Building ICF house in the Tenn MTNS!

[Raider Bill]

I just spent 2 weeks bull dozing which caught on fire. Drove it out of the woods while burning as I was in the middle of about 1000 acres of pines when she went.
Anyway here are some pix I took of the house site and other areas I liked.

This will be my south veiw from the porch.


South east veiw


To the west

The plan is to use ICF's 40x50 to the sills with a timber frame center great room 24X40 in the center. Timber frame will also serve as roof rafter/trusses.
House will have a full size drive out basement.
If anyone knows of a timber framer in SE tenn I could sure use one!

[Raider Bill]

here are some more pix

[Sprucegum]

Love that view!  8)

What caught fire? - the dozer?

[KGNC]

Raider:

Don't know that this will help but there is a timber frame manufacture not to far away in NC.
http://www.harmonyexchange.com/
All of their timbers are machined. They have some cool photos of their Hundegger machine in their gallery.

[Raider Bill]

I believe I have found a foreclosed doublewide I want to put upthere to stay in while building. Right now I need to find a mover to get it up there and set on blocks. Hopefully I will be able to connect it to the same septic as the house will be on. The well and power people were there last week and all is set to go as soon as I get the septic permit. They require this before well and power I suppose to make sure someone doesn't build and just let the sewage go wild.
My next trip will be to get the doublewide connected and if time get my footers in.

I was looking hard at Reddiform ICF's but am not happy with the local support. I hope to find someone local to Knoxville or chattanoga that will have the proper bracing for rent and support.
If anyone out there has info on a ICF system please let me know.

[Raider Bill]

Yepper the rented dozer! Flame on! They had just rebuilt it but didn't put the side panels on so it collected a bunch of leaves and twigs down there. The second day I had it one of the hydrulic lines burst so all the debris was soaked. As best as I could tell the altenator overheated and sparked the fire.
Being in the middle of the lower pines I had no cell service so drove it out to call the FD. The radiator hose when it went did give cause to jump but once I realized what it was climbed back on and got er to the road.

[Tom]

What was the damage?

[metalspinner]

 

I'm glad your OK.  What did the rental company have to say for themselves?

Those are some beautiful views.  What mountain are you looking at to the southeast? Now take all those pics down so we don't get a mad rush of folks up here. :D

[Raider Bill]

that's Starr Mtn to the South and Tellico to the east.
The rental Co was pretty good about it. I called them the next day. They had a guy there the next who got it cranking but the fuel lines were burnt. It really isn't that bad and as I ponited out to them they should have at least had a fire extingusher mounted..
I did pay the extra $125 for liability waiver and they refunded me 1 day's rental so all in all I did ok.
Actualley as much fun as I was having if I'd have had it anothe r couple day's I would have bull dozed the whole 69 acres. I was having fun. Missed my calling.
Will be back up your way the 16th though 25th of May for septic permit and to get the well drilled.

[scgargoyle]

Gee Bill, sounds like you're already halfway there- I'm jealous! Great pics, and I love the flaming dozer story- you live a more exciting life than I do :D :D :D I had a line on a timber framer in TN- more towards Nashville, IIRC. I'll email it to you when (and if) I find it. One thing they offer that interested me was an apprenticeship, where you go stay at their place for 6 weeks, and cut your own frame under their guidance. Cost was about half that of having them do it.

[WDH]

Raider Bill,

That view to the south was Georgia???  That is some beautimous place that you have there .

[Raider Bill]

I can't say it's Georgia just Starr Mtn which I assume is in TN but for all I know some of it can be in North GA. Actually it wouldn't surprise me. I know North Carolina is just south of Tellico.

John, come on over and hang out some more, it's never a dull moment here in L.A. [Largo Area] Next time you stop by I have vidieo of the fire, fire trucks, all the good stuff. Love this new fangled phone!

My design is pretty easy ICF perimiter with timber frame to hold up the roof. I've got to work out the floor joist and timber post /bent placement so I can plan on where I need to have footers to hold everything up. I guess it would be better to have my posts supported by concrete pillers up throught the basement. Laying out how and where the floor joists need to go is my current delimina.
I wish I had 6 weeks, I'd love to do that but between holding down the fort here in FL and getting up to TN to work on it I'm tapped out time wise. I'm planning on 2 weeks at each place this summer.
I like the look of the flat metal plate connectors which in my mind should be easier to do the timber frame connections as I should just have to cut the proper angles, drill the blot holes and add the metal plates. Simpson has a pretty good assortment of them and I'm sure there's more out there. I wanted to make my own but again time maybe againest me. I'd like to be dried in by fall.

[WDH]

I like the plan Raider Bill.  Keep the photos of the plants coming ;D.  We are here to help you 8).

[Raider Bill]

Thanks, as many others have done before me this building your own house stuff will keep you up at night thinking about everything.
I keep a note book next to the bed for those bone shaking ideas that pop into my head while asleep. Now if I could only decipher what I write........

[Onthesauk]

This is out of the Everett Herald, Everett, Washington.  Another rental horror story.

