22 ms·

WikiHouse – Open source, modular, wood based, zero carbon housing

505 points by xor99 4y ago

dr_dshiv 4y ago
I have questions on fire safety. I lost some close friends recently to a fire. I had never thought about it before.
- ruined 4y ago
  most buildings in america today are wood frame, this is likely no better or worse. it is more important to consider what you put in the building, have a good electrician do the wiring, and design your layout and exits to fire code compliance.
  - 542458 4y ago
    All wood frame is not equivalent. Modern stick framing is designed to slow the spread of flame both with how the wood is used (see modern stick framing vs balloon framing) and the other materials chosen (drywall is fairly nonflammable, whereas this seems to use plywood walls). I’m not saying this is better or worse (it might be that all the insulation significantly slows the spread of flame?), but they haven’t really discussed the fire safety implications of their design that I can see.
    - kupfer 4y ago
      To quote their FAQs: >Is it firesafe? >WikiHouse is not really any different from most kinds of 1-3 storey buildings with timber roof, floors, or internal walls, in that the building needs to be designed with adequate means of escape, and the chassis needs to be reasonably protected from catching fire. This can usually be achieved either with a plasterboard internal lining, by using a non-toxic fire protection coating, or by installing a basic sprinkler system. >If you are building several adjacent houses, located close together in a row, you will usually need to use an external fire barrier material to prevent fire spreading from one building to the next.
- Schroedingersat 4y ago
  Doesn't seem incompatible.
- pera 4y ago
  They probably would use fire retardant timber/plywood. There is a pretty cool office building in Barcelona (still under construction I believe?) entirely made of wood that uses this kind of treated wood: https://wittywood.es/en/ https://wittywood.es/en/
  - Animatronio 4y ago
    By the looks of it they also rely on oversizing the columns and beams to achieve fire retardation.
    - shagie 4y ago
      This is known as mass timber. https://www.wsj.com/articles/wooden-skyscrapers-are-on-the-rise-11649693924 https://www.wsj.com/articles/wooden-skyscrapers-are-on-the-r... https://www.thinkwood.com/mass-timber https://www.thinkwood.com/mass-timber https://www.naturallywood.com/topics/mass-timber/ https://www.naturallywood.com/topics/mass-timber/ https://www.ijpr.org/housing/2022-09-04/oregons-mass-timber-industry-gets-boost-from-federal-government https://www.ijpr.org/housing/2022-09-04/oregons-mass-timber-... And regarding fire retardation - Cross Laminated Timber Fire Testing from the Forest Products Laboratory and US Forest Service - https://youtu.be/HuVTCOmRGd0 https://youtu.be/HuVTCOmRGd0
      - Animatronio 4y ago
        yes, you're absolutely right, I couldn't find the right term for it. unfortunately it works at the cost of 2x or 3x the raw materials it would normally take.
        shagie 4y ago
        It represents a sequestration of carbon whereas the cement in a traditional cement framework building represents significant portion of the carbon footprint. As to the cost - https://www.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/pubs/62676 https://www.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/pubs/62676 > Based on commercial construction cost data from the RSMeans database, a mass timber building design is estimated to have 26 percent higher front-end costs than its concrete alternative. And from the paper: > The resulting TLCCs of the two buildings under these scenarios are shown in Table 6 and Figure 5. From the results of these scenarios, it was found that the TLCC for the mass timber building would have a cost advantage with its longer life span (100 yr) than the concrete alternative (75 yr) when other factors are the same (see Scenario S0 and S4), and the higher front-end cost (value) showed an even greater advantage of 7.0 percent difference (Scenario S4). When the life spans of the two buildings were the same, the end-of-life cost or value of the mass timber building was not able to be offset by the higher front-end costs (see Scenario S1 [12%], S2 [6.7%], and S3 [5.9%]). In this case study, the two buildings were designed to be functionally equivalent. Thus, we assumed the same operational utility and maintenance during the building-use stage. No impact from these parts were considered in the TLCC calculations on the cost- performance for the comparison of the two buildings. But if there are energy savings discovered in the new mass timber buildings, the LCC analysis would reveal more cost benefits (Liang et al. 2019). I can't find any sources that agree with your cost assessment... instead: https://www.bdcnetwork.com/5-myths-about-cross-laminated-timber https://www.bdcnetwork.com/5-myths-about-cross-laminated-tim... > When considering the total in-place value of a CLT system, it is cost competitive to other plate building materials. But you also need to consider all the value added benefits: > • More savings can be found in the reduced installation cost, usually 50% cheaper than installing other plate materials. > • With an earlier project completion date, you are open for business sometimes months ahead of schedule. > • The building structure will weigh less than half the weight of other construction types, so the foundation costs less money. > • Job site safety is dramatically increased due to the prefabricated CLT panels and usually the only power tools are pneumatic drills. > The intent of cross laminated timber is not to replace light-frame construction, but rather to offer a versatile, low-carbon, and cost-competitive wood-based solution that complements the existing light frame and heavy timber options while offering a suitable candidate for some applications that currently use concrete, masonry, and steel.
- xor99 4y ago
  Sorry to hear that! Valid point ofc, I would like to see if they have addressed that with the wooden build. BTW the plans can be made using non-wooden materials or limited wood but this may change the zero carbon status/ease of fabrication.
design-of-homes 4y ago
My first impressions are favourable. There are contraints though, as the design guide acknowledges: > WikiHouse is intended for buildings of up to 3 storeys. This covers 95% of all buildings, and allows gentle density neighbourhoods of up to around 75 dwellings per hectare. > The main constraint on height is not gravity, but wind. In high winds, lightweight structures are more prone to slight lateral flexing, which is not allowed within most building codes. Further structural research and testing is ongoing.
- actually_a_dog 4y ago
  I'm kinda curious about this. Under the International Building Code, you can build wood frame buildings up to 6 storeys tall [0]. Granted, this is not actually wood frame construction, but I don't see why a building built this way would be any less structurally sound than a traditionally built wood frame building. --- [0]: https://seagatemasstimber.com/how-tall-are-tall-wood-buildings-is-there-a-height-limit/ https://seagatemasstimber.com/how-tall-are-tall-wood-buildin...
  - quixoticelixer- 4y ago
    You can built wood frame buildings much taller. And wood framing is stiffer especially if you are using mass timber.
  - criddell 4y ago
    Maybe it has to do with lack of bracing? When my home was being built I noticed lots of metal straps going between studs in an X-formation. I wonder if that was to make lots of triangles to add rigidity?
    - redtexture 4y ago
      Yes. This can also be provided by sheet materials like plywood, securely attached, providing diagonal structure preventing racking of the frame. In older houses, sheathed with one inch by eight or ten or twelve inch boards, diagonal wood bracing was cut into the two by four inch wall studs for diagonal bracing and structure.
dang 4y ago
Related: Facit Homes, Wikihouse, and the Plywood Frame - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27666320 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27666320 - June 2021 (33 comments) WikiHouse – Open source buildings and interiors for self-build - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13856917 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13856917 - March 2017 (53 comments) The WikiHouse chassis system [pdf] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13029982 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13029982 - Nov 2016 (1 comment) WikiHouse's DIY kits are the open-source way to build a house - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5768030 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5768030 - May 2013 (3 comments)
jbu 4y ago
One of these went up near me. Pretty cool. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfTkW87vmUQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfTkW87vmUQ
- skylanh 4y ago
  The resources I could find that reference this indicate that they needed 30k £ to finish the interior--the same page indicates they were fund-raising 190k £, and the charity that operates on about ~214k £ a year. Do you have any inductions on the cost of this building?
- oblio 4y ago
  I don't see any toilets, kitchen, electrical stuff in that time-lapse. It looks more like a shed than a house :-)
samwillis 4y ago
I really like the concept of this, it's basically a step further on from SIPs (structural insulated panels) by having standard composable blocks. The things I think are particularly good: - Standardising on screw pile foundations. Standard concrete foundations are often be about 30% of the build cost, with the quantity of earth removed and cement used it's a massive part of the carbon footprint of a home. For a "light weight" timber construction, screw piles are the future. - Having services recesses and notches built into the panels, and there is no need to batten the internal walls for boarding. this will increase the speed of construction significantly. - Being an "Open" standard allows any timber frame or prefab construction company to adopt it. My one concern (I wouldn't go as far as criticism) is that the panels have a somewhat complex manufacturing process by having to be CNC machined. Realisticly they almost always will be, but I would have liked to see the panels designed to be constructed a little more simply - you will always have to make changes on site. I wander why they went with ply over OSB, they have similar structural properties but OSB can be cheeper.
