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Dec 03
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How to Acquire Timbers For Building Your Own Timber Frame Home

By Timber Framing, Strawtron
Timbers

Figure out how you will acquire your timbers… early!

This is the first of many posts where I travel back in time, and fill in missing parts of the Strawtron building timeline with essential information for how we built our timber frame and straw bale home.

If you want to design and build you own timber frame home, you should be prepared to determine how you will acquire the timbers for your frame. You almost can’t determine this too early, nor start your search too soon. The timber frame can be a significant portion of the total expense of construction for an owner-builder, and as always, it is helpful to know how to keep costs manageable.

Here are a few tips for how you might acquire timbers for building your own timber frame home.

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Nov 28
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Our Timber Frame & Straw Bale House Building Timeline

By Timber Framing, Straw Bale Building, Strawtron

Straw Bale House2012 was a whirlwind of a building season. Organizing and running two natural building workshops, building a timber frame house with hand tools, meeting deadlines, unbelievable heat…

Despite all of it, we accomplished an amazing amount of work. Again, huge thanks to our awesome building workshop crews, and every volunteer that picked up a hammer (or a really heavy timber) in our crazy journey. Here I present a recap of our 2012 Strawtron building season. In the coming weeks I will ‘fill in the blanks’ where I have not provided online documentation of our timber frame & straw bale house, so look out!

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Nov 24
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Why You Should Read A Pattern Language

By Resources

Before you take your shovel to the dirt and start digging to build your own home, before you even take pen to paper in sketching designs, I advise you to read Christopher Alexander’s A Pattern Language.

If you want to understand what makes a good building good, and a particular space work well, this book will teach you the “pattern language” derived from timeless architectural problems and their solutions. A Pattern Language presents compelling design practices and ideas that will make your space more functional and pleasant.

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Nov 21
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Help Turtle Island Preserve: Community Raided For Code Violations

By Resources

Turtle Island Preserve

Turtle Island Preserve is an educational center that focuses on primitive and traditional living skills, including natural building. They have been operating for 26 years. Recently, they have been subject to a harsh government raid for apparent code violations.

Once again, the government demonstrates complete hypocrisy and hatred in the face of positive change, and my compassion goes out to Turtle Island.

Read their urgent letter below, and support them by signing this petition!

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Nov 14
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How To Build a Timber Frame & Straw Bale House — Coming This Winter

By Timber Framing, Straw Bale Building, Strawtron

Timber Frame Home

Throughout the process of building my cob house “Gobcobatron”, I documented the entire process of its construction online here at The Year of Mud, demonstrating the process I went through to build my first home. It has been a rewarding experience for me, and the feedback and learning experience has been wonderful.

This year, since beginning the construction of my new timber frame and straw bale home, time has been particularly scant, as the timeline was even more compressed and deadlines were many, thus a less detailed documentation effort during the building season throughout the various construction stages.

However, this winter I have plans to retrace my steps, to present how to build a timber frame and straw bale house.

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Oct 28
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Wood Stove Installation: Our Unique Stove Install Job

By Winter, Heating, Strawtron, Living Sod Roof
Wood Stove Installation

Through the wall and up… avoiding our living roof!

Well, I ended up with another weird wood stove installation in the new straw bale house. Back in 2010, I described how I penetrated the living roof of my cob house to install our new small wood stove at the time. (It was equally weird, and awkward.)We did a somewhat successful job (although every now and then we get water dripping into the mudroom).

This time, I wanted to completely avoid penetrating the EPDM pond liner, so I opted for a through-the-wall stove installation. There were a few tricks along the way.

Here’s how it went.

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Oct 19
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Rainbow Over a Straw Bale Home

By Uncategorized, Photos, Strawtron
Rainbow over straw bale house

Nice way to end the day

Don’t you love it when that happens?

October feels like it is moving quicker than lightning. It is one of my favorite months, no doubt. A much-needed rainstorm ended with this visual feast just the other day.

The work season is rapidly coming to an end…

Oct 15
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Moving Into an Incomplete House (p.s. We’re in Strawtron!)

By Strawtron, Winter
Straw Bale House Interior

Pug waits for the base plaster to dry

It is with somewhat reluctant, but inevitable feelings that we have just recently moved into our new straw bale house. I say ‘reluctant’ because really, the house is not complete. However, it has always been our intention to move in for winter, before the house is finished. Generally speaking, however, I highly advise people against moving into incomplete shelter, if they can avoid it.

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Oct 12
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Upcoming Woodworking Tools Festival: Handworks

By Hand Tools, Timber Framing

handworks

Wow, this event looks really awesome, and best of all, it’s not that far away — and it’s free! Handworks is a (hand) woodworking tools event from May 24-25, 2013 in a beautiful restored timber frame dairy barn in Amana, Iowa. A bunch of hand tool companies will be there with their wares (and door prizes), and there will also be a presentation about that killer (and now famous) tool chest of H.O. Studley. Really cool. I definitely plan to attend.

Get the details here: http://handworks.co/