Category Archives: tiny house build

Technology Part I: Electricity (a)

April 8, 2015Electric, tiny house build100% green, DIY, electric, electricity, green, organization, plug, solar, tiny house buildseedswithwings

Tiny House Technology

In the next series of posts, we will explore some nuts and bolts of tiny house technology and share resources that have pointed us in the right direction. We will also share information on electrical loads and a nuanced discussion of the embodied energy inherent in many ‘green’ technologies. The research we’ve done has included an understanding of the embodied energy required to manufacture the product, as well as the latest research about their sustainability. Embodied energy is “…the energy consumed by all of the processes associated with the production of a building, from the mining and processing of natural resources to manufacturing, transport and product delivery.” (www.yourhome.gov.au).

We would also like to acknowledge the ever-changing nature in the building field, as new research constantly comes to light. It’s not possible to be “100% green,” a phrase too often left unsubstantiated in the building industry, and which has been co-opted to mean the same as “sustainable” without taking into account long-term social, environmental and economic impact.

We’re trying to do our best to be aware of our choices, avoid “soap-boxes,” vote with our dollars, and know that “purity” in building can’t really exist. No one is perfect, most builds are not without those sheets of plywood trucked in from afar, and the rabbit hole of “100% green” is very deep.

Electricity

The first step we took was to gather information on electrical loads of common appliances and calculate a tiny space’s electrical needs. From this we discovered just how much power we’ll need to generate, collect or plug into. Here’s a resource on solar load calculation/determination with an empty chart to work from.

Here’s an interactive resource to calculate how many kilowatt-hours (kWh) one might need to generate for construction, which for us is significantly more than for day-to-day usage: Here’s one for day-to-day post-construction usage.

We are trying to use Energy Star-rated appliances when possible (www.energystar.gov) and LED light-bulbs that require a significantly lower wattage than incandescent or compact fluorescent bulbs, with the same amount of lumens. Here are some recommended LED light-bulbs.

Solar

Sarah and I have decided to go solar for the whole house. Now that we’re living in a cabin with Solar we really get to experiment with our electricity usage and are finding that we don’t use much. LED’s cut down on our usage in a major way and aren’t as harsh/blue as we thought they would be. The biggest appliance we have is a juicer, which tends to be used only in summer with plenty of sun in the sky (winter feels cold to be juicing and veggies are in shorter supply).

In terms of good solar options for tiny houses, the “Classic” unit from Sol-Man costs $4995 and can power one tiny house without an electric heater. The Sol-Man has all the components one needs with 2.4 kWh, inverter, charge controller and batteries. It is an easy plug-and-play system that can roll around to adjust to the sun’s location. Sol-Mans units seem almost too big for our usage unless we decide to heat our home or hot water with electricity.

Though the initial investment is large a solar electricity system requires less maintenance and pays for itself in saved electric bills over the years AND in some states you can sell the excess electricity back to the grid. Solar technology is also improving rapidly and as the market widens costs come down significantly.

Here’s a good online solar calculator.

Some portable solar solutions: We are leaning towards the Goal Zero Yeti 400

An all-around great resource for anything solar: www.solarliving.org

More good resources:

www.treehugger.com/slideshows/energy-efficiency/all-solar-efficiency-breakthroughs-single-chart

otherpower.com

Next up: Some specifics about our electric usage and other fun ways to meet your electricity needs.

March Update…Finally

March 29, 2015learning curve, roof, tiny house build, work and lifebeginner, caretaking, DIY, expert, fail, fix, frustration, Learning curve, lesson, liveandlearn, mistakes, practice, progress, ridge, ridge cap, roof, tiny house build, updateseedswithwings

March has glided into the Oregon bringing plum blossoms, morels and humming pollinators.

Sarah is working happily away with Sum Of Us, and I’ve been working on the land here gardening, building ‘A’ frames for a green house, and re-roofing the cabin we’re living in while we finish the Tiny House. It literally blew off in a huge storm that rolled through. This required peeling it off, scooping out the rotten old fiber-glass insulation (worst part…most def.), replacing and sistering in rafters, re-sheathing and putting on standing seam metal roofing and flashing a chimney. While it took longer than I thought it would, it didn’t take long at all…and the next metal roof that I do will be even better.

The good news is the tiny house is bone dry. That storm didn’t even come close! WOOT! While we were gone, there were some woodpeckers that made a home in the house, but then a ring-tailed cat moved in and took care of that problem! I evicted them plus a few wasps with a little sage smoke and we’re off to the races.