- kupfer 4y ago
  From their FAQs: >Which material is better, ply or OSB? >Ply is lighter and generally better structurally but more expensive. OSB is cheaper but heavier. With the recent research on WikiHouse Skylark we did test both materials, but in terms of the full spanning floor beams it’s clear ply offers advantages in terms of strength but also because it’s lighter it’s easier to move and carry. A hybrid approach is also a possibility.
  - LegitShady 4y ago
    He's talking about the moisture resistance property of plywood over OSB. OSB absorbs moisture readily and turns into mush.
- forgetfreeman 4y ago
  Mold abatement & home restoration contractor here. OSB should not be considered code-compliant material, full-stop. Imagine your home has been constructed with slabs of sponge that have are purpose-engineered to provide optimal growing conditions for fungi when moisture is introduced. Now consider that over the lifetime of a structure some combination of exterior cladding failure, roof leaks, ground moisture issues, and plumbing fails are not only likely, but basically guaranteed. My biggest concern with this system is given this system's "tightness" to water vapor (similar to SIPs), all of the same issues with mold and related air quality are inherited. If structures don't breathe they rot. i
shafyy 4y ago
The use of "Carbon negative" really grinds my gears. Carbon negative would mean that by building this house, you actually remove carbon from the atmosphere. No, you don't remove CO2 from the atmosphere by buliding this house. Yes, trees remove carbon, but now you've just cut them down and released a bunch of carbon in that process (plus all the CO2 you emit, you know, building the actual house). Edit: Ok, looking more through their website I came across this: https://www.wikihouse.cc/product https://www.wikihouse.cc/product They say that the upfront carbon cost of building a WikiHouse is - 17T CO2, compared to a normal house of + 30T CO2. This is so fucking misleading, I've just lost all respect for the makers of this. I think it's a great project, but once you start bullshitting like this, you can get the hell out.
- marcus_holmes 4y ago
  The carbon sequestered by the trees is now in the building materials. The space the trees were in will now have more trees grown in them. The carbon from the trees is now not in the atmosphere, it's in the wood components, and won't be in the atmosphere until the wood components reach end of life and are burned/rotted/whatever. So yes, carbon has been removed from the atmosphere. I don't understand the objection.
  - musingsole 4y ago
    > The carbon sequestered by the trees is now in the building materials You're ignoring material waste. This process doesn't consume 100% of the tree; only a portion of the tree's carbon is sequestered into the building. The rest is rotting. > The space the trees were in will now have more trees grown in them. Trees are renewable, but it's not quite "copy&paste". Further, the harvesting of the trees was certain to be carbon intensive. So, on the whole, you can trust this process IS NOT CARBON NEGATIVE. What it may be is LESS CARBON INTENSIVE than a traditional process. They are VERY FAR from crossing the neutral line and yet are trying to claim carbon negative? That's pretty brash. Does the objection make more sense now?
    - shafyy 4y ago
skylanh 4y ago
I see. Another wood-house project created by civil engineering or building material science graduates (Leeds Beckett University)--similar to the last one. Build costs similar to brick (ouch!), requires a specific CNC operator to build panels (supply chain ouch!), and creates an integrated house (ouch! to any renovations using conventional materials; ouch! to system longevity). I hate these as they're basically the results of a couple of graduate students operating under a innovation grant. The practical results of this are that someone is going to find a local CNC operator (within 320km based on the study), find out the costs of buying 300 sheets of quality 7-layer plywood and running a custom project with the CNC operator, find a local engineer willing to sign off on the project (for insurance, mortgage, and to maintain the 10 year defect free period), and then have to find a local labour contractor willing to use their building materials as the structure. After all that legwork, they're going to go with a traditional building contractor.
- ShredKazoo 4y ago
  On the other hand, if you're a CNC operator and you already have spare capacity, this could allow you to cheaply branch into home construction by hiring a few more employees...
- monkeydust 4y ago
  So this happened. I looked at wikihouse many years ago for a project. I really liked the idea and team but (at least at the time) it was still very new. Too much risk to take on for individual homeowner and it was cheaper for me to get a local contractor who had experience in developing what I was after.
- SamBam 4y ago
  > requires a specific CNC operator to build panels (supply chain ouch!) Unsure what this means. The CNC files are open source, and there are millions of CNC machines in the world. What specific CNC operator? In general, I'd say your comments are valid for a random homeowner that decides they want to try this out. If you think in terms of a contractor who wanted to start specializing in this in their region, it seems quite doable. They could have their own engineer that has seen many of these, and a stable source of plywood/OSB and access to a CNC shop.
fareesh 4y ago
How do these hold up in stormy weather?
- nemo44x 4y ago
  It's funny you mention it because in the part regarding foundations they mention that the foundation for these homes not only has to help keep the home up but also stop it from flying away.
throwaway787544 4y ago
Frame is just a small part of the cost and complexity of building a house. Considering you still need the CNC, and expensive materials, and a contractor, this doesn't seem like a win. On the contrary, I'd rather see more open designs for modern post-frame homes. They're lighter, cheaper, simpler, faster, and provide some design benefits. The only real downside is zoning needs to catch up.
fasteddie31003 4y ago
Just buy some 2x4's and plywood and start building. It's not that hard. Building does not have to be this complicated. The building systems and products out today make it incredibly easy and (before the ridiculously low interest rates) pretty cheap.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- LegitShady 4y ago
  >Just buy some 2x4's and plywood and start building. It's not that hard. I mean sure, if you live somewhere without building codes, don't need a foundation, and don't care how long something lasts or how safe it is. Just chuck it together. Just some 2x4s and plywood is all you need for a treehouse. Maybe.
  - turtlebits 4y ago
    The linked project/product does not include foundation, and most likely also needs engineering work to pass codes/inspection. Stick framing is cheap and simple- 2x4s are abundant. And you can do it yourself solo with minimal tools. Also, using plywood is way more prone to water issues than solid wood.
    - LegitShady 4y ago
      disclaimer - I work in civil/structural engineering but typically much larger structures than houses and mostly concrete and wood and haven't done wood design since school. the following does not constitute engineering advice and should not be relied upon for design or construction purposes. This is merely discussion. I wouldn't build most houses today out of 2x4s, simply because its not a big enough insulation cavity for a modern home. Stick framing being cheap does not substitute for planning. As you say - you need to design a structure and that includes hiring an engineer for more than just 'passing codes/inspection' but also for structural design of your home. It's unlikely you'll be able to design a roof out of 2x4s without making major sacrifices to the design of the house, and you're probably not qualified to judge the worst case loading in your area or capacity of a 2x4 roof (or else you wouldn't even mention 2x4s). The linked site includes several guides including an engineering guide most non engineers would struggle to understand. https://www.wikihouse.cc/guides https://www.wikihouse.cc/guides Plywood is not particularly prone to water issues, and isn't used in the same way as solid wood would be. In situations where plywood would be having water issues, so would solid wood. You might be confusing plywood and OSB. Structurally, plywood sheathing is primarily used for shear capacity to let structures handle lateral (sideways) loads to resist racking, and to have somewhere to attach the exterior materials of the structure to. The linked engineering guide provides structural testing numbers of their panels for various capacities that a structural engineer understands. Like proper stick framing, it requires planning and design, rather than grabbing some 2x4s and letting er rip.
debacle 4y ago
Stick based construction is already incredibly time, resource, and labor efficient. SIPs are neat (https://www.sips.org/what-are-sips https://www.sips.org/what-are-sips), but even they are an added cost. Dirt-based construction is an intriguing idea, but generally you are trading materials cost (which is already relatively low) for quite a bit of labor cost. A system that cheaply allows for enduring dirt-based construction would be an interesting advancement, but I'm not sure how universal that system would be.
- upsidesinclude 4y ago
  This is basically available, but no one offers the service. https://www.opensourceecology.org/ https://www.opensourceecology.org/ There is just too much labor involved for the material savings unless you are in the third world. Bagged earth construction is similarly cost effective given a cheap labor force.
