The house seems both bigger and smaller than I had imagined from the plans on paper. The house is long, about 74 feet, but it is only 33 feet wide, making the distance from the front door on the west to the window wall on the east look short. The roughed in openings for the windows are bigger than I imagined, so the ocean will be in full view from most parts of the house. I think it is beautiful. A person standing at our front door will be able to see through the house to the beach, which I find both amazing and wonderful!Some of the sheathing on the south side has been applied, so there’s a small feeling of enclosure on that south wall. Our specifications call for the plywood sheathing to be glued and screwed, so it’s slow work. Using the polyurethane construction adhesive and the 2 ½” screws provides some assurance that the screws will not “back out” of the wall, and the adhesive also keeps the plywood from twisting out of plane. We are using ¾” exterior grade, pressure treated plywood in an effort to prevent any environmental damage to the plywood and avoid its losing strength. Mother Nature may still surprise us, but the exterior walls will be strong.

August 16: The First Framing

2008-08-20T09:56:00.003-04:00

There’s something intrinsically Southern in talking about a firm foundation. Maybe it’s that long and secure thread of old Protestant hymnology that underscores much of growing up in the Carolinas, but it’s also likely to be part of a culture where being strongly connected to one’s root system is a prized piece of life’s puzzle. There’s also an unfortunate tendency to talk about the size of a person’s feet as being part of their foundation, as in, “Well, look at her. She’s certainly got a firm foundation!” In my case, being a person with long, thin feet, someone once said to me, “Girl, if the Lord hadn’t turned down so much, you’d a been right tall,” with an answering comment by my dad saying, “She’s always had a firm foundation.”

For our house, Vince has tried to make sure the foundation is firm and strong. There’s a lot of heavy house that will sit on it and a powerful myriad of forces that can act against it. Now that the framing has begun, I understand why there were so many discussions about structural loads. The exterior walls are 2”x 8”, whereas the more common size is 2” x 4”. As one of the framers told us, “Those walls are HEAVY!” The first and second floor loads will be distributed through the truss system, but when the storms come, the foundation and the house will act as a unit to deflect the pressures of the winds. The 2”x 8” walls will stiffen the house, and everything from the very top plate to the bottom of the house will be tied together with periodic stainless steel threaded rod. The idea is to keep the house from pulling apart from the lift exerted on the house during a hurricane. With the exception of some things that aren’t available, all of the fasteners in the house are Type 316 stainless steel, so that there’s less of a chance for interior corrosion and weakness from failing fasteners. Type 316 is the fastener of preference for the Army's Field Research Facility in Duck.

Here’s the encyclopedic explanation of Type 316 stainless steel:

Stainless Steel is a common name for metal alloys that consist of 10.5% or more Chromium (Cr) and more than 50% Iron (Fe). Although it is called "stainless", a better term for it is "highly stain resistant". A somewhat dark metal, it looks bright because it reflects light. There are different types of stainless steels: when nickel is added, for instance, the austenite structure of iron is stabilized. This crystal structure makes such steels non-magnetic and less brittle at low temperatures. For greater hardness and strength, carbon is added. When subjected to adequate heat treatment, these steels are used as razor blades, cutlery, tools, etc. Significant quantities of manganese have been used in many stainless steel compositions. Manganese preserves an austenitic structure in the steel as does nickel, but at a lower cost.

Type 316 is most appropriate for severe environments, because of its resistance to corrosion. Type 316 is an austenitic, non-magnetic, and thermally nonhardenable stainless steel like Type 304. The carbon content is held to 0.08% maximum, while the nickel content is increased slightly. What distinguishes Type 316 from Type 304 is the addition of molybdenum up to a maximum of 3%.

Molybdenum increases the corrosion resistance of this chromium-nickel alloy to withstand attack by many industrial chemicals and solvents, and, in particular, inhibits pitting caused by chlorides. As such, molybdenum is one of the single most useful alloying additives in the fight against corrosion.

By virtue of the molybdenum addition, Type 316 can withstand corrosive attack by sodium and calcium brines, hypochlorite solutions, phosphoric acid; and the sulfite liquors and sulfurous acids used in the paper pulp industry. This alloy, therefore, is specified for industrial equipment that handles the corrosive process chemicals used to produce inks, rayons, photographic chemicals, paper, textiles, bleaches, and rubber. Type 316 is also used extensively for surgical implants within the hostile environment of the body. Type 316 is the main stainless used in the marine environment, with the exception of fasteners and other items where strength and wear resistance are needed, then Type 304 (18-8) is typically used.

