Home building/living suggestions wanted.

Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

John Roberts said:
Yup, CFLs kinda suck but I do appreciate the freedom from constantly having to replace burned out incandescent bulbs.
JR
Click to expand...
Yup,incandescents used to be a reqular item on the shopping list - no more, but the light sucks. To that end I started replacing GU10 IC lamps with the LED equivalents, but the failure rate is appalling. Not the LEDs themselves but the tiny little inverter in the base, which has an electrolytic cap which dries out in this hot environment. I love the 5800K LEDs for reading and working but the manufacturers really need to do better.
Two other thoughts on housebuilding / renovation.
1: Cat5 EVERYWHERE
2: At least 190mm windowsills (we used 140mm and the cats do not approve).
M
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

Mike Diack said:
Yup,incandescents used to be a reqular item on the shopping list - no more, but the light sucks. To that end I started replacing GU10 IC lamps with the LED equivalents, but the failure rate is appalling. Not the LEDs themselves but the tiny little inverter in the base, which has an electrolytic cap which dries out in this hot environment. I love the 5800K LEDs for reading and working but the manufacturers really need to do better.
Two other thoughts on housebuilding / renovation.
1: Cat5 EVERYWHERE
2: At least 190mm windowsills (we used 140mm and the cats do not approve).
M
Click to expand...

May your feline overlords forgive you.
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

I'll add one more thing, since no one else brought it up.

I disagree with the notion of putting Cat5, or any other "low voltage" wiring in the walls. A proper dwelling should outlast any wiring fashion by an order of magnitude, or more. But I think it's a safe bet that wires will get smaller and less numerous in the future. So put in conduit, cable trays, or whatever floats your boat, but make it easily rewireable without tearing up the walls and ceilings.

I built my house in 1990-1992 and followed this philosophy. Back then people were still putting RG-59 in the walls for cable TV and Ethernet over unshielded twisted pair was just a dream.

Since building the house I've run POTS/DSL, Cat5, AES3, speaker cables, 5 Volt audio control, RG-11 antenna cable, and some stuff I've no doubt already forgotten, without tearing up a single wall or going on any heroic fishing expeditions.

A friend recently built a fancy new place and, over my objections, put an i-Pod docking station in every room as part of the ~$200,000 (not a typo) low voltage contract. I must confess to a small amount of schadenfreude when the i-Phone 5 came out obsoleting his docks.

My choice for a consumer "audio dock" is the venerable 3.5mm stereo phone plug. I think those will be around for a while. I know the one feeding into my stereo gets lots of use when friends show up with music on their mobile devices.

BTW, I appreciate the discussion of heat pumps and ground thermal storage. My next project will likely use that.

--Frank
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

There are CFLs in all the fixtures in the common areas of our building. I thought about half of them were dead. But we had a power outage today, and when the power came back on, the "dead" CFLs were lit. Are there problems with CFLs in "always on" fixtures? What would make one go out, but come back when you cycle the power? Do the little ballasts in the base overheat and shut off?
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

Frank Koenig said:
I'll add one more thing, since no one else brought it up.
My choice for a consumer "audio dock" is the venerable 3.5mm stereo phone plug. I think those will be around for a while. I know the one feeding into my stereo gets lots of use when friends show up with music on their mobile devices.
--Frank
Click to expand...
Just to play devil's advocate, I reckon the 3.5mm phono connector is the second most loathesome audio connection in the known universe (the grand turkey award going to the DIN connector, which, due to Philips gaining quite a toehold over here, we haven't quite seen the back of yet).
M
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

Dave Barnett said:
There are CFLs in all the fixtures in the common areas of our building. I thought about half of them were dead. But we had a power outage today, and when the power came back on, the "dead" CFLs were lit. Are there problems with CFLs in "always on" fixtures? What would make one go out, but come back when you cycle the power? Do the little ballasts in the base overheat and shut off?
Click to expand...

Don't know, but I think there is a regulated supply inside, so some kind of protection is not out of the question.

JR
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

Mike Diack said:
Just to play devil's advocate, I reckon the 3.5mm phono connector is the second most loathesome audio connection in the known universe (the grand turkey award going to the DIN connector, which, due to Philips gaining quite a toehold over here, we haven't quite seen the back of yet).
M
Click to expand...