  - debacle 4y ago
    Bagged earth construction is great, however you are adding a TON of labor. So much so that in a developed country you might as well just use brick construction because it will be cheaper. In addition, in my area I would have to have my dirt amended because we have very sandy soil, but I don't know by how much because a few feet down that sandy soil turns to clay. They have some mobile dirt brick factory machines, but those seem to be home-built prototypes for the most part.
- mellavora 4y ago
  > cheaply allows for enduring dirt-based construction would be an interesting advancement, you wouldn't mean clay brick, would you? I see some of the advantages, but want to be pendantic about calling a 10K old technology an 'advancement'
  - debacle 4y ago
    Unfired clay brick production is incredibly labor intensive, and generally you'll want to produce those bricks on-site because they don't transport well.
phantomathkg 4y ago
Genuine question, other than the cover hero image title, where does it explain how come this is zero carbon?
kgran 4y ago
Says zero-carbon, proceeds to show single-family detached homes in a suburban setting, mostly accessible by car only. P.S. The concrete foundations look far from zero-carbon.
- MontyCarloHall 4y ago
  Put solar panels on the roof and an electric car in the driveway. The main strike against suburban lifestyles today is that they’re energy intensive and thus carbon-heavy. There is nothing wrong with a energy intensive suburban life if that energy is carbon neutral. (And yes, as other posters point out, there are some additional environmental externalities associated with suburban versus urban lifestyles. It’s not clear to me how severe these externalities are, and thus whether they are worth the tradeoff of increased quality of life for the many people who love living in the suburbs. As an extreme example, living a pre-industrial lifestyle would be much more environmentally friendly, but it isn’t remotely worth the quality of life tradeoff.)
  - kgran 4y ago
    Electric cars are as zero-carbon as the cost-equivalent space of a freshly paved asphalt concrete highway or parking space. If not more than that due to the more special materials required to make them. Also note that, due to much heavier weight of electric cars, asphalt concrete surfaces will be damaged a lot faster. The relationship between vehicle weight and its damage to the road surface is exponential, not linear.
  - oblio 4y ago
    You still need to drive places, which is the least efficient method of mass transportation. An entire infrastructure needs to be built and maintained for cars, which is super wasteful and in almost every country is pushing everyone into debt that is just punted into the future. Sure, convenient for individuals but absolutely not sustainable for society, nor the planet. Even with electric cars and green energy. The insane cost of cars: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ztHZj6QNlkM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ztHZj6QNlkM The hard truth is that if we don't want to abandon our comfortable modern lifestyles, 80-90% of us will have to live in dense cities and use mass transportation 95% of the time.
WillAdams 4y ago
I'm still surprised that no one has made a CNC specifically designed to be: - carried on a truck - used while in place on the truck or is easily removed from it and then set up - which has an interface suited to a job site in terms of setting up a design and cutting The Shapr3D seems to get some jobsite use, and there is at least one digital saw where one plugs in a dimension and the stop moves to the correct position for the cut --- the Yeti SmartBench seems like it might be a contender in this space, but still not seeing the CAD/CAM interface which would make it workable. Really miss Saltire's SketchRight and FutureWave's SmartSketch for quick jobsite sketches.
- dieselgate 4y ago
  This isn't my field but I'm assuming there are size/width constraints to the "carried on a truck" CNC machine. Of course it's possible but the width for a trailerable load is around 10' which may be quite limiting for residential structures. At that limit prefab units may seem more practical? I find the CNC housing idea interesting but similar to EVs (in the past) it needs to catch on
  - riskable 4y ago
    > the width for a trailerable load is around 10' Ahh but the maximum height is 14'! Well, on most roads and Federal highways anyway (plan your route!). Also, the maximum trailer width is actually 12' with a realistic payload for non-flatbed of around 11'. The maximum width that'll fit in the bed in your typical American pickup truck is around 5-5.5'.
  - leoedin 4y ago
    Do sheet materials ever come in larger sizes than 4' x 8'? The CNC wouldn't need to be much larger than the largest sheet it could cut.
    - aaronax 4y ago
      Drywall is commonly available at any home center in 4'x12', and available in 4'x16' sizes.
huetius 4y ago
The responses here are critical —- some useful, some not so useful. I’m happy to see this project and would like to see more like it, even if this is not quite ready for show time. The possibility of using advances in technology and open source methods to allow people to make more stuff for themselves and their communities in a way that is efficient and feasible is exciting to me.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- dagw 4y ago
  I guess the real question is does this actually solve a real problem people are having? An acquaintance of mine recently built a house, and constructing the outer 'shell' was by far the quickest and easiest part of the whole process.
  - falcolas 4y ago
    > does this actually solve a real problem people are having? And does it solve it at a price point that makes it practical in comparison to other high efficiency house building technologies?
  - huetius 4y ago
    Depends what you mean by “this.” This exact project is, I think, not ready for prime time, as I said in my post. If by “this” you mean “ways to make more of our own stuff on a smaller scale,” I am currently in my fourth month of waiting for a proprietary part for my tractor, when if I had an economical and legal way to either machine the part myself, or have it machined by a competent neighbor, then I wouldn’t have this problem. In a time when we are experiencing the consequences of over-specialized, over-connected, over-optimized supply chains, I think that a more fractal, scale-invariant, redundant approach to production has real value. (It also, in general, makes humans feel good to make and then use something).
- forgetfreeman 4y ago
  Are construction methods the bottleneck though? Habitat For Humanity is an excellent example of communities building things for themselves and others. What problem do you see systems like this solving?
tengbretson 4y ago
This looks neat, but having to submit a structural engineer's inspection report before they sell you the materials is absurd.
- cdot2 4y ago
  That seems specific to how mortgages work in the UK
theptip 4y ago
This is cool. The model of distributed local fabrication is one that I think we’ll see more of in future as automation becomes more capable and cheaper. This seems to fix one of the big problems with pre-fab houses, that they are expensive to ship long distances, and therefore can’t benefit from economy-of-scale centralized manufacturing.
parkersweb 4y ago
Does anyone know of a similar project for garden offices?
- turtlebits 4y ago
  Tuff sheds (no affiliation) are inexpensive. My 12'x16' cost ~$6k a few years ago. Hire a contractor to finish the interior.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
greenie_beans 4y ago
how is this zero carbon? logging is very carbon intensive. and, i'm not an expert, but from what i've read as a layperson, doesn't removing trees cause a loss of the carbon that's stored in the soil?
- X6S1x6Okd1st 4y ago
  Is it? The first study I found showed some extra carbon storage, but the 95 CI includes 0 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339956316_The_lifecycle_of_wood_from_tropical_forests_in_Costa_Rica https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339956316_The_lifec...
  - greenie_beans 4y ago
    that's interesting, i'll take a deeper look later. if only i had bookmarked all the studies i've come across. i have an interest in woodland so i've been curious to learn about this and my (layperson) takeway is that logging adds a lot of carbon to the atmosphere. also, the soil stores a lot of carbon, and when you log trees, you degrade the soil and cause loss of stored carbon. (but i'm far from a scientist, just waiting for somebody who knows what they're talking about to chime in.)
    - X6S1x6Okd1st 4y ago
      Looking further it seems like there's a lot of logging practices that are worse than performing no action (assuming that the biomass provided doesn't offset something else, e.g. prevents coal from being burnt)
- Ndymium 4y ago
  Isn't the majority of carbon in a tree coming from the air, not soil? I could imagine it removes nutrients though.
- cookieswumchorr 4y ago
  the wood will usually be replanted, if they do it properly. But the basement it stands on- it still cement.
goatcode 4y ago
You forgot "ridiculously expensive." I got excited by this project several years ago, but like most of its sort: it's completely inaccessible for what it is.
- troymc 4y ago
  It's open source; I wonder if competition and innovation will bring the cost down over time. One obvious way to do that is to build one, or a few, giant centralized plants that pump out a zillion of these each year, i.e. economies of scale. Like Honda Civic cars or Lego blocks (which also are machined with tight tolerances). Yes, I know that the founders want these to be manufactured in a decentralized way, all over the world, but that's not how economies of scale work. Systems that can be run decentralized (e.g. email, Bitcoin mining) often end up becoming centralized anyway.
  - peatmoss 4y ago