I’m glad to know that the house will not be rusty, and looking at the first walls standing there in full strength was impressive, but the most exciting part was being able to stand on the first deck and realize what the view will be like from those rooms. The house is beginning to have shape and identity. I stood and looked out of the window that will be my studio’s view on the world. I thought of our family and friends waking up in the guest rooms and seeing the sunrise or watching the early dolphins. I can imagine the dogs, Addie and Lily, charging out over the walkover with such glee and Vince in his workshop, finally able to work with his long stored tools. The growing reality of the house and the life it will bring to us is breathtaking, like the view.

Completed Trusses and a Beautiful Day

2008-08-09T20:16:00.002-04:00

Yesterday and today were picture perfect beach days, with a light northeast wind blowing, less humidity, and slightly lower temperatures. I drove up to the lot on Friday by myself and back again today with Vince. The first floor trusses are completed, and we hope the framing will begin next week. Although engineered for structure, the trusses have an aesthetic beauty in their shape and balance, casting shadows on the sand in symmetrical patterns. I met a beautiful little beagle named Sandy Beach Paws, on site for the day on Friday with Jimmy, her daddy.

Here's a little video taken from the peak of our frontal dune. This is the beach that we will see every day when the house is finished. I thought Vince would enjoy watching it when he is having long days at work, especially since the sky and the sea were so incredible today.

Girders and Floor Trusses

2008-08-07T14:09:00.002-04:00

Yesterday, Karl and I went up to the lot to check on the progress with the girders and the trusses. The work with the girders is complete except for some of the strapping, and the trusses were going up. This piece of the work is so important, because these are the bones of the house, like the bones in a person’s hips that support everything else.

When I was a little girl going to First Methodist church in Henderson, I would hear the phrase “gird up your loins” and think that the preacher said to put a girdle on the lions. Back then, most of the older women I knew struggled miserably into girdles to look their best on Sunday, so that didn’t seem like a great idea for lions at all! The verb, “gird,” means, among other things, “to encircle or bind with a flexible band.” When the word “undergird” first entered the English language in the 16^th century, it meant to “make secure underneath,” by passing a rope or chain underneath, as for a ship. That literal sense of the word is out of use, but in the 19^th century, “undergird” picked up the figurative meaning of “strengthen” or “support” that now gives us the word, “girder,” meaning a horizontal piece supporting a structure. For our house, the girders are 2”x12” pressure treated boards that are set in the pilings using seat cuts. They are connected to the pilings with 2” x 18” double dipped galvanized steel straps and bolts. The seat cut is a horizontal cut that provides a secure placement for the girder. In this case, the girders are placed as doubles within the piling system, so there are two girders in each piling. I wondered if cutting into the piling would weaken it, but the International Building Code and Miami-Dade Building Code allows for up to 50% of the piling to be cut for girders. (That begs the question of piling size, since more than half of a 10” square piling still leaves more wood that exactly half of an 8” square piling. Vince guesses that it is kept at 50% to keep it simple, since most projects don’t have an engineer on site.) The girders run the length of the house, from north to south and provide support for the trusses, which run the width of the house, from east to west. All girders are strapped to the pilings with 2” x 1/8” thick double dipped galvanized steel. (see foundation drawings) 4 sets of girders.

In architecture and structural engineering, a truss is a framework comprising one or more triangular units constructed with straight slender members whose ends are connected at joints. The subsections of the trusses are rectangles, and diagonal 2x4’s form the triangles which provide the stiffness. Trusses work to distribute the loads of forces pushing and pulling the house. Our trusses were engineered by Johnny Ghee at International Forest Products. By knowing that four sets of girders would provide intermediate load bearing points (one on each end and two in between), he was able to design strong trusses that would not be too heavy. In addition to the structural integrity of trusses, they also provide an open structure for services, like water and sewerage, coming into and out of the house.

Trusses are not new, and they work in many different ways. When I saw Stuart use the fork lift to place the truss on the deck, I realized that the Wright Brothers airplane was basically an open parallel truss, like these. Reading more, I found that trusses were much, much older than that!

Marcus Vetruvius Pollio (b. about 80 BC) was a Roman architect and military engineer in the time of Emperors Gajus Julius Caesar and Augustus. He devised the Vitruvian trinity of Firmitas (strength, stiffness, durability), Utilitas (use or function), and Venustas (form, beauty, aesthetics) as the key to design. Vetruvius discusses trusses in the fourth of his books on Architecture. The ancient Egyptians used rope trusses to strengthen the long beams on ships as early as 1250 BC. That’s a long time ago!

Here's a little video of the work:

House Plans

2008-08-05T08:57:00.008-04:00

Heaven's a little closer

in a house...
by the sea.

D. Morgan

Here is a slideshow with views of the house as planned. We'll use silver gray siding with white trim and a darker gray roof. (Use the pause button under each picture to take a longer look.) The slideshow is a bit small, but it's a start!

Can You Dig It? The Piling Installation Video

2008-08-04T18:05:00.005-04:00

Obviously, this is my first video. I was completely intrigued by how much thought, preparation, and sheer hard work goes into getting pilings in the ground, especially our extra long pilings! The augur, the expert management of the crane, the jetted water, the pushing and pulling by the guys...just a tremendous effort. The best part is at the end when the piling is standing straight and tall, and everyone steps back in relief.

Looking Back: Designing the House

2008-07-25T19:45:00.008-04:00

“It would be better for true physics if there were no mathematicians on earth.”

Daniel Bernoulli

This house was not designed to be beautiful. Rather than being based on aesthetics, the size and shape of the house were based on the physical dynamics of wanting to build a strong oceanfront house in a high velocity hurricane zone. Those forces of nature set a group of constraints in place which became the ruling body for most of the design decisions.

It’s all because of Daniel Bernoulli, and just before him in history, Isaac Newton, who were both smart guys a very long time ago. Both worked on what we now call “lift,” but neither used that word in his work. Here’s more than you might want to know about why it matters for a beach house, borrowed without permission from the folks online:

Bernoulli’s Principle, in physics, is the concept that as the speed of a moving fluid (liquid or gas) increases, the pressure within that fluid decreases. Originally formulated in 1738 by Swiss mathematician and physicist Daniel Bernoulli, it states that the total energy in a steadily flowing fluid system is a constant along the flow path. An increase in the fluid’s speed must therefore be matched by a decrease in its pressure. The Bernoulli effect contributes to the damage caused by violent storms such as hurricanes and tornados by reducing the pressure above a roof and lifting the roof. (Wind = moving air; Air is made up of gasses; Gasses are fluids.)

Bernoulli's principle gives the pressure difference between the inside and outside of the roof, rather than the force directly. Pressure is force divided by area, so the force is the pressure times the area of the roof. The air inside the house is still, there are no elevation differences, and the wind is blowing over the roof. Bernoulli's equation tells us the pressure difference between the inside and outside of the roof is one half the air density multiplied by the wind speed squared. If the air density is 1.3 kilograms per cubic meter, and the wind speed is about 67 meters per second (=150 miles per hour - a strong hurricane), the pressure difference between the inside and outside of the roof is 3000 Newtons per square meter or 0.4 pounds per square inch. This pressure sounds insignificant, but the total force is the pressure times the area. A modest home might have a roof area of 1000 square feet. There are 144 square inches in a square foot. Multiplying 1000 by 144 by 0.4 pounds per square inch gives a lifting force of about 60,000 pounds (30 tons!). Higher wind speeds will produce even greater lifting forces. If the roof lifts from the house, the wind blowing under the roof equalizes the pressure below and above. With no lifting force, it crashes down. In the brief time the roof is suspended, entering winds can blow the walls outward. So it looks like the house exploded. There is a myth that opening a window before a tornado can prevent a house from exploding. The NOAA does NOT recommend this practice. Opening a window won't help, since most houses are already ventilated.

More simply put, if the roof is lost, the house goes with it. If a window or a door breaks or there is a hole in a wall, the roof is lost and the house goes with it. We don’t want to lose the house, so the house has a hip roof with a 5 -12 pitch over a shoebox whose dimensions were governed by the optimal pitch for the roof. Hopefully, it will be a beautiful shoebox (Jimmy Choo or Prada, not Converse), but the shape was not to be changed regardless of how the interior spaces would need to be put together. The shoebox could be longer, but not deeper (size 12N, but not 8W)

With scissors and a ruler and pieces of graph paper, Vince and I started putting the design of the house together back in the early winter of 200i, fitting cut pieces of paper together like a puzzle to get the basic layout of the house. There were plenty of appropriate squares and rectangles for all the rooms and functions, but the space looked institutional, like a rabbit’s warren with long narrow halls and rooms on either side. We needed some help from a person who could take that immutable rectangle and find a beautiful home within it. At first, we tried working with a couple of local OBX house designers, but the process didn’t go well. By asking around in Annapolis, MD., (where we lived) I heard about Cathy Cherry and read her web-site. Just from the words on her web-site back then, the tremendous energy and spirit of this woman bounced from the page. When I spoke with her, I knew she would be wonderful for us, and there was also the sense that she was strong and savvy and quick enough to work well with Vince.