Man on hook for sinking excavator
Rented rig is stuck in muck of Ebey Island

By David Chircop
Herald Writer



It's one of the most visible foul-ups in Snohomish County. That is, except for the fact that it's sinking a couple of inches every day.

Jim Clemetson, 48, of Everett, was attempting to cut a driveway last month to his mother's property on Ebey Island, just north of the U.S. 2 trestle.

That plan was bogged down when a 20-metric ton excavator that he rented got stuck in the mud.

"It's quite a freaking mess," Clemetson said. "I've had nothing but troubles lately."

He says he paid a contractor to pull the excavator out of the mud, but, after a week of trying, the yellow 2006 John Deere 200 fell on its side and filled with sludge.

A man working with the contractor inside the excavator narrowly escaped injury, he said.

Clemetson said he fears the equipment rental company will hold him responsible for the $140,000 to $200,000 machine.

The state Department of Ecology is also demanding something be done.

Department of Ecology spokesman Larry Altose said the fuel was drained from the excavator before it tipped, and it does not appear as though hydraulic fluid, oil or contaminants from the machine are leaking into the water.

Clemetson said he wanted to use the property to store native trees that he digs up and sells to landscapers and nurseries.

He said he decided to cut the driveway only after learning that he had no access to his family's 4.5-acre parcel, which was recently purchased for $65,000.

Ellen Steck, vice president of marketing for RSC Equipment Rental in Scottsdale, Ariz., said the company is still figuring out how it will reclaim the equipment.

The Clemetsons' land is flanked by protected wetlands and private land, whose owner is demanding money and legal protection for Clemetson to enter.

"All of us at RSC take this situation very seriously and we will provide any needed information to authorities," she said, reading from a prepared statement.

The sight is prompting truckers to crook their necks as they drive along the elevated highway east of Everett.

"It seems to be sinking a few inches every day," said Rudy Horak, who drives a cement truck for Rinker Materials across the span about five times a week.

Horak was so curious that after work, he hiked down for a closer look at the submerged excavator.

He said he ran into the brother of another trucker who was doing the same thing.

Bruce King, Clemetson's neighbor, who allowed him to drive the excavator across his land, said he gets about two visitors a day asking about the equipment.

He said on Thursday a group of about 30 people hiked through the foul-smelling muck and downed brush to look.

Government officials, tow companies, even people from competing rental companies have stopped by.

King, who runs a small poultry and bee farm off 55th Avenue SE, said he feels sympathy for Clemetson, and hopes insurance will cover any remaining expenses.

He said he extended an offer to RSC Equipment Rental to reach the landlocked site: pay him $4,000 and let Clemetson off the hook, or pay him $20,000 and continue to pursue him.

King said Clemetson was wronged when he was sold inaccessible land, and wronged again when he paid a contractor for a job that wasn't finished. Now he could be on the hook with a big expense.

"This would be the third time he's been screwed," he said.

Reporter David Chircop: 425-339-3429 or dchircop@heraldnet.com.

[beenthere]

Here is link to a photo......hope this is ok.
Sinking Excavator

[metalspinner]

 :D :D :D

Oh, man!  That's something else!

:D :D :D

[Raider Bill]

yikes! pricey dunking 

[DanG]

I like the way that Mr. King thinks. ;D :D

Bill, that's a beautiful place.  It's easy to see why you're anxious to get up there.  Then I've seen Largo, too, and again, it's easy to see why you're anxious to get up there. ;)

[Raider Bill]

Yep gotta get out while the getting good! City manager was a man now a woman going to work in Sarasota. Fire Chief got caught with his digits in the cookie jar, I maybe next, they'll up my taxes and insurance another 1000%

[Raider Bill]

Does anyone have any experiance with AMVIC ICF's they have a distrubitor in Cleveland TN which is close by.

[mometal77]

I like the view nice piece of country you have. A perfect spot to build a place.
bob

[Raider Bill]

Thank you!
I put the house site on the highest ground which just happens to overlook my pine "plantation" and that beautiful veiw. What you don't see in the pix is just below that I can see about 200 beef cattle grazing in a pasture. Real; nice guy owns that, Old "hill Billy" who has offered me 1/2 a Angus beef for $1.00 lb plus packing costs. He's my new best friend! ;D

[metalspinner]

Real; nice guy owns that, Old "hill Billy" who has offered me 1/2 a Angus beef for $1.00 lb plus packing costs.

I'll take the other half!

[Don_Papenburg]

I don't have experiance with Amvic  . My ICF was a panel system from a now defunckt company .  The reason I used them was most of the ICFs I had seen at the time were so congested in the cavity that all the concrete had to be rodded or viberated to fill the forms .   I would stay away from forms with steel mesh holding the foam together , the tremal bridge  defeats  the porpose.   Look for a open cavity that lets you use normal concrete . You want to stay away from pump mix and the cost  of a pumper truck .   Another option is to line the outside of a regular form  with 25 psi extruded foam . That would make the concrete inside the heated/cooled envelope.   That would give a very nice thermal mass .  I will see if I can find some info I got reacently on some ICFs that had lego type interlock