    Framing out a house with construction lumber is “open source” too. Vastly simpler and cheaper than lock-together blocks made out of relatively complex materials like sheet goods. In a pinch, you can fell trees and process them with hand tools using methods refined over many, many generations. In other words, stick construction has been public domain for so long that it would be impossible to even acknowledge its creator and significant contributors.
corwinstephen 4y ago
The physical world is headed in the same direction as the internet. In 20 years, the built environment is going to be entirely comprised of identical materials and trademarked by a tiny handful of monopoly companies.
throwaway4aday 4y ago
I think this is overly complicating the process. If you want an open source DIY method of building a home, just learn basic framing and construction. It's not hard, lots of people have built their own homes, you just need some common sense and a willingness to learn. If you want to go all in on modular, wood based, zero carbon housing then learn how to build a timber frame house. If you really want zero carbon you can use only hand tools and harvest your own trees. Wikihouse seems more for people who want to buy something off the shelf, pretty much a kit house. That's not a bad thing since it takes a lot of effort to build something as big as a house and lots of people don't want to do that. But I don't think this should be sold as a solution for DIYers since the existing methods already satisfy the listed requirements.
- wizofaus 4y ago
  > If you really want zero carbon you can use only hand tools and harvest your own trees. Why on earth can't power tools run off renewables? And even hand tools/nails/ bolts etc. have embedded CO2 emissions.
  - throwaway4aday 4y ago
    They can but can you guarantee it? Hand tools have a much smaller footprint compared to the mix of metals and plastic that go into power tools. You can buy 100 year old hand tools that work just as well as new ones too so they've got the whole recycle thing going for them.
    - fomine3 4y ago
      It's too nitpick. If I think too deep, your body needs more energy if you don't use electric tools, so you need more foods to feed energy but perhaps every foods aren't carbon neutral for farming tools, fertilizer, and transportation.
- simmanian 4y ago
  any resource you'd recommend for learning framing and construction?
rmah 4y ago
Two things... First, looking through their design guide (https://www.wikihouse.cc/guides/design https://www.wikihouse.cc/guides/design), the only thing they mention is that space (32mm in walls, I guess, and 70mm under ceilings) is provided. Given that the plumbing, electrical, ventilation, appliances, etc. are the majority of the cost of a home, I find this a bit odd. A typical American full bathroom costs something like $5k to $20k (and up... way up) depending on the quality. A kitchen can cost multiple times more. Sure, you can build them cheaper, but that's the rub... most people who are in the market to purchase a home don't want low-end bathrooms and kitchens. Or windows. Or lighting. Or wall fixtures. Or anything really. Second, IMO, the problem with affordable housing is not a construction cost problem. We can build small, livable (for various definitions) homes for $50k (or less) today, ignoring land costs. But the regulatory costs, the land costs, the market demands all make building such homes a non-profitable endeavor. Why build 20 $50k homes on the land and make $200k profit when you can build 10 $500k homes and make $1mil in profit? The affordable housing crisis in the America do not have a technical solution, only a socio-political one. And since nearly all the power related to zoning, building costs, etc are managed at the local and state level, that means engaging with local politics.
- ReptileMan 4y ago
  You are right to a point. But one problem is that everyone is trying to cram into the same couple of places. Every country in the world tries to become effectively a city state. The housing shortage is secondary to this trend. You may turn every block into kwaloon walled city and there will still be housing shortage. I am not against density - I am fond of European 6 story buildings. But you have a fundamental demand problem. The big cities are bleeding dry the rest of the countries.
  - dsr_ 4y ago
    That's very, very incorrect. At the population density of Kowloon in 1987, 1,255,000 per square kilometer, and today's population of 8 billion people, it would only take 6375 square km to house everyone. That's less than five cities the size of Phoenix, Arizona. Reasonable urban population density -- the kind where there is still green space and buildings are mostly just a few stories high -- would be about 7500 per square km, about 1.1 million square km for the world population. That sounds like a lot, but it's only about one tenth the metro area of Paris. There is a clean water problem. There is a good sewage treatment problem. There are energy delivery problems. But people will happily live in much denser arrangements than they do on average, and cities make all of the other problems more efficient to deal with. These are policy problems.
maxehmookau 4y ago
So we used WikiHouse construction to build a community centre in our local park. You can see a timelapse here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfTkW87vmUQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfTkW87vmUQ Took 4 people 6 days to build it. Slotted together like lego, it was quite something to watch.
hedgehog 4y ago
This is interesting. The Walter Segal self-build method is another approach that aims to use common materials (lumber, plywood, insulation) with little cutting so as to reduce labor and allow for later disassembly+reuse. https://theprepared.org/features-feed/segal-method https://theprepared.org/features-feed/segal-method With many of these less common methods it's more work to show safety, code compliance, etc. For example the Segal method doesn't really allow for modern levels of air sealing and insulation.
- xor99 4y ago
  Seagal's designs are fantastic. His approach is more convincing in terms of fab methods/cost and looks a little less standardised compared to wikihouse imo.
  - hedgehog 4y ago
    His approach is pretty well proven in that some of the buildings have been standing over 40 years which seems long enough to find most of the issues. Insulation/sealing and permitting are the two I know about, at least at house scale, but If I needed a temporary storage shed it would be a great way to build & be able to dismantle later.
ElijahLynn 4y ago
MMM, I might just have to build a home office away from the house with WikiHouse! I've been dreaming of something like this!
int0x2e 4y ago
If I was designing this, I would only have a small set of "SKUs" with minimal customization, and then go all out on economies of scale. If 10% of houses switched to a single "system" with a small set of SKUs, such that everything is optmized for manufacturing, shipping and assembly - you could reduce the cost of construction significantly. This is basically an extension of the IKEA model for the house itself instead of just the furniture.
yosito 4y ago
If wood-based housing can be considered "zero carbon", I must be confused about the definition of "zero carbon".
- timbit42 4y ago
  I'm not sure what you are referring to but the carbon in the wood of a house is effectively sequestered. I've heard the equivalent amount of hemp made into boards holds 60% more carbon than tree wood so perhaps that would be better, depending on the carbon required to convert the hemp to usable lumber.
kthejoker2 4y ago
Been re-reading Walden ( https://www.gutenberg.org/files/205/205-h/205-h.htm https://www.gutenberg.org/files/205/205-h/205-h.htm ) lately, so eyeopening compared to our strange "modern" world: > And when the farmer has got his house, he may not be the richer but the poorer for it, and it be the house that has got him. > It is possible to invent a house still more convenient and luxurious than we have, which yet all would admit that man could not afford to pay for. Shall we always study to obtain more of these things, and not sometimes to be content with less? Shall the respectable citizen thus gravely teach, by precept and example, the necessity of the young man’s providing a certain number of superfluous glow-shoes, and umbrellas, and empty guest chambers for empty guests, before he dies? And the coup de grace, his own accounting of building his own house: > The exact cost of my house, paying the usual price for such materials as I used, but not counting the work, all of which was done by myself, was as follows; and I give the details because very few are able to tell exactly what their houses cost, and fewer still, if any, the separate cost of the various materials which compose them:— > Boards.......................... $ 8.03½, mostly shanty boards. > Refuse shingles for roof sides,.. 4.00 > Laths,........................... 1.25 > Two second-hand windows with glass,................... 2.43 > One thousand old brick,.......... 4.00 > Two casks of lime,............... 2.40 That was high. > Hair,............................ 0.31 More than I needed. > Mantle-tree iron,................ 0.15 > Nails,........................... 3.90 > Hinges and screws,............... 0.14 > Latch,........................... 0.10 > Chalk,........................... 0.01 > Transportation,.................. 1.40 I carried a good part on my back. > In all,..................... $28.12½ > These are all the materials excepting the timber stones and sand, which I claimed by squatter’s right. I have also a small wood-shed adjoining, made chiefly of the stuff which was left after building the house. > I intend to build me a house which will surpass any on the main street in Concord in grandeur and luxury, as soon as it pleases me as much and will cost me no more than my present one.
teleforce 4y ago
Wow, this can be a great foundation for open source bike and motorcycle communicator intercom [1]. Does this support mesh networking to extend the coverage? [1]FreedConn: https://en.fdcdz.com/ https://en.fdcdz.com/
mikestaub 4y ago
Another interesting option is Earthships: https://earthshipstore.com/collections/construction-drawings-offgrid/products/4bed-3bath-construction-drawings https://earthshipstore.com/collections/construction-drawings...