Walking into Cathy’s design studio for the first time, I found myself hoping that she wouldn’t be able to tell just by looking at me that Vince and I live in utter chaos. I fervently wished that I could be better than I am about things like knowing the exactly best and right place for the silverware and always getting the old newspapers out to the recycling bin. I just wasn’t born with the domestic gene, and I have never been able to grow one, so some of the usual questions were hard to answer. The good news is that Cathy is a very human person, acknowledging with an impish grin that everyone is guilty of similar household sins, like having drippy coffee cups and doggy floors to keep up with. At that first meeting long ago, ideas and sketches were rebounding from one person to the other, and after about four hours, we had a good beginning. Cathy opened up the interior, creating a bookcase vestibule in the center of the first floor and moving the open staircase to the ocean side of the house in front of a wall of windows. Those three design elements are still our favorites in the house and have remained clear in our hopes and dreams all this time. There were plenty of lively discussions, with Cathy patiently listening to Vince’s zipping around with his ideas and waiting for me to more slowly consider each new aspect and then responding with a fast pencil drawing option after option. At other times, she would look right at us saying, “I’m not going to let you do that. It’s a mistake and here’s why…” I remember her asking, “So, where will you find your trashcan?” “Where do you lay your hairbrush,” “Are you sure you understand how close this wall is to…” and “When I come to your house, I will know exactly where to find the toothpaste”. I think that Cathy intuitively sees whole people going through their days within the house and then designs the walls and floors and windows to support real life: Wet towels, sandy feet and all.

From the time Hurricane Isabel hit in 2003 until last fall, 2007, our plans sat waiting somewhere in a Purple Cherry file. The house design needed to be reworked for a lot of reasons, and plans were made for Cathy to do the work even though weren’t in Annapolis. The core of the house is basically the same as it was in 2003, but the layout and the way the house will function is much better. Live and learn and then apply what you learn. Right?

Designing a house is not a simple task. Many, many hours were spent working with Cathy and also with Brain Bassindale, our project manager. Once the basic space was organized, there were the details of how the doors would open and what shape the kitchen island would be and where to put the light switches and at which corner to fit the shower. With a house on the beach, it is important to consider where the sun will be for the better part of the day and what might happen when a nor’easter comes through and everyone is socked in. The hundreds of bits and pieces that make up daily life all stand up to be counted in this process, leading to a bit of introspection. (“Wow. Do I really do that?” “Why do we have to have…?”) One thing becomes obvious: The house will be new, but the people will not be new. Looking at the differences in people with a grain of salt and a sense of humor goes a long way in a lot of situations. Cathy was so good about this aspect of the discussions, showing tact and diplomacy when she must have often wondered what spaceship dropped us off in her design studio.

Great suggestions came from friends and family along the way. Our talented friend Kathy Creel solved in about 15 minutes one dilemma that had plagued us for months. A few changes have been made since we said good-bye to Cathy and Brian in Annapolis, and we have the help of a great house designer in Kitty Hawk: Mike York at York Residential Design. Astonishing the number of people who have a part in this house!

In the long course of this blog, there will be a lot of to say about how each structural aspect impacted the completion of the design, from being determined to have no penetrations in the roof, to the type of insulation used and the impact of 8” walls on window sills. A good architect, besides needing to know how to make beauty and organization from the chaos of brainstorms, also has to know building materials, wiring, plumbing systems, tile, wood, soffits, and even about Bernoulli, visualizing all the pieces and how they will function together in the structure. Now, Cathy and Purple Cherry Architects have plunged deeply into something new that she is calling Purpose Driven Architecture (http://www.purplecherry.com/news/view/23). It seems to me that what Cathy has done all along has been purpose driven architecture, and it is her gift. Vince and I are thankful to have Cathy’s vibrant energy and spirit, as well as her talent and expertise, in all the nooks and crannies of our house.

Cathy Purple Cherry

Looking Back: Finding our builder

2008-07-24T13:00:00.008-04:00

Back in the 1940’s, Woody Guthrie wrote a song for his children called, Bling Blang. The second verse goes like this:

Bling! Blang! Hammer with my hammer
Zingo, Zango, cutting with my saw.

