Quick Update

In the spirit of shorter posts, here is a quick update for this week.

Address

We finally got an address, which is an important precursor for lots of things like permits and quotes.  It wasn’t easy in the small town environment where the person who does it works 6 scattered hours per week.  It took many calls, but we finally got it.  I am leaving off the full address for privacy reasons, but for those who know the town and road, the number is 10415.  Sherri liked how the guy said it, ten-four-fifteen.

Sourcing

This week, we got some quotes on well drilling (roughly $7k) and we visited a Pella showroom.  The Pella show room sales person was very much more responsive and engaging than anyone else we have spoken to.  I had been ignoring Pella based on early impressions, but I gave them another chance due to comments by the owner of the Battle Creek earth shelter and poor service I was getting from Marvin distributors.   Lets see how the quote works out.

I am considering ways to reduce the cost, including flattening the curved walls…  But I have not decided on that change yet.

Engineering

Engineers rough reinforcement sketch on my concrete rib design…

I finally got a few hand sketched pages from my engineer.  This one has the rebar sketched out on the concrete ribs.  It was pretty much what I was expecting (maybe a bit more more and thicker rebar).  He also did some work on the arches that span between the ribs, but he must have misunderstood the examples I provided and went about 10 times over weight/cost, so we will need to get that reviewed.

 

Battle Creek

Next Tuesday  I am taking a day off work to head out to Battle Creek (about a 2 hour drive) and watch the shotcrete get applied.   The house is all ready with the poured slab, steel arches and rebar, and an ICF front.  This is the next big step.  It will be interesting to see how cement is sprayed on a 50ft dome (25 ft high).  I will try to bring back some pics.

Eye Candy

Here are some fun pics I have seen lately (collected across the internet) that I found inspiring in one way or another.  Enjoy.