505 points by xor99 4y ago

dr_dshiv 4y ago

I have questions on fire safety. I lost some close friends recently to a fire. I had never thought about it before.

ruined 4y ago
most buildings in america today are wood frame, this is likely no better or worse. it is more important to consider what you put in the building, have a good electrician do the wiring, and design your layout and exits to fire code compliance.
- 542458 4y ago
  All wood frame is not equivalent. Modern stick framing is designed to slow the spread of flame both with how the wood is used (see modern stick framing vs balloon framing) and the other materials chosen (drywall is fairly nonflammable, whereas this seems to use plywood walls). I’m not saying this is better or worse (it might be that all the insulation significantly slows the spread of flame?), but they haven’t really discussed the fire safety implications of their design that I can see.
  - kupfer 4y ago
    To quote their FAQs: >Is it firesafe? >WikiHouse is not really any different from most kinds of 1-3 storey buildings with timber roof, floors, or internal walls, in that the building needs to be designed with adequate means of escape, and the chassis needs to be reasonably protected from catching fire. This can usually be achieved either with a plasterboard internal lining, by using a non-toxic fire protection coating, or by installing a basic sprinkler system. >If you are building several adjacent houses, located close together in a row, you will usually need to use an external fire barrier material to prevent fire spreading from one building to the next.
Schroedingersat 4y ago
Doesn't seem incompatible.
pera 4y ago
They probably would use fire retardant timber/plywood. There is a pretty cool office building in Barcelona (still under construction I believe?) entirely made of wood that uses this kind of treated wood: https://wittywood.es/en/ https://wittywood.es/en/
- Animatronio 4y ago
  By the looks of it they also rely on oversizing the columns and beams to achieve fire retardation.
  - shagie 4y ago
    This is known as mass timber. https://www.wsj.com/articles/wooden-skyscrapers-are-on-the-rise-11649693924 https://www.wsj.com/articles/wooden-skyscrapers-are-on-the-r... https://www.thinkwood.com/mass-timber https://www.thinkwood.com/mass-timber https://www.naturallywood.com/topics/mass-timber/ https://www.naturallywood.com/topics/mass-timber/ https://www.ijpr.org/housing/2022-09-04/oregons-mass-timber-industry-gets-boost-from-federal-government https://www.ijpr.org/housing/2022-09-04/oregons-mass-timber-... And regarding fire retardation - Cross Laminated Timber Fire Testing from the Forest Products Laboratory and US Forest Service - https://youtu.be/HuVTCOmRGd0 https://youtu.be/HuVTCOmRGd0
    - Animatronio 4y ago
      yes, you're absolutely right, I couldn't find the right term for it. unfortunately it works at the cost of 2x or 3x the raw materials it would normally take.
      - shagie 4y ago
        It represents a sequestration of carbon whereas the cement in a traditional cement framework building represents significant portion of the carbon footprint. As to the cost - https://www.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/pubs/62676 https://www.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/pubs/62676 > Based on commercial construction cost data from the RSMeans database, a mass timber building design is estimated to have 26 percent higher front-end costs than its concrete alternative. And from the paper: > The resulting TLCCs of the two buildings under these scenarios are shown in Table 6 and Figure 5. From the results of these scenarios, it was found that the TLCC for the mass timber building would have a cost advantage with its longer life span (100 yr) than the concrete alternative (75 yr) when other factors are the same (see Scenario S0 and S4), and the higher front-end cost (value) showed an even greater advantage of 7.0 percent difference (Scenario S4). When the life spans of the two buildings were the same, the end-of-life cost or value of the mass timber building was not able to be offset by the higher front-end costs (see Scenario S1 [12%], S2 [6.7%], and S3 [5.9%]). In this case study, the two buildings were designed to be functionally equivalent. Thus, we assumed the same operational utility and maintenance during the building-use stage. No impact from these parts were considered in the TLCC calculations on the cost- performance for the comparison of the two buildings. But if there are energy savings discovered in the new mass timber buildings, the LCC analysis would reveal more cost benefits (Liang et al. 2019). I can't find any sources that agree with your cost assessment... instead: https://www.bdcnetwork.com/5-myths-about-cross-laminated-timber https://www.bdcnetwork.com/5-myths-about-cross-laminated-tim... > When considering the total in-place value of a CLT system, it is cost competitive to other plate building materials. But you also need to consider all the value added benefits: > • More savings can be found in the reduced installation cost, usually 50% cheaper than installing other plate materials. > • With an earlier project completion date, you are open for business sometimes months ahead of schedule. > • The building structure will weigh less than half the weight of other construction types, so the foundation costs less money. > • Job site safety is dramatically increased due to the prefabricated CLT panels and usually the only power tools are pneumatic drills. > The intent of cross laminated timber is not to replace light-frame construction, but rather to offer a versatile, low-carbon, and cost-competitive wood-based solution that complements the existing light frame and heavy timber options while offering a suitable candidate for some applications that currently use concrete, masonry, and steel.
xor99 4y ago
Sorry to hear that! Valid point ofc, I would like to see if they have addressed that with the wooden build. BTW the plans can be made using non-wooden materials or limited wood but this may change the zero carbon status/ease of fabrication.

design-of-homes 4y ago

My first impressions are favourable. There are contraints though, as the design guide acknowledges: > WikiHouse is intended for buildings of up to 3 storeys. This covers 95% of all buildings, and allows gentle density neighbourhoods of up to around 75 dwellings per hectare. > The main constraint on height is not gravity, but wind. In high winds, lightweight structures are more prone to slight lateral flexing, which is not allowed within most building codes. Further structural research and testing is ongoing.

actually_a_dog 4y ago
I'm kinda curious about this. Under the International Building Code, you can build wood frame buildings up to 6 storeys tall [0]. Granted, this is not actually wood frame construction, but I don't see why a building built this way would be any less structurally sound than a traditionally built wood frame building. --- [0]: https://seagatemasstimber.com/how-tall-are-tall-wood-buildings-is-there-a-height-limit/ https://seagatemasstimber.com/how-tall-are-tall-wood-buildin...
- quixoticelixer- 4y ago
  You can built wood frame buildings much taller. And wood framing is stiffer especially if you are using mass timber.
- criddell 4y ago
  Maybe it has to do with lack of bracing? When my home was being built I noticed lots of metal straps going between studs in an X-formation. I wonder if that was to make lots of triangles to add rigidity?
  - redtexture 4y ago
    Yes. This can also be provided by sheet materials like plywood, securely attached, providing diagonal structure preventing racking of the frame. In older houses, sheathed with one inch by eight or ten or twelve inch boards, diagonal wood bracing was cut into the two by four inch wall studs for diagonal bracing and structure.

dang 4y ago

Related: Facit Homes, Wikihouse, and the Plywood Frame - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27666320 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27666320 - June 2021 (33 comments) WikiHouse – Open source buildings and interiors for self-build - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13856917 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13856917 - March 2017 (53 comments) The WikiHouse chassis system [pdf] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13029982 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13029982 - Nov 2016 (1 comment) WikiHouse's DIY kits are the open-source way to build a house - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5768030 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5768030 - May 2013 (3 comments)

jbu 4y ago

One of these went up near me. Pretty cool. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfTkW87vmUQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfTkW87vmUQ

skylanh 4y ago
The resources I could find that reference this indicate that they needed 30k £ to finish the interior--the same page indicates they were fund-raising 190k £, and the charity that operates on about ~214k £ a year. Do you have any inductions on the cost of this building?
oblio 4y ago
I don't see any toilets, kitchen, electrical stuff in that time-lapse. It looks more like a shed than a house :-)

samwillis 4y ago

I really like the concept of this, it's basically a step further on from SIPs (structural insulated panels) by having standard composable blocks. The things I think are particularly good: - Standardising on screw pile foundations. Standard concrete foundations are often be about 30% of the build cost, with the quantity of earth removed and cement used it's a massive part of the carbon footprint of a home. For a "light weight" timber construction, screw piles are the future. - Having services recesses and notches built into the panels, and there is no need to batten the internal walls for boarding. this will increase the speed of construction significantly. - Being an "Open" standard allows any timber frame or prefab construction company to adopt it. My one concern (I wouldn't go as far as criticism) is that the panels have a somewhat complex manufacturing process by having to be CNC machined. Realisticly they almost always will be, but I would have liked to see the panels designed to be constructed a little more simply - you will always have to make changes on site. I wander why they went with ply over OSB, they have similar structural properties but OSB can be cheeper.