I feel like I’m continually finding ways that the house ‘could be better’ if only x-y-z, but at the same time I’m charmed by the little mistakes. I have even started laughing (lovingly) at ‘Past-Joseph’ when ‘Present-Joseph’, who has excellent hind-sight, comes upon something that his predecessor did that made the next step SO much more difficult.

The ridge cap is a perfect example of this. I know what the roofing directions told me to do, but the stock ridge cap that came with the roofing material was too small for our massive ridge beam and I just HAD to do it my way *eye-roll*. So I made a bigger ridge cap out of the metal sheeting, bent the edges a few times to mimic the original cap thinking the “z” channeling that we put on for ventilation would snug into it nicely.

This was dramatically foiled as I precariously tried putting a 25′ long 65 lbs piece of steel on in one long ‘home run’ and, after dropping it twice, hollered for Sarah to come up and help. She did, we got it on, but the piece was bent all over the place, and it was foolish to think that I could make a machine-straight bend in a piece of metal with only hand tools, then put it on while precariously straddling the roof.

Well, we’ve come this far!

I move forward knowing that this self here IS the past self, and will have to contend with/fix/accept the choices I make again and again as the learning curve winds on. It’s always a funny feeling to be SO SURE of what I’m doing, knowing full well that there will be something that humbles me coming down the pipe. There WILL be some part of the task that is unexpected, it’s never what I think it will be. After all, ‘these are the stones on which we choose to whet the keen edge of our spirit.’*

Next week I’ll start running electrical, and now that we’re a little more settled in this life, be more diligent about updating the blog. Thanks for reading!

Parting shots!

Cuper grillin me, as Annie looks on approvingly. — Throwback! Coopy practices for his performance as Rodolfo, in La Boheme

*Paraphrased from Richard Bach.

November Update: Home Is Where the House Is

November 14, 2014framing, roof, siding, tiny house build, work and lifeashland, beginner, build, Christmas Trees, community, DIY, framing, freedom, OR, partnership, practice, roof, southern oregon, sum of us, tiny house build, traveling, treeridersnycseedswithwings

Where to even begin!

Our house is dry-in (as far as we can tell)! That means waterproof, that means the outside is pretty much done!

And the house moved to Oregon. Wait…what? You’re in Oregon now? Yes, we’re in Oregon. Our lease was up on the sheep ranch we were still building, so it was time to mosey on. Good thing we’re building a house on wheels. Now we’re living in a small community in southwestern Oregon near Ashland. Trillium Farm is a stunningly beautiful place, and we are feeling very fortunate to living here alongside inspiring people, deep in the wilderness.

Here are some pictures of our little house, as we put the roof up and siding on.

And here it she sits, at Trillium, in Oregon.

If you blow up the picture below you can see small houses dotting the hillside, and if you look reeally close, you can spot Hoss, our big yellow truck. If you don’t want to squint, just rest your eyes and know that we live just above that green valley down the middle.

A baby bear print.

Joseph is in New York now, planning another fun year of Christmas-tree-forest wonder on the Lower East Side at St. Marks Church in the Bowery. #TreeRidersNYC

Here is a picture of the tiny house he builds every year on the sidewalk of Manhattan… more pics and upgrades to come!

Year one, very little building skills required mostly nailed together then scrapped 😦

Year two, a little more skillful from year one. We kept some of the pieces for re-use:

Year Three: after working on tiny house. This one was built in panels that bolt onto a base then bolt together… much like our house! And the only thing I will be replacing is the floor (which got kind of snow/water-logged last year).

Sarah has started a new job with SumOfUs. SumOfUs is a worldwide movement for a better global economy, which fights for people over profits, and to limit corporate power. Sarah serves as the Executive Program Coordinator where she… coordinates programs for the Executives 🙂 She works closely with the Executive Director and Chief of Staff, and also the Board and major donors. The SumOfUs staff all works remotely so Sarah can carry out her duties while nestled in the mountains of Oregon… or cozied up in a Tree Shack in the East Village, NYC… or even while sipping coffee on a visit to sunny Petaluma!

Here is a photo from a recent SumOfUs action in Australia, from a campaign to stop Doritos from using palm oil sourced from rainforest deforestation. More on the Doritos campaign here. And all of SumOfUs’ campaigns here.

So, there the house rests in Oregon, and here we are, New York at the moment, and Oregon again soon. Change swirling around us as we relax into movement as a way of being. What the new year will bring? Who knows. All we know is that this linear time will keep coming and we’ll keep flexing and learning, board by board.

Next up: Helpful practices we use to keep our heads straight while building.

Here’s Annie-Lamb-Boleyn just for good measure: