900 Sq. ft Earth Bermed Passive Solar Home in Upstate NY

[drainl]

Squirl we went to Tractor Supply, Lowes and the stove store on rt 23 today.  The guy at the stove store couldn't bother to help us so we didn't stay.  Cheapest woodstove was over $1300 anyway.  Jeff talked with the guy at TS for quite awhile.  Now Jeff's leaning towards a bigger stove so we don't have to get up during the night to stoke it.  He's looking at one off Craigslist tonight too.  We'll see! 

We also went to our bank and started the application for the home equity loan.     Hopefully we won't dip into it too much.

[Squirl]

Thanks.  I kind of expected that at the specialty stores.  I have never been to those particular ones, but I have been to specialty stores before and everything was really beautiful and REALLY expensive.  I always was treated poorly by salespeople because they knew they weren't going to make much of a commission off of me.  I knew I was looking for a plain stove and didn't want to waist my time.  Thank you for the update.

Good luck tonight.

[Dog]

I hope you find the perfect stove to meet your needs.

We had a wood burning stove when I was a kid and my dad had to get up 2-3 times a night to stoke it. That was no fun!

[EcoHeliGuy]

This stove you can buy today, and then down the road build a brick surround to convert it into a masonry stove. once you have the brick surround you won't need to stoke it at night.
http://www.vermontwoodstove.com/vermontbunbaker.htm

[soomb]

This stove you can buy today, and then down the road build a brick surround to convert it into a masonry stove. once you have the brick surround you won't need to stoke it at night.
http://www.vermontwoodstove.com/vermontbunbaker.htm

I see the soap stone add-ons, but did you speak with someone about building a surround?

[EcoHeliGuy]

I found this over a year ago, and can't seem to find the link where i originally found the mod done, I'm sure if you contact them they can offer there input. I'll keep looking for the link.

Also I would like to note that this doesn't make a true masonry stove, but Its still better then a regular stove at holding heat.

[speedfunk]

Good call Squirl lol.  We try to support local businesses first but I think Tractor Supply had better local people working for them lol.  

The situation is that we will need the wood stove for this year when the house has no insulation and the 2 years that follow and from then on, depending on outcome of solar design intermittent use after that or hopefully we get to take it out and sell it.  So price is a huge consideration and so is not loading it 3 times a night.

the stove we are looking at used burns for 8 hours.  Here's a link to it for sale on amazon.

http://www.amazon.com/Vogelzang-Defender-Wood-Stove-Epa-Blower-TR001-B/dp/B000KKO5LA

Seems like a better made stove then the one at tractor supply and is 550 obo.  However it's a bit smaller, says it heats 1200 sq ft.  

Here's tractor supply one
http://www.tractorsupply.com/home-improvement/heating-supplies/wood-heaters/wood-heaters-coal-heaters/united-states-stove-co-2015-magnolia-wood-burning-stove-with-blower-3173129
Then of course, we factor the tax credit for new stoves in..... my head hurts  

Eco:  Thanks for that link....way to much money for our budget and situation however mass could be added (local bluestone slabs instead of soapstone) if needed.  Thanks for link.

Dog:  I had a stove as a kid and for a short bit of time after high school with debbie in that same house and your right loading it 2-3 times does not sound like fun  

Any thoughts on either of the stoves?  

[Squirl]

The tax credit for new stoves is , with a tested efficiency of 75%.
"(e) A stove that uses the burning of
biomass fuel to heat a dwelling unit or to
heat water for use in such a dwelling unit,
and that has a thermal efficiency rating of
at least 75 percent as measured using a
lower heating value."

I am still having trouble figuring out the requirements.  But there seems to be some guidance here.
http://www.chimneysweeponline.com/protocols.htm
http://www.chimneysweeponline.com/taxcredit.htm


All the ones I found that were certified were well over $1000 close to $2000.  Even with the tax credit, it wasn't worth it.  Don't' forget the tax credit is part of the $1500 maximum which includes the windows, doors, roofing and alternative energy systems over a two year period.  I would look at what else you plan to buy.  If it is over $5000, you may max out and it would be wasted anyway.  The positive side of the new stove is the tax credit seems to be on the entire installation.  Tractor supply used too sell the Vogelzang stoves and just switched to Magnolia.  They have about the same BTU output and they used to sell the Vogelzang at around the same price.  Seems almost identical. 