kupfer 4y ago
From their FAQs: >Which material is better, ply or OSB? >Ply is lighter and generally better structurally but more expensive. OSB is cheaper but heavier. With the recent research on WikiHouse Skylark we did test both materials, but in terms of the full spanning floor beams it’s clear ply offers advantages in terms of strength but also because it’s lighter it’s easier to move and carry. A hybrid approach is also a possibility.
- LegitShady 4y ago
  He's talking about the moisture resistance property of plywood over OSB. OSB absorbs moisture readily and turns into mush.
forgetfreeman 4y ago
Mold abatement & home restoration contractor here. OSB should not be considered code-compliant material, full-stop. Imagine your home has been constructed with slabs of sponge that have are purpose-engineered to provide optimal growing conditions for fungi when moisture is introduced. Now consider that over the lifetime of a structure some combination of exterior cladding failure, roof leaks, ground moisture issues, and plumbing fails are not only likely, but basically guaranteed. My biggest concern with this system is given this system's "tightness" to water vapor (similar to SIPs), all of the same issues with mold and related air quality are inherited. If structures don't breathe they rot. i

shafyy 4y ago

The use of "Carbon negative" really grinds my gears. Carbon negative would mean that by building this house, you actually remove carbon from the atmosphere. No, you don't remove CO2 from the atmosphere by buliding this house. Yes, trees remove carbon, but now you've just cut them down and released a bunch of carbon in that process (plus all the CO2 you emit, you know, building the actual house). Edit: Ok, looking more through their website I came across this: https://www.wikihouse.cc/product https://www.wikihouse.cc/product They say that the upfront carbon cost of building a WikiHouse is - 17T CO2, compared to a normal house of + 30T CO2. This is so fucking misleading, I've just lost all respect for the makers of this. I think it's a great project, but once you start bullshitting like this, you can get the hell out.

marcus_holmes 4y ago
The carbon sequestered by the trees is now in the building materials. The space the trees were in will now have more trees grown in them. The carbon from the trees is now not in the atmosphere, it's in the wood components, and won't be in the atmosphere until the wood components reach end of life and are burned/rotted/whatever. So yes, carbon has been removed from the atmosphere. I don't understand the objection.
- musingsole 4y ago
  > The carbon sequestered by the trees is now in the building materials You're ignoring material waste. This process doesn't consume 100% of the tree; only a portion of the tree's carbon is sequestered into the building. The rest is rotting. > The space the trees were in will now have more trees grown in them. Trees are renewable, but it's not quite "copy&paste". Further, the harvesting of the trees was certain to be carbon intensive. So, on the whole, you can trust this process IS NOT CARBON NEGATIVE. What it may be is LESS CARBON INTENSIVE than a traditional process. They are VERY FAR from crossing the neutral line and yet are trying to claim carbon negative? That's pretty brash. Does the objection make more sense now?
  - shafyy 4y ago

skylanh 4y ago

I see. Another wood-house project created by civil engineering or building material science graduates (Leeds Beckett University)--similar to the last one. Build costs similar to brick (ouch!), requires a specific CNC operator to build panels (supply chain ouch!), and creates an integrated house (ouch! to any renovations using conventional materials; ouch! to system longevity). I hate these as they're basically the results of a couple of graduate students operating under a innovation grant. The practical results of this are that someone is going to find a local CNC operator (within 320km based on the study), find out the costs of buying 300 sheets of quality 7-layer plywood and running a custom project with the CNC operator, find a local engineer willing to sign off on the project (for insurance, mortgage, and to maintain the 10 year defect free period), and then have to find a local labour contractor willing to use their building materials as the structure. After all that legwork, they're going to go with a traditional building contractor.

ShredKazoo 4y ago
On the other hand, if you're a CNC operator and you already have spare capacity, this could allow you to cheaply branch into home construction by hiring a few more employees...
monkeydust 4y ago
So this happened. I looked at wikihouse many years ago for a project. I really liked the idea and team but (at least at the time) it was still very new. Too much risk to take on for individual homeowner and it was cheaper for me to get a local contractor who had experience in developing what I was after.
SamBam 4y ago
> requires a specific CNC operator to build panels (supply chain ouch!) Unsure what this means. The CNC files are open source, and there are millions of CNC machines in the world. What specific CNC operator? In general, I'd say your comments are valid for a random homeowner that decides they want to try this out. If you think in terms of a contractor who wanted to start specializing in this in their region, it seems quite doable. They could have their own engineer that has seen many of these, and a stable source of plywood/OSB and access to a CNC shop.

fareesh 4y ago

How do these hold up in stormy weather?

nemo44x 4y ago
It's funny you mention it because in the part regarding foundations they mention that the foundation for these homes not only has to help keep the home up but also stop it from flying away.

throwaway787544 4y ago

Frame is just a small part of the cost and complexity of building a house. Considering you still need the CNC, and expensive materials, and a contractor, this doesn't seem like a win. On the contrary, I'd rather see more open designs for modern post-frame homes. They're lighter, cheaper, simpler, faster, and provide some design benefits. The only real downside is zoning needs to catch up.

fasteddie31003 4y ago

Just buy some 2x4's and plywood and start building. It's not that hard. Building does not have to be this complicated. The building systems and products out today make it incredibly easy and (before the ridiculously low interest rates) pretty cheap.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
LegitShady 4y ago
>Just buy some 2x4's and plywood and start building. It's not that hard. I mean sure, if you live somewhere without building codes, don't need a foundation, and don't care how long something lasts or how safe it is. Just chuck it together. Just some 2x4s and plywood is all you need for a treehouse. Maybe.
- turtlebits 4y ago
  The linked project/product does not include foundation, and most likely also needs engineering work to pass codes/inspection. Stick framing is cheap and simple- 2x4s are abundant. And you can do it yourself solo with minimal tools. Also, using plywood is way more prone to water issues than solid wood.
  - LegitShady 4y ago
    disclaimer - I work in civil/structural engineering but typically much larger structures than houses and mostly concrete and wood and haven't done wood design since school. the following does not constitute engineering advice and should not be relied upon for design or construction purposes. This is merely discussion. I wouldn't build most houses today out of 2x4s, simply because its not a big enough insulation cavity for a modern home. Stick framing being cheap does not substitute for planning. As you say - you need to design a structure and that includes hiring an engineer for more than just 'passing codes/inspection' but also for structural design of your home. It's unlikely you'll be able to design a roof out of 2x4s without making major sacrifices to the design of the house, and you're probably not qualified to judge the worst case loading in your area or capacity of a 2x4 roof (or else you wouldn't even mention 2x4s). The linked site includes several guides including an engineering guide most non engineers would struggle to understand. https://www.wikihouse.cc/guides https://www.wikihouse.cc/guides Plywood is not particularly prone to water issues, and isn't used in the same way as solid wood would be. In situations where plywood would be having water issues, so would solid wood. You might be confusing plywood and OSB. Structurally, plywood sheathing is primarily used for shear capacity to let structures handle lateral (sideways) loads to resist racking, and to have somewhere to attach the exterior materials of the structure to. The linked engineering guide provides structural testing numbers of their panels for various capacities that a structural engineer understands. Like proper stick framing, it requires planning and design, rather than grabbing some 2x4s and letting er rip.

debacle 4y ago

Stick based construction is already incredibly time, resource, and labor efficient. SIPs are neat (https://www.sips.org/what-are-sips https://www.sips.org/what-are-sips), but even they are an added cost. Dirt-based construction is an intriguing idea, but generally you are trading materials cost (which is already relatively low) for quite a bit of labor cost. A system that cheaply allows for enduring dirt-based construction would be an interesting advancement, but I'm not sure how universal that system would be.

upsidesinclude 4y ago
This is basically available, but no one offers the service. https://www.opensourceecology.org/ https://www.opensourceecology.org/ There is just too much labor involved for the material savings unless you are in the third world. Bagged earth construction is similarly cost effective given a cheap labor force.
- debacle 4y ago
  Bagged earth construction is great, however you are adding a TON of labor. So much so that in a developed country you might as well just use brick construction because it will be cheaper. In addition, in my area I would have to have my dirt amended because we have very sandy soil, but I don't know by how much because a few feet down that sandy soil turns to clay. They have some mobile dirt brick factory machines, but those seem to be home-built prototypes for the most part.
mellavora 4y ago
> cheaply allows for enduring dirt-based construction would be an interesting advancement, you wouldn't mean clay brick, would you? I see some of the advantages, but want to be pendantic about calling a 10K old technology an 'advancement'
- debacle 4y ago
  Unfired clay brick production is incredibly labor intensive, and generally you'll want to produce those bricks on-site because they don't transport well.

phantomathkg 4y ago

Genuine question, other than the cover hero image title, where does it explain how come this is zero carbon?

kgran 4y ago

Says zero-carbon, proceeds to show single-family detached homes in a suburban setting, mostly accessible by car only. P.S. The concrete foundations look far from zero-carbon.

