Comment by forgetfreeman | Hacker News Reader

Comment by forgetfreeman | Hacker News Reader

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Assuming I was building in the Southeast where I live, that someone handed me a blank check, and without drilling down to specific products?

- Hardwood timber framing

- Stone or masonry curtain wall from the foundation to the bottom of the window sills.

- Fully sealed crawlspace with inline registers broadcasting conditioned air into the space

- Insulate the curtain wall instead of the interstitial space between floor joists

- Standard soffit-to-peak venting in the attic space

- Two layers of plywood subfloor separated by a layer of tar paper

- Double layered sheetrock on all interior walls

- Wall-to-wall sheet vinyl floor treatments in all of the rooms where water is a thing.

- 3/4" hardwood flooring everywhere water isn't a thing.

- Passive/active solar combo meal on the roof to offset any efficiency losses incurred by "loose" construction methods

- Temperature & humidity sensors in the crawl space & plenum

- Wood window frames and sills. Modern plastic window frames and sills are excellent at hiding a problem until it's turned into a $50k project (see also: aluminum siding). By comparsion wood trim acts as a bellwether. I'd much rather have to scrape, recaulk, and paint a window than be looking at deconstructing an exterior wall that's rotted to the foundation.

> Wall-to-wall sheet vinyl floor treatments in all of the rooms where water is a thing.

Doesn't this risk any water that does end up getting in, to accumulate and cause more damage over time since there's no route for it to dry out?

I was always taught in my building science courses to put the water/air/vapour control layer inside the wall, before the insulation, so vapour can dry out from both sides.

Pretty much, yeah, but it just never becomes an issue. Folks have been using wall to wall impermeable floor treatments (hello linoleum) in kitchens and bathrooms since the 1870s so the stuff has a pretty well established track record. Vapor barrier under the house passively blocks ground moisture, conditioning systems in the crawlspace actively prevent moisture buildup, and the floor treatment rejects both vapor and spills. In practice you'll end up renoing the floor treatment decades before any problems crop up.

If you really want to rot a floor though the absolute best A+ gold star method for doing so is adding a gas log fireplace with surround. I had a house a couple years ago that had moisture from the flue pooling inside the surround and under the unit. Rotted through 3/4" red oak hardwood flooring, 2 layers of 3/4" plywood, and bit off the top 4" of the 2x8 joists under the unit. Interior space was a solid sheet of black mold. That was one of those bag-the-room negative air pressure break-out-the-space-suits jobs. Six months later I was on a job where condensation off another gas log flue pooled inside a surround and got into the OSB cladding, then wicked 9' straight up. Only time I've ever seen cedar siding actually rot. We ended up having to cut the entire fireplace surround and a portion of the roof off the side of the house and rebuild it studs and all. Never a dull moment I tell ya.

Cool, fascinating to get such detailed insights from actual practise.

> ... and the floor treatment rejects both vapor and spills.

That's a good point I didn't consider. Drying out the inner surface works well for interior vapour that gets into the enclosure, but won't handle spills, or standing water well.

Fascinating, I understand most of it but why vented attic vs conditioned?

Simplicity. Sealed crawlspace prevents the plenum from ingesting ground moisture, so as long the roof is maintained that space shouldn't see any significant issues at any point in the next century.

Thanks! Very interesting.

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