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strawtron Archives - Page 4 of 8 - The Year of Mud

May 09
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No Shortage of Things To Do

By Strawtron, Woodworking

spring work

There’s been no shortage of things to do these past few weeks. Other than the usual building and gardening tasks, there’s been a lot on the list of items to complete.

I realize it’s been a while since I’ve posted any new photos of work on Strawtron… I promise we are not slacking. Nothing has jumped out at me as really photo-worthy just yet. Although that will change soon, as we are closing in the north porch and will soon be doing some light clay straw work. Yea!

Just when I think we’re done with work on Gobcobatron, we find more to do. As we are converting the cob house to a rental this year (see how you can stay in our cob house this summer!), it means we’ve taken some time to do some maintenance work — re-grouting parts of the tile floor, oiling the floor (finally), tearing out the mudroom floor to put in a more durable tile floor, making a brandy new bed frame to accommodate a queen size mattress, dusting the rafters… Didn’t I say I was “done” with this house before?

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Apr 05
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Our Straw Bale House, One Year Ago

By Strawtron

concrete piers - batter boardOne year ago, our straw bale house was nothing more than a handful of holes dug in the ground. Now it’s got a completed timber frame, it is fully baled in and at least partly plastered over the interior and exterior, and half of the soil has been hauled up to the rooftop. The floor platform is insulated, we’re beginning to close in the porch, and I think I can say that things are looking pretty good coming into year two of building our timber frame and straw bale home.

rainbowThis year, we get to do more first coat plaster, but even more finish earthen and lime plaster, install finish floors upstairs and downstairs, close in the north porch and build our rustic kitchen, finish the roof, and build our attached greenhouse. Oh, and build the spiral staircase, and a handful of other finish work tasks.

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Mar 04
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Timber Frame Joinery: How to Make a Mortise By Hand

By Timber Framing, Strawtron, Hand Tools
Millers Falls Boring Machine

How to make a mortise with hand tools: boring machine and chisel

You can’t have a tenon without a mortise. They go together like peas and carrots. (Or insert your favorite “go together” cliche here.) Uh, anyway, I described how to cut a tenon by hand in a previous post, and in this article, I’ll describe the process for making a mortise in a timber by hand. A mortise is basically a slot for a tenon, which is later pegged to secure the joinery. It’s simple and timeless.

Mortises are arguably more difficult to make by hand than tenons. I’ll describe how to do it with a boring machine and chisel.

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Jan 28
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Timber Frame Joinery: How to Cut a Tenon By Hand… Quickly

By Hand Tools, Timber Framing, Strawtron

How to Cut a Tenon by Hand

I’m a sucker for cutting tenons. Maybe because it provides me with a great excuse to swing an axe. Maybe because once I get into the groove, I feel a great sense of accomplishment when I’m able to cut and clean up a tenon swiftly. Cutting a tenon — by hand — is a great skill to learn and practice, and I want to make the argument that it can be done by hand rather quickly, too. After cutting tenon after tenon, I got to the point of being able to do the bulk of the work with a saw and axe. I skipped the chisel altogether at some point. Here’s my process for cutting tenons by hand, perhaps my favorite “grunt work” of timber framing. Actually, I like it so much I wish I had an excuse to cut some right now…

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Jan 26
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Timber Frame Joinery Layout: Square Rule & Scribe Rule

By Timber Framing, Strawtron
Timber Frame Joinery

Understanding layout — the most important part of timber framing

I’m going to be very honest here — I will not be making any in-depth attempt to describe timber frame joinery layout here on this blog as part of my documentation for building our timber frame and straw bale house. I don’t feel fully qualified, and besides, you can find some pretty good documentation elsewhere. Personally, I’m in the camp of really needing to see and do layout to actually understand it. Reading about it, and having someone describe it to me makes my brain slowly turn off. Call me visual.

However, I can say a few things about the two systems we employed when building our timber frame. They are Square Rule and Scribe Rule layout. They are two singular approaches to achieving the same basic effect — making two different pieces of wood relate to each other, and join in a logical way.

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Jan 07
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Our Wood Flooring Installation & The Best Wood Floors

By Strawtron
Wood Flooring Installation

Using reclaimed material for our flooring installation

Our wood flooring installation was a race against the clock — back in June, we had but a few short days to install over 300 square feet of our wood subfloor before the start of our Timber Framing Workshop. No pneumatic nailers here, no big sheets of plywood — only a huge pile of nail-y, reclaimed yellow pine tongue and groove flooring, full sun blasting down on us, and a few great helping hands to see us through to victory.

Here is the story of our wood flooring installation, and why I think we chose the best wood floor for the job.
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Jan 04
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More Pier and Beam Foundation Design Images and Details

By Foundation, Timber Framing, Strawtron
Pier and Beam Foundation

The pier and beam foundation of our timber frame house

Earlier in the year, I discussed the idea of “replacing concrete with wood” in our pier and beam foundation design. For the construction of our timber frame house, we decided to go high and dry, and eliminate as much concrete as possible with this style foundation. I wanted to take this opportunity to go more in-depth about the plans for our pier and beam foundation, with a bunch of images to illustrate the design.

Read ahead more for details.

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

By Strawtron, Timber Framing
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 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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