MontyCarloHall 4y ago
Put solar panels on the roof and an electric car in the driveway. The main strike against suburban lifestyles today is that they’re energy intensive and thus carbon-heavy. There is nothing wrong with a energy intensive suburban life if that energy is carbon neutral. (And yes, as other posters point out, there are some additional environmental externalities associated with suburban versus urban lifestyles. It’s not clear to me how severe these externalities are, and thus whether they are worth the tradeoff of increased quality of life for the many people who love living in the suburbs. As an extreme example, living a pre-industrial lifestyle would be much more environmentally friendly, but it isn’t remotely worth the quality of life tradeoff.)
- kgran 4y ago
  Electric cars are as zero-carbon as the cost-equivalent space of a freshly paved asphalt concrete highway or parking space. If not more than that due to the more special materials required to make them. Also note that, due to much heavier weight of electric cars, asphalt concrete surfaces will be damaged a lot faster. The relationship between vehicle weight and its damage to the road surface is exponential, not linear.
- oblio 4y ago
  You still need to drive places, which is the least efficient method of mass transportation. An entire infrastructure needs to be built and maintained for cars, which is super wasteful and in almost every country is pushing everyone into debt that is just punted into the future. Sure, convenient for individuals but absolutely not sustainable for society, nor the planet. Even with electric cars and green energy. The insane cost of cars: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ztHZj6QNlkM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ztHZj6QNlkM The hard truth is that if we don't want to abandon our comfortable modern lifestyles, 80-90% of us will have to live in dense cities and use mass transportation 95% of the time.

WillAdams 4y ago

I'm still surprised that no one has made a CNC specifically designed to be: - carried on a truck - used while in place on the truck or is easily removed from it and then set up - which has an interface suited to a job site in terms of setting up a design and cutting The Shapr3D seems to get some jobsite use, and there is at least one digital saw where one plugs in a dimension and the stop moves to the correct position for the cut --- the Yeti SmartBench seems like it might be a contender in this space, but still not seeing the CAD/CAM interface which would make it workable. Really miss Saltire's SketchRight and FutureWave's SmartSketch for quick jobsite sketches.

dieselgate 4y ago
This isn't my field but I'm assuming there are size/width constraints to the "carried on a truck" CNC machine. Of course it's possible but the width for a trailerable load is around 10' which may be quite limiting for residential structures. At that limit prefab units may seem more practical? I find the CNC housing idea interesting but similar to EVs (in the past) it needs to catch on
- riskable 4y ago
  > the width for a trailerable load is around 10' Ahh but the maximum height is 14'! Well, on most roads and Federal highways anyway (plan your route!). Also, the maximum trailer width is actually 12' with a realistic payload for non-flatbed of around 11'. The maximum width that'll fit in the bed in your typical American pickup truck is around 5-5.5'.
- leoedin 4y ago
  Do sheet materials ever come in larger sizes than 4' x 8'? The CNC wouldn't need to be much larger than the largest sheet it could cut.
  - aaronax 4y ago
    Drywall is commonly available at any home center in 4'x12', and available in 4'x16' sizes.

huetius 4y ago

The responses here are critical —- some useful, some not so useful. I’m happy to see this project and would like to see more like it, even if this is not quite ready for show time. The possibility of using advances in technology and open source methods to allow people to make more stuff for themselves and their communities in a way that is efficient and feasible is exciting to me.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
dagw 4y ago
I guess the real question is does this actually solve a real problem people are having? An acquaintance of mine recently built a house, and constructing the outer 'shell' was by far the quickest and easiest part of the whole process.
- falcolas 4y ago
  > does this actually solve a real problem people are having? And does it solve it at a price point that makes it practical in comparison to other high efficiency house building technologies?
- huetius 4y ago
  Depends what you mean by “this.” This exact project is, I think, not ready for prime time, as I said in my post. If by “this” you mean “ways to make more of our own stuff on a smaller scale,” I am currently in my fourth month of waiting for a proprietary part for my tractor, when if I had an economical and legal way to either machine the part myself, or have it machined by a competent neighbor, then I wouldn’t have this problem. In a time when we are experiencing the consequences of over-specialized, over-connected, over-optimized supply chains, I think that a more fractal, scale-invariant, redundant approach to production has real value. (It also, in general, makes humans feel good to make and then use something).
forgetfreeman 4y ago
Are construction methods the bottleneck though? Habitat For Humanity is an excellent example of communities building things for themselves and others. What problem do you see systems like this solving?

tengbretson 4y ago

This looks neat, but having to submit a structural engineer's inspection report before they sell you the materials is absurd.

cdot2 4y ago
That seems specific to how mortgages work in the UK

theptip 4y ago

This is cool. The model of distributed local fabrication is one that I think we’ll see more of in future as automation becomes more capable and cheaper. This seems to fix one of the big problems with pre-fab houses, that they are expensive to ship long distances, and therefore can’t benefit from economy-of-scale centralized manufacturing.

parkersweb 4y ago

Does anyone know of a similar project for garden offices?

turtlebits 4y ago
Tuff sheds (no affiliation) are inexpensive. My 12'x16' cost ~$6k a few years ago. Hire a contractor to finish the interior.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

greenie_beans 4y ago

how is this zero carbon? logging is very carbon intensive. and, i'm not an expert, but from what i've read as a layperson, doesn't removing trees cause a loss of the carbon that's stored in the soil?

X6S1x6Okd1st 4y ago
Is it? The first study I found showed some extra carbon storage, but the 95 CI includes 0 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339956316_The_lifecycle_of_wood_from_tropical_forests_in_Costa_Rica https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339956316_The_lifec...
- greenie_beans 4y ago
  that's interesting, i'll take a deeper look later. if only i had bookmarked all the studies i've come across. i have an interest in woodland so i've been curious to learn about this and my (layperson) takeway is that logging adds a lot of carbon to the atmosphere. also, the soil stores a lot of carbon, and when you log trees, you degrade the soil and cause loss of stored carbon. (but i'm far from a scientist, just waiting for somebody who knows what they're talking about to chime in.)
  - X6S1x6Okd1st 4y ago
    Looking further it seems like there's a lot of logging practices that are worse than performing no action (assuming that the biomass provided doesn't offset something else, e.g. prevents coal from being burnt)
Ndymium 4y ago
Isn't the majority of carbon in a tree coming from the air, not soil? I could imagine it removes nutrients though.
cookieswumchorr 4y ago
the wood will usually be replanted, if they do it properly. But the basement it stands on- it still cement.

goatcode 4y ago

You forgot "ridiculously expensive." I got excited by this project several years ago, but like most of its sort: it's completely inaccessible for what it is.

troymc 4y ago
It's open source; I wonder if competition and innovation will bring the cost down over time. One obvious way to do that is to build one, or a few, giant centralized plants that pump out a zillion of these each year, i.e. economies of scale. Like Honda Civic cars or Lego blocks (which also are machined with tight tolerances). Yes, I know that the founders want these to be manufactured in a decentralized way, all over the world, but that's not how economies of scale work. Systems that can be run decentralized (e.g. email, Bitcoin mining) often end up becoming centralized anyway.
- peatmoss 4y ago
  Framing out a house with construction lumber is “open source” too. Vastly simpler and cheaper than lock-together blocks made out of relatively complex materials like sheet goods. In a pinch, you can fell trees and process them with hand tools using methods refined over many, many generations. In other words, stick construction has been public domain for so long that it would be impossible to even acknowledge its creator and significant contributors.