I'm not sure what you mean by a "3.5mm phono connector". I'm referring to the TRS connector whose plug has an outer diameter of 3.5 mm and is commonly used as the earphone connector on portable consumer audio devices. A "phono connector", at least in the States, refers to the truly hateful little coaxial connectors also called an "RCA plug" that was used, among many other things, to connect record turntables to their preamplifiers. I have, thankfully, eliminated almost all of those from my life.

I also dislike F-connectors -- another invention of the devil.

As for the 3.5mm PHONE plug (and jack), to which I was referring, they work about as well as any other TRS connector in my experience. If you want to connect to a portable device without using a proprietary dock, you have no choice but to use one.

--Frank
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

+1 to being apprehensive about making assumptions about future (non-power) wiring configurations. A friend of mine recently built a house and when he asked me my advice about this subject I told him I had no idea, but suggested making it easy to pull something different later. I think he ended up running his entertainment wiring in open trays in the attic.

I have seen proposals on alternate ideas for power wiring over the years, but expect changes in that area to be slow and reasonably backward compatible, or easily upgradable.

JR
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

Dave Barnett said:
There are CFLs in all the fixtures in the common areas of our building. I thought about half of them were dead. But we had a power outage today, and when the power came back on, the "dead" CFLs were lit. Are there problems with CFLs in "always on" fixtures? What would make one go out, but come back when you cycle the power? Do the little ballasts in the base overheat and shut off?
Click to expand...

The self-ballasted CFLs are built to a low price point, and it wouldn't suprise me if they have issues with heat. Most of the cheap CFLs also say "not for use in recessed or enclosed fixtures" precisely due to these overheating problems, not that anybody reads the printing on the units. Yet another great example of consumers saying one thing ("we want good quality, low power consumption lighting") and voting very differently with their wallets. Unfortunately, LED lighting is on track to have similar issues, due to the wide variety of cheap crap on the market.

</rant>
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

Dave Barnett said:
There are CFLs in all the fixtures in the common areas of our building. I thought about half of them were dead. But we had a power outage today, and when the power came back on, the "dead" CFLs were lit. Are there problems with CFLs in "always on" fixtures? What would make one go out, but come back when you cycle the power? Do the little ballasts in the base overheat and shut off?
Click to expand...

It's my understanding that fluorescents of any type require a bit of a kick to get started, so when you turn the ballast on there is an intentional spike and then it settles to normal voltage (that's why if you dim one that's not supposed to be dimmed, once it's on you can bring it way lower than the point at which it came on.
your bulbs may be near the end of their life but another turn-on kick was enough to get them going for a bit.

Jason
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

Frank Koenig said:
I'll add one more thing, since no one else brought it up.

I disagree with the notion of putting Cat5, or any other "low voltage" wiring in the walls. A proper dwelling should outlast any wiring fashion by an order of magnitude, or more. But I think it's a safe bet that wires will get smaller and less numerous in the future. So put in conduit, cable trays, or whatever floats your boat, but make it easily rewireable without tearing up the walls and ceilings.


--Frank
Click to expand...
This is a VERY important fact that is often overlooked by Churches (for the sake of "saving money"). A proper infrastructure is very important for any upgrades in the future.

We have had quite a number of customers who "handicap" them selves buy not wanting to pay for conduit.

So when they have to change cables for a new video system (for example) because of a different technology is needed-they will either need to rip out walls or run the wires exposed.

The money saved on the front end is soon forgotten.

Failure to plan on future upgrades can cost a lot more than the initial cost.

It is MUCH cheaper to install conduit BEFORE the walls are put up-than after.

But some people refuse to learn from others mistakes.
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

You might enjoy this house I was in yesterday for a Solstice party.
A two-story great room sized for about 50-60 people, floor to ceiling glass walls on the north side overlooking acres of hardwoods. A second-story open catwalk between an upstairs office, and a bedroom - wings off the great room.
The feature is on the south wall. Nearly two floors of completely featureless pure white wall, with narrow windows at floor and ceiling level.
The Solstice is the magic time - sunlight streams through the upper windows and hits specially designed reflectors that produce patterns and colors on the white wall between 12 and 2pm.
Designed and patented by Janet Saad-Cook.
Home will be on sale in the spring, so I've heard... Great place for house concerts...
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

frank kayser said:
You might enjoy this house I was in yesterday for a Solstice party.
A two-story great room sized for about 50-60 people, floor to ceiling glass walls on the north side overlooking acres of hardwoods. A second-story open catwalk between an upstairs office, and a bedroom - wings off the great room.
The feature is on the south wall. Nearly two floors of completely featureless pure white wall, with narrow windows at floor and ceiling level.
The Solstice is the magic time - sunlight streams through the upper windows and hits specially designed reflectors that produce patterns and colors on the white wall between 12 and 2pm.
Designed and patented by Janet Saad-Cook.
Home will be on sale in the spring, so I've heard... Great place for house concerts...
Click to expand...