If it is not a permanent addition you may want to add some thermal storage around it for over night.  Water tanks maybe?  Also could help protect it from children.

[EcoHeliGuy]

I know that money doesn't grow on trees, so If you can't afford a top of the line stove, then you can't afford it. But you shouldn't base not buying a good stove because you have maxed out your tax credit. Thats like saying Henry ford shouldn't have bothered spending money on R&D after he sold his first model T because it was a car, and today we still drive well a car..... Todays cars don't exhaust black thick smoke, and are able to pull trailers up hills at highway speeds. Same is true for a stove, sure you can build a stove from an oil drum, but its going to burn lots of wood, and it will make lots of black smoke. I'm not saying you have to go out and buy a Lincoln, but buy focus, not a 1980 pinto.   

[drainl]

Nice stove Eco!  That's cool with the oven too.  If it motivated me to cook more, Jeff just might agree to buy it. 

Jeff forgot to mention that for the one year we had wood heat, we froze our butts off.  The thing was out more than it was heating.  No fault of the stove.     Makes me a little nervous about wood heat.

Squirl I hate when salespeople don't bother when you actually want help.  I like supporting local businesses and will even pay a bit more to do it, but once they piss us off, we won't be back!

[speedfunk]

Well we finally made the final decision on our wood stove    .  Thanks everyone for sharing your input! This morning we put down 100 bucks after seeing the used vogelzang stove.  It was one year old.  After talking to owner I felt comfortable that it would fit out needs. 

He said he would fill it with dry wood at 10:30 at night and around 7:30-8:00 in morning get up rake out coals and throw on some kindling and it started.  So this is huge , I really don't want to get up at night, we are not built like that ;0)   

He had a 1500/sq foot house if memory serves me correctly and he said it heated all but very back room, which was through a maze of small doorways.  The house was an older farmhouse and their floor plan  had a lot of small rooms.  Ours will be much more open and will be 900/sq foot.  So I am comfortable it will be enough heat for the sq of our home.  It's nice to talk to someone who used that same exact stove.  He had some nice tips to share as well on using the stove .   I'm happy we bought used, I'd much rather deny the gov't their fee on a new stove and give money to someone local who needs it. 

We settled on 500 which I feel was a fair price.  It also has a fan on it which was kind of nice   So now just the chimney stuff $$$

Squirl:  Thanks for that info!!!  You make a good point about other things we could use the credit for.  What was interesting was that Tractor Supply had a sign saying tax credit eligible on ALL of their stoves even the inefficient ones.  I guess no one really understands that tax credit stuff.  Hopefully since our house will be ALL mass that will help hold the heat for the morning as well. 

EchoHeliGuy:  I'm fairley confident we got a good stove .  You make good points though.  A cheap stove will require more trees to cut, more wear and tear on chainsaw, more gas , more oil, more time for hauling, more storage space for wood, more loading, and that 200 bucks you save would be quickly gone even over the 3 years we plan on using the stove.   It's 75% efficient so it's def a ford focus!!

[EcoHeliGuy]

Great choice 

I'm a firm believer in buying used, and keeping cash in peoples wallets as well, remember its not because people paid in real cash that the economy fell apart. 

[Squirl]

Every store that sells woodstoves seems to put that sign up.  I think most stoves could pass, just the U.S. never required testing so most aren't tested.  I would ask for the certification with any new stove.  Congratulations on the purchase. 

[drainl]

I've been slacking - three weeks since the last photos!  We've been trying to put as much time as possible into the house lately. We're almost done with the block - woohoo! We finished up the blocks we had today and need one more pallet to finish up. 14 rows for the front of the house and 16 for the back. Four walls are completely done. Stacking is slower and harder on the back the higher we get. Until we get more blocks delivered, we're going to concentrate on core fills and SBC. Here are some photos as of yesterday...









It's peak hawk migrating season here, so it was fun to see all the hawks passing by. One even buzzed the house.

[Sassy]

You're making good progress - bet you've built up some muscles 

[speedfunk]

Thanks Sassy...

You bet ya...deb is RIPPED..... she flexed for me the other day and WOW 
my back just hurts lol.

I just looked over your blog, I've said it before but you place is just awesome!  I would love to see it someday.  50 dollar underground house was the first book I bought when starting my interest in building.  YOu both have done an amazing job.  You both should be very proud.

Update:  GOt some more SBC done today.  More tommorow then core fills which don't show up in any pics 

[Captnmav]

Hi everyone, I'm new to the forum and very interested in this project. Earlier someone mentioned a blog about this build, any chance someone could post a link? I plan to start a similar build next spring and am very interested to see how the umbrella insulation system works in NY's winters. I've read that it will, but being able to talk to someone who actually lives in a place with it would be great.

[speedfunk]

Hi Captin Mav..

I'm glad your intrested.  We (wife and I ) keep this thread the most upto date.  We have a blog but it basically just mirrors this thread.  So you will find the most info here.  I'm intrested also...unforntually by the time you are able to build (1 year) I probably won't have any positive feedback to give you get as from what I've read it takes a couple of years to heat that much mass up to sustain through the winter.   But I hope you get something out of it! 

There are two other PAHS (passive annual solar ) houses that i've found on the internet ..one in the rockies and one in virgina.  I've deviated from their methods quite a bit.  But the umbrella (in my case I like the term skirting since it's not compeletly burried) is similar to others, with the exception i'm taking a change swapping out the 2" poly strene insulation for tekfoil (bubble wrap type insulation).  It's considerably cheaper and I think will work better on uneven ground without as much cracking (hurts r value).  We will see kind of in un charted territory .... 

Look forward to hearing about your project ..please share when you do build it.. so as to pass on the knowledge and help make these type designs a bit more mainstream. 

[drainl]

No new exciting pictures... we did some core filling yesterday and Jeffs been working on more SBC when I'm not there.  The core filling is slow but we've come up with some ways to be a little more efficient.  We have a delivery of block, rebar, and portland coming tomorrow morning.  We've also written out what we've got left before we're ready for the roof and have wrapped up some decisions, so now we just have to do the work!

I've been keeping an eye on craiglist and found some 3" insulation that'll work for the roof - $10/4'x8' sheet.  No foil on it, but Jeff still says we saved a bundle.  We need to put 4" total on the roof, so we'll get 1" thick sheets.  I think they're around $20/sheet at the store.  It was quite a family adventure hauling a huge stack of insulation in the trailer over an hour.  Jeff did the 2nd trip on his own. 

We've had some awesome weather lately - fall is so nice for building too - 60s and sunny.  Tomorrow is supposed to be in the 80s!

[Captnmav]

I think I know the houses your talking about, and they have helped me in planning things too.

I'm no expert and have no experience with it but I have a concern with the foiltek, the r-value listed for foil faced wraps is generally a 'equivalent' r-value not and actual value. They use these equivalent values to adjust for the radiant barrier of the foil, but this only works if exposed directly to an air space, as soon as something touches it radiant heat flow stops and conduction becomes the primary flow.

I talked with a HVAC engineer and he said when doing his calculations (albeit for traditionally build structures) he de-rates foil faces because even as dust builds up on them they loose effectiveness. Not trying to step on your toes, but I'd hate to see you guys waste any time/money. Maybe the manufacturer would answer some questions? If I can find where I read that I'll post a link.

[drainl]

CaptainMav:  I know exactly what your talking about.  R value is a funny thing.  I've read pretty much that same things you have and up until recently was NOT going to use tekfoil.  Until when doing the dirt digging Tim our excavator dude reminded me about.  I then basically told him what you just told me ...  Then I got to thinking.  Even though the R value might not be quite as high as advertised it's still dead air space.  

I got to thinking about ease of installation and poly strene rigid boards (which John Hiat used in his underground as well as pretty much anyone i've found on the internet) vs the tekfoil which I had previously discarded.  to

The rigid foam cracks when installed.  You put a whole bunch of mass on it (dirt) and it will crack if not perfectly flat.  You add 3 layers of plastic and 2 layers of foam in alternating courses.  The plastic keeps the membrane when the foam cracks , so while the r value of polystrene is around 4, my thinking is that if it has cracks all over the place from uneven ground then that's not a true uniform installation and it would negate some of the R value.  To get perfectly flat ground , esp corners and the like would seem like an exercise in fultility lol.    .  Not to mention the cost of getting the ground that level.  

