Regnery Project - Construction 2010
Project description
The Regnery Project is a custom home that was designed by Richard MacCrea from Murphy N.C., the home is a passive solar design. In a passive solar home your home's windows, walls, and floors can be designed to collect, store, and distribute solar energy in the form of heat in the winter and reject solar heat in the summer. Passive solar homes range from those heated almost entirely by the sun to those with south-facing windows that provide some fraction of the heating load.
Read more about passive solar homes: Builder Magazine and Passive Solar Institute
What made this project difficult?
The project is located down a long drive that is nearly 750ft long so we had to run the power line that entire length. Also, cutting a long drive takes a lot of time and money. Covering the entire road with gravel can be a large expense. This lot had a lot of rock, rock in the road and rock in the house site. Some of that rock needed to be blasted in order to run sewer, power and water lines. During the beginning of this job, weather became a problem. With cold temps, heavy snowfalls and lots of rain there were considerable delays.
Preconstruction Photo's
Construction Photo's
This passive solar design required that the house's concrete envelope be insulated from the outside with 2" of insulation on the walls and 1" of insulation under the slab. The theory being that once the heat is captured through the windows on the south side the insulation will keep the heat inside the house/concrete and radiate throughout the night. There are other aspects incorporated as well.
This house was framed with 2x6 studs 24" on center. I usually build using 2x6 studs 16" on center. Building 24"oc. will save money in framing lumber but there are some cons that go with that when it comes to attaching siding on the exterior or drywall to the inside. The roof was framed using roof trusses, another way to save money on framing material and labor.
Finish Photo