Looks like there may be some photos of that house at the bottom of this article:
http://www.homeanddesign.com/article.asp?article=169
 
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Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

frank kayser said:
You might enjoy this house I was in yesterday for a Solstice party.
A two-story great room sized for about 50-60 people, floor to ceiling glass walls on the north side overlooking acres of hardwoods. A second-story open catwalk between an upstairs office, and a bedroom - wings off the great room.
The feature is on the south wall. Nearly two floors of completely featureless pure white wall, with narrow windows at floor and ceiling level.
The Solstice is the magic time - sunlight streams through the upper windows and hits specially designed reflectors that produce patterns and colors on the white wall between 12 and 2pm.
Designed and patented by Janet Saad-Cook.
Home will be on sale in the spring, so I've heard... Great place for house concerts...
Click to expand...

It had been a while since I was working on my old house design (never built), but that sounds bass-akwards. My recollection is that window exposure facing north is generally minimized to reduce heat loss, while southern exposure was made generous for solar input. I ASSume that house is in the northern hemisphere?

This is why location is important, sometimes the lot does not provide optimal views wrt optimal passive solar design considerations.

JR
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

Rob,
Yes indeed, it is the one in Accokeek.
That wall in the top photo now has a huge Banana? plant that reaches up to an art piece that is full width of the wall, a story and a half high. That was the stage area for a house concert I did there.

And yes, JR, from an passive energy standpoint, it is indeed, back-asswards. My first thought. Then I saw the gently falling forest floor, and later the lights that were put in playing off the trees. Then with the light show...

Art isn't always about form following function.
 
Re: Home building/living suggestions wanted.

frank kayser said:
Rob,


And yes, JR, from an passive energy standpoint, it is indeed, back-asswards. My first thought. Then I saw the gently falling forest floor, and later the lights that were put in playing off the trees. Then with the light show...

Art isn't always about form following function.
Click to expand...

Another way to describe that is "style over substance", but I understand. It is hard enough to get a house lot with a view worth looking out the window at, let alone a view that will coincidentally also be optimal for passive solar.

I recall one friend's house in an unremarkable neighborhood, built on a small lot, with a nice interior courtyard in the middle of the floor plan. The court yard let in a lot of sunlight and offered a much nicer vista than a neighbor, 20' away from each outer wall.

I was lucky enough to find a great lot (outside Atl) and came up with a kick ass house plan, but I didn't have enough cash flow to do it service, so I let the property go... It makes me sad to describe it fully so I won't, but the attic on the southern end was going to be a green house that followed the roofline in glass just for that end, with a hot tub inside that I could access from the master bedroom, and howl at the moon naked any time I wanted. :-( IIRC my living room vista looking down at the short waterfall was mostly facing east, so I shouldn't be so hypocritical.

JR

PS: Years ago my parents built a house on top of the highest spot in Westchester county (there was a marker on the spot). They had great views in all 4 directions. I learned from watching them that most people only have one house build in them. So measure twice and cut once.
 
I renovated a few years ago. Some things I did that I a happy about
Cat6 all over the place with lots in the office. Patch in the basement where he network switch is. Wireless is nice and I have both bands in the house but the throughput isn't what a wire does. The original house had conduit ( emt actually since PVC was in the future.) to some places where I thought I might change things. I never did.
Isonene insulation in the walls and roof. Works great and makes a nice tight house. I have intentional holes in the basement walls to bring in fresh air.
Cat5 to a bunch of outside locations ( cheaper than cat6 at the time) for CCTV.
Lots of underground PVC to locations where I wanted electrics and lights.
I have a 4 zone hydro air system for heat/ac. No gas here so oil boiler and 4 air handlers each with outside ac unit.
A pair of 200 amp services (cheaper than a single 400). PVC underground to a standby generator.
A return loop for the hot water with a circ pump. It is programmable to run when we are likely to want it.
A separate water line to the toilets with a temperature valve to supply room temperature water so no tank sweating.
Combination locks on the house so no keys to lose. Also, you can make up a code for friends or contractors so no need to rekey when keys go missing.


Sent from my iPad HD
 
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