I’ll grab some mud and you grab some clay
So when it rains it won’t wash away
We’ll build a house, it’ll be so strong
The wind will sing my baby a song

Bling! Blang! Hammer with my hammer
Zingo, Zango, cutting with my saw

Choosing a builder is the most important decision when starting a new house. All of the good ideas and knowledge in the world can’t build a house. It takes hammers and nails and shingles and sweat and being at the job until it’s completed. It takes the right person and the right spirit and the right sub-contractors to put all of the pieces together and end up with a beautiful, strong house on the last day of the job. It takes knowledge and experience and a lot of perseverance and patience, not to mention a sense of diplomacy and tact, as well as a good dose of hard work and good luck. We have all of these things in our builder, and this is how we found him. It makes you realize how much sheer good fortune has influenced so many things about our house…or was it magic?

For the week of the new millennium, Vince rented us a condo on the beach in Duck. While there, we decided to hunt for a builder for our eventual house. Starting from scratch, we made a list of names by looking around in the phone book and from seeing the signs near new construction on the beach. At the time, we knew we wanted to build a strong house, and we knew that it would truly be a custom house…not someone else’s ideas. It would have been hard to imagine how far our dreams and Vince’s research would eventually take us in terms of building specifications. Vince knew the constraints given by the physics of construction in a high velocity hurricane zone, though he had only just begun to scratch the surface of what would be learned over the next eight years. Needing some kind of instrument for comparison, we decided to use a test question for each builder that we interviewed.

Some years back, during Vince’s career at the Naval Research Center in Annapolis, he worked on the design of a fire suppression system for submarines. The design was like a sprinkler system that releases mist, rather than streams of water, so that the fire is smothered and extinguished with a relatively small amount of water damage. It’s a system that would work well in a private home, so we decided to tell each builder that we wanted to install a system like that in our house and to ask if he could so that for us. If the builder listened with interest and responded with curiosity, that company would be a reasonable prospect. The first stop was an interview with a large, well-known construction company. It did not go well. The representative began by telling us all the things that we would want to put in our house. When Vince responded with some of the things we really DID want to put in our house, the man said, “Oh, no. You don’t want that. You want blah blah blah.” When it came time to ask the test question, we already knew this would not be our company, but Vince asked it anyway. The response was, “You don’t need that.” End of conversation.

For many companies on the beach at that time, a custom design meant that the home owner could opt for one of a few given layouts and also choose what colors would be used in the house. That was it. Most of the houses being built were to be used for summer rental programs or vacation homes, and not many were being built for year around residence. That’s true today as well, though not nearly as many rental houses are going up. Neither Vince nor I had ever lived another person’s plan of any kind, and we had seen some wonderfully individual houses, so we knew someone was out there for us!

One of the construction companies on our list was “BC Custom Builders.” Since the word “custom” was in the name of the company, we had high hopes and made an appointment to see them. Walking into an office in Kitty Hawk we saw a Christmas tree decorated with little houses. We met a man named Ben Cubler, who was/is the founding president of the company. With Ben was his son, Karl, who formed the company with his dad in 1989, and Karl’s wife, Elizabeth, who worked closely with them. Vince and I liked them all immediately. Ben and Karl were clearly committed to quality construction. Both were extremely knowledgeable about building houses up in our area of the beach, having vacationed and explored there since the early 1980’s. In recent years, Karl and Elizabeth had built a house in the north part of Carova Beach and knew it well, so their experience was in depth and first hand. Ideas for the house were met with nods and good counter-questions, and finally…Vince asked the test question. Karl said, “What a great idea. I think we can do that!” Good answer.

On New Year’s Day, Karl drove Vince, Addie and me around to look at some of the houses that they had built. The work was beautiful. One house had a juniper ceiling that was perfectly stunning, and we saw different choices for siding and interior finishes. Karl had an obvious level of involvement and friendship with the people whose houses he built, and it was good to see.

In the years that followed, while we planned the house and planted the dune grass, Vince and I rented a couple of BC’s houses up in Carova, so that we could have some experience with actually staying in BC houses. We wanted to try out the plumbing and to see for ourselves if things that were wobbly or awkwardly put together. Everything that we saw affirmed our initial impression of BC’s good work.

Over the next three years, we worked with Ben, Karl and Elizabeth to get a basic plan for the house and to schedule when we would build. Their experience and input set us firmly on the path of the research that has been done ever since: Reading FEMA reports, learning about materials and technological advancements for this kind of construction, understanding CAMA, on and on. BC spent a tremendous amount of time with us finalizing our original design plans and conferring with our architect, Cathy Cherry. Vince was reading myriads of information about Coastal Construction and sending reams of documents to Karl and Ben. Finally, in the fall of 2003, we were ready to break ground in early November, and then came Hurricane Isabel.