The advantages of the tekfoil start to show them selfs.  I can probably safely remove 2 layers of membrane plastic from the underground "skirting" by laying the tekfoil down and a shingle like pattern.  The tekfoil has one side of the surface that is meant to place against the effects of concrete so it's fairly thick and waterproof.  My thought is to install as follows.

1. rake out all rocks and junk
2. put down a good layer of straw ( this will be dry so it should not decay and will  cushion the tekfoil from anything I miss and will add very cheap R value at the same time wooott)
3. put down tekfoil layer
4. put down 2nd tekfoil layer
5. put down 6 mil black plastic (first layer of defense against water)
6. put down old rugs I have to protect plastic membrane from backfill
7. install round less the 2" rocks (aids in give space from water to drain once it hits the plastic)
8. put down more straw to aid in keep dirt out of rocks so drainage will occur..
9. Hope I don't have to dig this shit up EVER!

I'm mostly concerned with function , but like I said this will save considerable time installing and save materials (mostly plastic) and tekfoil is cheaper (by quite a lot) then rigid board.  

Polyisonite will be used on ceiling of house.  Polystyrene will be used on sides.  Tekfoil underground.  Divirsty...each has the own set of properties that make them best in certain applications.  
Sorry for long post..  thanks for the concerns I certainly don't need to wreck my design with a bad insulation choice so thanks !

Do you have anythoughts as to how your going to build?

peace  

Editing to add that it's Speedfunk writing this... I always forget to log out of my wifes name... 

[Bishopknight]

Jeff,

You're absolutely right. I put some blueboard ( on the ground ) in front of my house that wasn't flat and its cracked considerably.

I'd love to see pics when you get a chance

[speedfunk]

working on the pics.  We are up to the bond beam level in front of the house and in the back up to the rear (north) windows .   Deb did core fills which are not that exciting pic wise lol.  I worked on stacking some of the block. 

We made a bit of an error putting in the rebar on a few of the walls a couple of weeks ago.  Luckily we stopped .  So there are sections of the wall that the block has to go over the 10' rebar and on the wall.  This job Debbie has outsourced to me  . 

Now to bank to get some credit line.  We still on cash but we can dip in as little as possible into our current home.

[drainl]

We've been continuing to work on getting the house ready for the next stage - a roof. Roofs are nice - no sunburns in summer and no indoor snow forts in winter. It'll be very exciting to have a roof. But, we've got some more work until we get there...

Most of the bond beams (which Jeff cut from regular blocks - they cost about double the price pre-cut) and all of the core fills are done on the front half of the house. The rear of the main part of the house is a little higher, so we're going to tackle that section separately. We need to finish up some bond beams, and then build forms for the windows. That'll take awhile - we'll use our scrap wood and will need to buy some. Depending on weather and illness (Jeff's been feeling a little sick) hopefully we'll be able to pour on Monday.

We had a death last week - our old corded Skil saw. It was about 10 years old and was working on house #3 with us, so it led a good life. Come to think of it, it may have been our first power tool. Aww...



Jeff planned to use duct tape to cover the holes we didn't have core fills in. It was too cold the other day when he tried to apply it so he used plastic. This week has been warmer, so he did get some of the tape on. You can also see where he did some more SBC recently.





Earth tubes on the back wall

[drainl]

It’s getting cold quick! We’re making more progress towards pouring the bond beam. We had to buy some wood to use for forms over the doors and windows since we didn’t have enough scraps. It hurts a little to buy something we’ll just waste. One of the best things about this house is the tiny amount of waste we’ve produced so far. Mostly it’s just been the empty cement bags. Here’s the start of our forms. We used blocks to support the forms.







We also bought the last window we needed this week - a 48″x48″ for the bedroom. It’s nice and big - I love it! Jeff found an old door with a big window for free that we’re thinking will work great down the line for our greenhouse/mudroom. We also saw some pvc, electrical boxes, and used masonry tools for cheap the other day. The place having a $3/car load sale this weekend, so we may stop by. Even if we find a few useful items it'd be worth it.
Jeff and I will get a full day in on Thursday and should get the front half of the house ready to go. Hopefully we’ll make some progress on the back half as well.