corwinstephen 4y ago

The physical world is headed in the same direction as the internet. In 20 years, the built environment is going to be entirely comprised of identical materials and trademarked by a tiny handful of monopoly companies.

throwaway4aday 4y ago

I think this is overly complicating the process. If you want an open source DIY method of building a home, just learn basic framing and construction. It's not hard, lots of people have built their own homes, you just need some common sense and a willingness to learn. If you want to go all in on modular, wood based, zero carbon housing then learn how to build a timber frame house. If you really want zero carbon you can use only hand tools and harvest your own trees. Wikihouse seems more for people who want to buy something off the shelf, pretty much a kit house. That's not a bad thing since it takes a lot of effort to build something as big as a house and lots of people don't want to do that. But I don't think this should be sold as a solution for DIYers since the existing methods already satisfy the listed requirements.

wizofaus 4y ago
> If you really want zero carbon you can use only hand tools and harvest your own trees. Why on earth can't power tools run off renewables? And even hand tools/nails/ bolts etc. have embedded CO2 emissions.
- throwaway4aday 4y ago
  They can but can you guarantee it? Hand tools have a much smaller footprint compared to the mix of metals and plastic that go into power tools. You can buy 100 year old hand tools that work just as well as new ones too so they've got the whole recycle thing going for them.
  - fomine3 4y ago
    It's too nitpick. If I think too deep, your body needs more energy if you don't use electric tools, so you need more foods to feed energy but perhaps every foods aren't carbon neutral for farming tools, fertilizer, and transportation.
simmanian 4y ago
any resource you'd recommend for learning framing and construction?

rmah 4y ago

Two things... First, looking through their design guide (https://www.wikihouse.cc/guides/design https://www.wikihouse.cc/guides/design), the only thing they mention is that space (32mm in walls, I guess, and 70mm under ceilings) is provided. Given that the plumbing, electrical, ventilation, appliances, etc. are the majority of the cost of a home, I find this a bit odd. A typical American full bathroom costs something like $5k to $20k (and up... way up) depending on the quality. A kitchen can cost multiple times more. Sure, you can build them cheaper, but that's the rub... most people who are in the market to purchase a home don't want low-end bathrooms and kitchens. Or windows. Or lighting. Or wall fixtures. Or anything really. Second, IMO, the problem with affordable housing is not a construction cost problem. We can build small, livable (for various definitions) homes for $50k (or less) today, ignoring land costs. But the regulatory costs, the land costs, the market demands all make building such homes a non-profitable endeavor. Why build 20 $50k homes on the land and make $200k profit when you can build 10 $500k homes and make $1mil in profit? The affordable housing crisis in the America do not have a technical solution, only a socio-political one. And since nearly all the power related to zoning, building costs, etc are managed at the local and state level, that means engaging with local politics.

ReptileMan 4y ago
You are right to a point. But one problem is that everyone is trying to cram into the same couple of places. Every country in the world tries to become effectively a city state. The housing shortage is secondary to this trend. You may turn every block into kwaloon walled city and there will still be housing shortage. I am not against density - I am fond of European 6 story buildings. But you have a fundamental demand problem. The big cities are bleeding dry the rest of the countries.
- dsr_ 4y ago
  That's very, very incorrect. At the population density of Kowloon in 1987, 1,255,000 per square kilometer, and today's population of 8 billion people, it would only take 6375 square km to house everyone. That's less than five cities the size of Phoenix, Arizona. Reasonable urban population density -- the kind where there is still green space and buildings are mostly just a few stories high -- would be about 7500 per square km, about 1.1 million square km for the world population. That sounds like a lot, but it's only about one tenth the metro area of Paris. There is a clean water problem. There is a good sewage treatment problem. There are energy delivery problems. But people will happily live in much denser arrangements than they do on average, and cities make all of the other problems more efficient to deal with. These are policy problems.

maxehmookau 4y ago

So we used WikiHouse construction to build a community centre in our local park. You can see a timelapse here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfTkW87vmUQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfTkW87vmUQ Took 4 people 6 days to build it. Slotted together like lego, it was quite something to watch.

hedgehog 4y ago

This is interesting. The Walter Segal self-build method is another approach that aims to use common materials (lumber, plywood, insulation) with little cutting so as to reduce labor and allow for later disassembly+reuse. https://theprepared.org/features-feed/segal-method https://theprepared.org/features-feed/segal-method With many of these less common methods it's more work to show safety, code compliance, etc. For example the Segal method doesn't really allow for modern levels of air sealing and insulation.

xor99 4y ago
Seagal's designs are fantastic. His approach is more convincing in terms of fab methods/cost and looks a little less standardised compared to wikihouse imo.
- hedgehog 4y ago
  His approach is pretty well proven in that some of the buildings have been standing over 40 years which seems long enough to find most of the issues. Insulation/sealing and permitting are the two I know about, at least at house scale, but If I needed a temporary storage shed it would be a great way to build & be able to dismantle later.

ElijahLynn 4y ago

MMM, I might just have to build a home office away from the house with WikiHouse! I've been dreaming of something like this!

int0x2e 4y ago

If I was designing this, I would only have a small set of "SKUs" with minimal customization, and then go all out on economies of scale. If 10% of houses switched to a single "system" with a small set of SKUs, such that everything is optmized for manufacturing, shipping and assembly - you could reduce the cost of construction significantly. This is basically an extension of the IKEA model for the house itself instead of just the furniture.

yosito 4y ago

If wood-based housing can be considered "zero carbon", I must be confused about the definition of "zero carbon".

timbit42 4y ago
I'm not sure what you are referring to but the carbon in the wood of a house is effectively sequestered. I've heard the equivalent amount of hemp made into boards holds 60% more carbon than tree wood so perhaps that would be better, depending on the carbon required to convert the hemp to usable lumber.

kthejoker2 4y ago

Been re-reading Walden ( https://www.gutenberg.org/files/205/205-h/205-h.htm https://www.gutenberg.org/files/205/205-h/205-h.htm ) lately, so eyeopening compared to our strange "modern" world: > And when the farmer has got his house, he may not be the richer but the poorer for it, and it be the house that has got him. > It is possible to invent a house still more convenient and luxurious than we have, which yet all would admit that man could not afford to pay for. Shall we always study to obtain more of these things, and not sometimes to be content with less? Shall the respectable citizen thus gravely teach, by precept and example, the necessity of the young man’s providing a certain number of superfluous glow-shoes, and umbrellas, and empty guest chambers for empty guests, before he dies? And the coup de grace, his own accounting of building his own house: > The exact cost of my house, paying the usual price for such materials as I used, but not counting the work, all of which was done by myself, was as follows; and I give the details because very few are able to tell exactly what their houses cost, and fewer still, if any, the separate cost of the various materials which compose them:— > Boards.......................... $ 8.03½, mostly shanty boards. > Refuse shingles for roof sides,.. 4.00 > Laths,........................... 1.25 > Two second-hand windows with glass,................... 2.43 > One thousand old brick,.......... 4.00 > Two casks of lime,............... 2.40 That was high. > Hair,............................ 0.31 More than I needed. > Mantle-tree iron,................ 0.15 > Nails,........................... 3.90 > Hinges and screws,............... 0.14 > Latch,........................... 0.10 > Chalk,........................... 0.01 > Transportation,.................. 1.40 I carried a good part on my back. > In all,..................... $28.12½ > These are all the materials excepting the timber stones and sand, which I claimed by squatter’s right. I have also a small wood-shed adjoining, made chiefly of the stuff which was left after building the house. > I intend to build me a house which will surpass any on the main street in Concord in grandeur and luxury, as soon as it pleases me as much and will cost me no more than my present one.

teleforce 4y ago

Wow, this can be a great foundation for open source bike and motorcycle communicator intercom [1]. Does this support mesh networking to extend the coverage? [1]FreedConn: https://en.fdcdz.com/ https://en.fdcdz.com/

mikestaub 4y ago

Another interesting option is Earthships: https://earthshipstore.com/collections/construction-drawings-offgrid/products/4bed-3bath-construction-drawings https://earthshipstore.com/collections/construction-drawings...