I will never forget Elizabeth’s phone call when she said, “You have to understand that there is nothing left. No dune. No grass. It’s flat, like a pancake…like the desert.”

And so here we are again, five years later with a new sand dune and a lot of grass, working with Karl and Elizabeth and actually building our house. Ben Cubler is happily retired. BC has taken huge strides in the last 8 years, always looking ahead, learning more, and expanding horizons. Karl frequently tells me that “we are all flawed human beings, doing the best that we can to make something wonderful happen. We work together. We try hard, and it usually comes out well in the end.” How fortunate for us that they chose to put the word “custom” in the name of their company. (http://www.bccustombuilders.com/)

Looking Back: Building the Dune

2008-07-21T15:18:00.001-04:00

“I believe that a leaf of grass is no less than a journey-work of the stars”
Walt Whitman

It’s been all about the grass, really: Sand fence and beach grass, though we didn’t know it at first. The wind blows the sand across the beach, and the sand fence slows the grains of sand down enough for them to drop onto the land and gather into mounds. The beach grass grows forward with deep roots that help to hold the sand in place, and the grass fronds trap sea oat pods so that they can safely take root. The sea oats grow in clumps that are strong and secure, with a deep network of ever-expanding roots. That’s what makes a sand dune grow and stay in place. It doesn’t happen by itself. Sand fence alone will gather sand, but without the plants to hold it there, a new dune can be in place one day and gone the next day, at the whim of the tide and the wind. During a hurricane, the dune system protects the land from damage and erosion largely by buying time against the elements of the storm. The longer it takes for the dune to be destroyed, the more the house and land is protected as the storm moves away. That’s important.

The local folks told us a lot of stories about how to plant beach grass. There were some creative approaches, including using a broom handle to both create the hole and push in the sprig, but common sense, what we read and what we heard were not in agreement. We tried several things before Vince finally designed a tool for planting that would work for us. This tool is a long dibble that can be used from a standing position, so that Vince can poke holes in the sand at the correct depth for planting, and I can then drop in the sprigs and fill the holes. Vince machined the dibble at home and had it welded by one of his friends at the Navy Lab. It's made of stainless steel, so it will be a useful tool for a very long time. It’s really too heavy, but it works for us. One year, we planted more than 6,000 sprigs across the winter. I complained, but it was a good thing to do.

The first time we ever planted beach grass was over Christmas. 2000 / New Year’s 2001. It was unusually cold, and the ground was frozen. We used the fireplace poker from the house we had rented to poke the holes. The grass that we planted thrived, but we didn’t get many sprigs in the ground that day!

The grass that we call “dune grass,” but whose name is really “American Beach Grass,” needs to be planted in the winter. We buy the grass sprigs in bundles of 250 from Central Garden, a nursery in Kitty Hawk. Each grass sprig must have its own hole, though we sometimes put two sprigs together. Vince and I can do this job, he poking the holes with me skittering along on the sand dropping in the sprigs, for about two hours, maybe three, and that’s enough for one day.

When Vince and I bought the lot in August, 1999, it was flat. At the time, we had no idea how important it was that the lot NOT be flat, especially not flat enough to easily see the breakers from the very back end of the property! Vince and I didn’t own a 4wd vehicle, and we were busy with other parts of life, so we didn’t go back up to the lot until Christmas, 2000. Not checking on the property was a mistake. People had been using it as a drive-through short cut to get to the properties on the next row back, creating a big depressed swath from front to back. Taking Ben Cubler’s advice, we had some guys put up the first of many, many rows of sand fence (they call it “sand fencin’”). It was New Year’s Eve, and those boys were already drinking, but the fence did go in. It was a beginning, at least. From then on, we fenced and planted, fenced and planted, and by the winter of 2002 / 2003, there was enough of a little bump of a dune and enough thriving grass sprigs to hope that we could get a CAMA (Coastal Area Management Act) permit. Firm plans were made to build the house that next fall. The Severna Park house was renovated and put on the market, I sold my school, Vince retired from Uncle Sam and began a temporary double dipping job in Arlington, VA., and we rented a little “beach box” house in Kill Devil Hills so that I could watch over the construction.

Two weeks later, on September 18, 2003, Hurricane Isabel took our entire sand dune, leaving the land scoured bare and flat, like a pancake…or the desert… flatter than flat! There was not a sprig of beach grass to be found anywhere, but the big clump of sea oats on the northeast corner survived. We were completely devastated, and it was time to start over.

