Archive | March, 2012

Advantages of Steel Framed Tiny Houses

Advantages of Steel Framing

Using cold formed steel instead of wood in steel tiny houses plans provides the following advantages:
Strength: Steel-framed houses have withstood hurricanes and earthquakes. Steel’s qualities allow it to meet the strictest wind and seismic standards in the building codes.
Fire resistance: Steel is not combustible, so it will not feed a fire.
Resistant to water and insect damage: Most structural damage is due to water rotting the wood frame components of the house; whereas water does not rot steel. And insects aren’t interested in steel!
Steel is “true”: Unlike lumber, which is often warped, steel is always straight.
Environmentally friendly: Steel delivers a number of unique environmental benefits such as product longevity, recyclability, easy transportation and less raw material wastage.
Lower insurance premiums: Due to steel’s fire, insect, wind, and earthquake resistance, homeowner’s insurance premiums will be much lower.
Earthquake Tested: Structural integrity of steel framed houses tested in full-scale simulations resulting in positive outcome
Healthy: Steel also doesn’t need to be treated with pesticides, preservatives or glues making it safer for handling and living or working around.
Design-Flexible: Steel offers architectural and design flexibility due to its inherent strength. This allows large span distances and curves to be easily incorporated into designs.

Connections: Welding steel together is often stronger than the actual product and stronger than any fastener or screw is capable of. The weld adds a tensile strength that is vibration resistant just like in aircraft and space vehicles.

Window Installation

We install windows at Tiny Green Cabins using the following steps for all of our tiny houses.

Tools Needed: Hammer, caulk gun, slap stapler, level, tape measure, utility knife, work gloves

Materials needed: Butyl Caulk, Dupont Flex Wrap, Dupont Straight Tape 4″ wide, Shims, Great Stuff Window spray expanding foam

Step 1; After the Tyvek house wrap has been installed and wrapped into each of the windows opening, cut

Wildflower Tiny House Bunkhouse Model

the Tyvek house wrap at the window rough opening top corner diagonally about 4″ upward and away from the window and tack back.

Step 2; Cut the Dupont Flex Wrap 12″ to 16″ longer than the window sill. Peel off the paper backer centering the Flex Wrap in the opening and full width of the sill. Press into place across the bottom and up the sides of the window – minimum up each window side is 6″.

Step 3; Peel the paper off the back of the flex wrap hanging outside the window and starting at each window corner, pull the corners outward and stretch while adhering it to the walls, then pull and press the rest of flex wrap into place.

Step 4; Using the shims, lay a shim at each window sill corner for creating a space to insulate used in step 10

Step 5; Caulk up the sides of the window frame, across the top of the window rough opening and down the other side to the sill. Warning, DO NOT CAULK ACROSS THE BOTTOM OR WINDOW SILL – EVER

Step 6; Insert the window into the rough opening, center the window on the opening, and nail at one top corner of the window flange. Level the window and after leveling nail the other top window corner.

Step 7; Plumb the window sides Tip: Square the window and check the reveal spaces where the window meets the window jamb. To square, using a tape measure, check the measurements diagonally from each corner to the opposite corner – they should be equal. Also check the window edges from other features of the wall, such as wall corners or fascias to make sure things are set correctly. On a tiny house, since other features are close to the window, this is a check that everything is spaced correctly. After this check nail the window in place and around the window perimeter, nailing through every other hole in the flange.

Step 8; Install the corner flaps at each corner of the window.

Step 9; Cut the butyl tape for each side of the window and across the window head. Each piece should be cut 8″ to 12″ longer than the window. Install each side, and then install the top piece of Butyl tape.

Step 10; Pull the Tyvek that was tacked out of the way, fold it down, and tack in place, cutting just short of the window head. Tape to the butyl tape and Tyvek together to seal them tight.

Step 10; insulate the window jambs cavity to wall opening. We recommend Great Stuff as the expanding foam seals the cavity better than a stuffed fiberglass can. Plus the foam does not allow mold to grow if the window leaks.

Here a good video that follows our best practices

How Tiny Houses Meet the Needs of a Diverse Population

By Guest Blogger, Annie Blair from Tiny House Wisdom

It is an unfortunate reality for so many families these days that rates of Autism and other Spectrum diseases are incredibly common. Many children suffer from a host of other physical and mental ills that leave families grasping at ways to cope and do the very best they can for ailing children.

Tiny Houses are not only cute, but they are inherently adaptable to a variety of circumstances. Much has

The new home and landscape of the Wildflower II

been said about the use of these homes as a way to help the aging. Many place them in the backyard of relatives and this practice has been discussed at length on other sites, so I will not address that here. They have also been used for therapy cottages for children who need stimulation and productive play. But the possibilities do not end there. These diminutive structures are easily used to meet the needs of children with physical and mental handicaps, or even mental illness.

First of all, for a family struggling to house, clothe and feed children of special needs, tiny houses are a financially excellent choice, costing pennies on the dollar when compared to traditional housing. Many families chose not to send their kids to live in institutions due to high rates of abuse and rape. They often find that the cost of dealing with a host of ills at home is beyond the scope of their resources, both financial and physical.

Secondly, tiny houses are frequently mobile. This helps to ensure the flexibility of environments should parents need to change environs or climate to meet the needs of a sick child without having to buy or sell anything. You could live in Florida for two years, and then return to Wisconsin, for example, and instead of rent, etc, you would only have the cost to tow it. The child could stay in his or her own environment for stability. Think of how that could help in a situation where a family lives a good distance from institutions that specialize in their type of disease. This would enable the family to travel for an extended stay somewhere else, in order to see specialists or participate in studies before they returned to their home state.

Thirdly, Tiny Houses are flexible in terms of structure, or what you chose to include. As previously noted here in Tiny House Myth #1, these can be used as “PODS” with plug-in sections that can change and grow with the child and needs of the family. For example, you may have a child who would benefit from a therapy room outfitted with various tactile stimuli, or activity of daily living play areas. Sometimes children with severe early onset types of mental illness become so violent, parents find they need to keep other children in separate quarters for their own safety. This could be built fairly inexpensively, and removed or re-designed as the need changes.

Tiny Houses are not all about lofts. For the elderly or mentally handicapped, one level care cottages are popular, and these can be used in a grouping. Mentally ill children and their families could live in a communal lot where each family had its own Tiny House. In the middle of the shared land, there could be a center where the kids receive therapies and other specialty learning geared toward them. This could also include areas for animal therapies where that would be appropriate. The families could pool resources to pay for respite and other types of interventions that could be provided by professionals that are too costly individually.

Fourthly, Tiny Houses are often low toxicity. For children suffering from allergies, tiny homes are frequently made from reclaimed wood with little to no off gassing or other types of pollutants that most try to eschew when building tiny. It is possible that even milder forms of childhood onset mental illnesses could be lessened by the tiny house with lower environmental toxins,

And finally, financially strapped families of children with special needs would benefit from being free of rent and mortgage. Having more free time to spend with the children instead of devising ways to bring in more and more cash as prices rise would be the greatest benefit of all. These parents are often so exhausted trying to make ends meet and still “be there” for their kids that they are worn out from the “lifestyle”.

As you see, the possibilities are endless and do not require government grants to achieve. Tiny Houses can be built by hand, (a learning experience in itself for those children to whom it would apply), and adapted on a case by case basis. They are affordable and flexible, and I think are a great potential to address needs of the children who are not being helped by existent services

For more articles by Anne Blair, visit Tiny House Wisdom