In late September, 2003, North Carolina Sea Grant published The Dune Book, by Spencer Rogers and David Nash. Spencer Rogers has been the coastal construction and erosion specialist for NC Sea Grant in Wilmington, NC, since 1978. David Nash has been as extension agent in coastal management and commercial horticulture for the NC Cooperative Extension in Brunswick and New Hanover Counties since 1993. Vince and I attended a dune building workshop presented by NC Sea Grant after Hurricane Isabel, and we later spoke with Spencer Rogers by phone about rebuilding our dune. The processes Rogers and Nash describe are really effective, and we listened to them. With a lot of sand fence, thousands of grass sprigs, and 200 sea oat sprigs, the peak of our frontal dune is now about 20’.

The Dune Book can be purchased or downloaded from the NC Sea Grant website at:
http://www.ncseagrant.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=news_item&id=238

This is what the lot looked like after the hurricane: Very bleak.

By obtaining a CAMA minor permit in late autumn that year, we were allowed to have enough sand hauled in to jump start the new dune. Mark Thompson did the hauling, sculpting a mound about 4’ high and 20’ deep across the 120’ width of the lot. New sand fence was put in across the winter, and we planted beach grass at every opportunity. When the weather warmed, Vince and I planted 200 sea oat seedlings bought from Angie Kite at Coinjock Farms. Our dream for the new house was still alive and well, but it was in the nebulous future and completely dependent on the whims of the wind and the sea. Vince was determined to get that dune back into shape, and we spent a tremendous amount of time and energy either fencing or planting or fertilizing. By 2005, Vince had become dissatisfied with hiring local men to put in sand fence, and we began to do the work ourselves.

Putting in sand fence is hard work. We bought 50' rolls of sand fence and 4x4 posts at the Home Depot in Kitty Hawk, about 12 miles south of our house in Duck. We then hauled the materials up to the lot, which is about 25 miles north of Duck. Vince dug the holes and set the posts, and together we strung the sand fence from pole to pole, nailing the fence to the posts with staples and then tightening each weave. Vince did most of the work, and my job was to hold the fencing steady. Working together, we could manage about 3 roles in a couple of hours, but we were exhausted. Vince by himself could do two rolls in about two hours... also exhausting. In the winter of 2006/2007, Vince decided that we were up against impossible odds and bought himself a Milwaukee Hole Hawg drill, a 4' long, 5" diameter augur, and a small 1200 watt generator. With those three things, we could put in 30 posts in an hour, and stringing the sand fence was much easier. That winter, we did a huge amount of work, installing about 40 rolls of sand fence all over the lot. It was such a relief to have a good working system in place. Putting in the fence is still hard work, but what we have gained from it is incredible.

As a side note, it is important to understand that the damage from Hurricane Isabel came not from the wind as much as from the unusually high storm surge (26’ one mile out). If our house had been standing, it would not have been damaged.

Vince and I will always be working on our sand dune, planting and fencing, fencing and planting. Over time, we want to add more species of plants that thrive in our environment, because each one helps the others to survive, and they will help us to survive. In time and with another storm, we may have to build it again from scratch, but we can do that. It will help that the house will be there and the coffee pot and bathroom waiting.

Here are two slideshows to show the lot in 2003, before Hurricane Isabel, and then this year when we decided to build.

Beginning Construction: Pilings in the ground at last!

2008-07-20T17:20:00.002-04:00

Carefully watched over by a Chocolate Lab named Keya, a man named Duncan Aydlett and his crew have completed the job of putting our pilings in the ground. Duncan started Lightning Marine Construction in 1991, and his experience is obvious even to an unpracticed eye. ( see http://lightningmarine.com/) Vince and I went up to the site on Monday (7/14) and watched them put in three pilings in about an hour. I spoke to Duncan, who said that they had never put in pilings this deep before and that the work is really hard on the men. It was very hot out there with no wind behind the dune, so I know that’s true. For their sakes, I was glad that we are having days with highs in the 80’s and not the 90’s or worse. Duncan told me that the Chocolate Lab, Kaia, is his dog and that the name means “turtle” in an Indian language, though he didn’t say which. I have read that "Keya" means a lot of beautiful things in several languages, all having to do with the earth and beauty, so it’s a great name for a Lab. This dog was named Keya/turtle, because of the way he laid with his paws turned out like a swimming sea turtle as a puppy. Keya was clearly very much an old hand on the job site, patiently adjusting his position as the men moved the equipment, digging for cool spots in the sand, and finally taking a nap in the shade under the truck. I felt good about the work and the man, knowing that there was a Lab on site.

Duncan had Rick House’s well-used piling layout in his hand, and he and another one of the men marked off the spots where each piling should go. Since the holes are so deep, I wondered how they could possibly know how far into the sand to dig, but each post is marked at about 16’, 18’ and 22’, so they can read the depths from the top down. Steve, who operates the crane, is like the choreographer in a ballet, moving the boom and augur around the site as exactly as if it were his own arm and hand. First, he lowers the augur tip to the spot Duncan has measured and marked, digs down to first one level and then another, shaking the accumulated sand off the augur in between, like a wet animal without a towel. The augur is huge, making a clean round hole about 2 feet in diameter. When it comes up out of the hole caked with sand, it looks like a fat round man after eating too much at a big meal. After digging the hole, Steve then moves the boom over to grab one of the pilings from the stack. There is a big hook that is on a reel that allows the hook to be pulled farther from and then back towards the rig. Another worker takes the big hook and loops it into a piece of wire rope that is on the piling. The boom slowly lifts and drags the piling until it is erect over the hole, and then it is lowered in. Several of the men guide the piling as it sinks deeper and deeper into the ground. Judging from the marks on the piling, the augured holes are about 16 feet deep. The hole is deepened the last six or so feet by jetting an intense stream of water down into the hole as the men push the piling deeper and deeper until it reaches the 22 foot mark. This process is a muddy mess, and the water and wet sand are everywhere. The water comes from temporary shallow wells that are dug on site and stored in a tank called the mule. The strength of the jetted stream comes from the power of the pump. Finally, Duncan makes sure the piling is standing level, the men fill in the hole, and they do it all again. .. about 44 times.

When I went back up to the lot on Thursday (7/17), I found Duncan grilling hamburgers for the guys under a tarp. I met Steve’s little Yorkie, Rusty, who also spends his days at work, carefully tucked out of harm’s way in the truck and watched over by all the men on the site. The pilings are surely one of the most important elements of having a strong house, and I was glad to know that such a good crew did that work for us.

It seemed that getting the pilings started would take forever! Once Karl ordered the pilings, there was a problem between Kellogg’s (the lumber yard) and the piling source. When the order was corrected, there was an issue with getting the pilings treated, because the treatment facility was not equipped to handle the larger pilings. The piling treatment had to be outsourced to a commercial facility. Once they were finally delivered to Kellogg’s, a special truck was needed to get the pilings up to our lot, since they were too long for the typical delivery truck and too heavy to be carried in just one or two trips up the beach. Mark Thompson came to the rescue with his big 8-10 ton military truck, (he can haul ANYTHING!) and hauled them up there in a couple of trips. SO, the right pilings with the right treatment finally arrived on the lot on Monday, 7/14. Next, there had to be a piling inspection by the Currituck County Building Inspector to make sure there were no knots or other deformities that would make them too weak to support our house. Having passed the inspection, the first piling was installed on Wednesday afternoon. As of Friday evening, July 18, the last of the pilings were in the ground and tamped. Vince and I had planned to be there watching and toasting the event with champagne, but since it was so long past the time that we expected things to begin, neither of us could be there for the first ones. It was a moment that I truly wanted to see, especially since it was only a once in a lifetime occurrence!

Things became a bit more complicated because we made the decision to use very long pilings: 34 footers. The usual pilings are 24 feet long, with 8 feet off the ground and 16 feet in the ground, so ours had to be specially ordered. (That’s a BIG tree!) According to Vince, FEMA guidelines recommend that pilings for ocean front houses be 10 feet below MSL (mean sea level). Our lot has an elevation of 12 feet above MSL, so that adds up to 22 feet in the ground. We are putting the house nearly 11 feet above the sand, so that’s 33 feet of piling, with the extra foot allowed for leveling and some discrepancy in the depths. At our location on the beach, flood level is considered to be 12’ above MSL, so our grade is at flood level. The problem that arises during a high water event (translation: hurricane or nor’easter) is that when water flows onto the land from the sea, the wave action erodes the sand around the pilings and eventually causes the piling to lose its lateral support. Here in North Carolina, we call that process “wallering out,” as in “the hole got wallered out.” When the force of the wind then pushes on the weakened piling system, the house does what is called “racking,” leaning farther and farther until it falls over. The deeper pilings provide support that shouldn’t “waller out” with the depth and energy of the water that we expect in North Carolina, so there you go…longer pilings are important! A toppled over house is NOT a good thing! For the extra long pilings and the different facility for the treatment and the additional hauling, we paid about $5,000.00 more than if we had used the standard 24 foot pilings. Definitely a case of something worth its weight in gold.

Whew!