Log Cabins

[mudflap]

First carport beam is up! Now to throw a few rafters up to connect it to the house and prep for beam #2...



it's a 26' 4x12. I'm estimating the weight to be about 1900 lbs. My neighbor is now convinced block and tackle is needed on every job. Read it here:

https://x42.nohost.me/BALCAS/books/2024 ... beam-is-up

[mudflap]

2nd beam is up:



you blinked and missed the part where I got all the rafters up on section 1.

https://x42.nohost.me/BALCAS/books/2024 ... beam-is-up

[mudflap]

....and you blinked again and I got the rafters up:
https://x42.nohost.me/BALCAS/books/2024 ... l-in-place


throw up some 2x4 purlins, and I'll be ready to spend my life savings on the roof....it's gonna be spendy....

[mudflap]

happy national log cabin day!



because freedom.

not to be confused with 'muh-freedom'.

[Libertas Est Salus]

happy national log cabin day!



because freedom.

not to be confused with 'muh-freedom'.

Is this just a random pic of a random cabin, or is this your cabin during the early stages of construction? Either way, it's a beautiful pic, and I love it!

[mudflap]

happy national log cabin day!



because freedom.

not to be confused with 'muh-freedom'.

Is this just a random pic of a random cabin, or is this your cabin during the early stages of construction? Either way, it's a beautiful pic, and I love it!

yeah, this one's mine. I might have started a trend on LHBA of taking a pic like this - when the roof is on, the logs are stacked, the doors and windows are cut out - you put a spotlight inside the place at night and take a pic.

it's required to do this now as part of your membership in LHBA, lol.

[mudflap]

Purlins done, ready for metal:

https://x42.nohost.me/BALCAS/books/2024 ... uly-7-2024

[Cruiserdude]

Purlins done, ready for metal:

https://x42.nohost.me/BALCAS/books/2024 ... uly-7-2024

That's massive!!

[mudflap]

Purlins done, ready for metal:

https://x42.nohost.me/BALCAS/books/2024 ... uly-7-2024

That's massive!!

28x28. We wanted a clear span with no posts in the middle because we'll soon have a teenage driver . Plus we wanted enough roof to cover the back door as well. 28' deep because we'll have a 6' deck up against the house, and the cars are about 17' long - that gives us about 2' in front and back of each vehicle.

I'm noticing while walking around on it installing the roof panels that it's just a little more "bouncy" than the roof on my house - but not any more than a normal roof. probably should expect that with that much of a span.

[Silver Pie]

28x28. We wanted a clear span with no posts in the middle because we'll soon have a teenage driver . Plus we wanted enough roof to cover the back door as well. 28' deep because we'll have a 6' deck up against the house, and the cars are about 17' long - that gives us about 2' in front and back of each vehicle.

I'm noticing while walking around on it installing the roof panels that it's just a little more "bouncy" than the roof on my house - but not any more than a normal roof. probably should expect that with that much of a span.

So, essentially a massive carport.

[mudflap]

https://x42.nohost.me/BALCAS/books/2024 ... -roof-done

need to trim the ends.... it's on my to-do list.

[Cruiserdude]

https://x42.nohost.me/BALCAS/books/2024 ... -roof-done

need to trim the ends.... it's on my to-do list.

What you built is pretty freaking cool, hermano

[mudflap]

https://x42.nohost.me/BALCAS/books/2024 ... ine-repair

Why we should all hate cheap Chinese imports.....

[mudflap]

https://x42.nohost.me/BALCAS/books/blog ... porch-2024

(new blog location, you can ignore the security warning)

[RosyPosy]

So I been thinking of what my future house for my homestead will be. I decided to hop on the log cabin train. It seems the most economical since the building materials are practically free and they insulate well. I like the concept that Dave Whipple of Bushradical does here.

https://youtu.be/AiCGM7n79VU?si=uo7O1jrP3vSL3GzV

Haven't decided on vertical logs, horizontal logs, really depends on material availability. What I plan to do is buy a sawmill like the one at harbor freight and double flat side the logs to make a flush fit so I don't have to spend alot on the chink.

[mudflap]

So I been thinking of what my future house for my homestead will be. I decided to hop on the log cabin train. It seems the most economical since the building materials are practically free and they insulate well. I like the concept that Dave Whipple of Bushradical does here.

https://youtu.be/AiCGM7n79VU?si=uo7O1jrP3vSL3GzV

Haven't decided on vertical logs, horizontal logs, really depends on material availability. What I plan to do is buy a sawmill like the one at harbor freight and double flat side the logs to make a flush fit so I don't have to spend alot on the chink.

Awesome! Welcome to the club!

I watched the video - very cool how they did it.

don't use permachink like they mention in the video - it's "a hydrophobic" - meaning, it pushes water away from itself, which of course sounds good, but it's bad for the logs - if water gets trapped underneath it, the water will stay there forever until the log rots. just as a "what if?", I went to the permachink website and entered the details for my cabin in their calculator, and found out it would cost me $13k to chink my cabin.

Sand, lime, and cement only cost me about $500 so far. It is a natural substance that will last darn near forever. It breathes with the logs so moisture can pass through it and not get trapped. Folks will say, "yeah, but I don't want ANY water getting in my logs...." yeah, well - that's what roof overhangs are for: 3' of overhang for every 10' vertical or something like that.

cutting the logs flat on both sides will definitely give you less gaps to chink. Just look into how logs shrink and settle - you'll have to allow for settling in your window and door frames, your 2nd floor height*, as well as making sure the roof can be lowered (look into "screw jacks") to keep everything tight. the formula will be something like "1/4" per foot of log", so a 16' wall will shrink about 4".

*I actually don't know how they do the 1st floor framing in a 2-story chinkless cabin. I assume you have to attach your studs to something, but you also have to watch out for the 2nd floor to settle along with the logs and not crush your first floor framing.

Another thing to remember: logs shrink radially, but not longitudinally. So this means if you cut down a tree that is 40' long, it will stay 40' long practically forever. so a cabin with vertical logs won't experience settling. But it will shrink towards it's center, so you'd have to account for that when you screw your windows and doors in. I'm sure there's a discussion somewhere on how to do this. On mine, you screw the door and window frames directly into the center of the logs - because the logs shrink towards their centers - this is the area of the log that won't move in my design.

so yeah, there's benefits and drawbacks to each style. chinking really did suck on mine - it took me about a month to do each wall, working about 2 hours a night. straighter logs would've made it go faster, but I love how mine turned out - the logs look like they are floating in a river of chink:

[RosyPosy]

So I been thinking of what my future house for my homestead will be. I decided to hop on the log cabin train. It seems the most economical since the building materials are practically free and they insulate well. I like the concept that Dave Whipple of Bushradical does here.

https://youtu.be/AiCGM7n79VU?si=uo7O1jrP3vSL3GzV

Haven't decided on vertical logs, horizontal logs, really depends on material availability. What I plan to do is buy a sawmill like the one at harbor freight and double flat side the logs to make a flush fit so I don't have to spend alot on the chink.

Awesome! Welcome to the club!

I watched the video - very cool how they did it.

don't use permachink like they mention in the video - it's "a hydrophobic" - meaning, it pushes water away from itself, which of course sounds good, but it's bad for the logs - if water gets trapped underneath it, the water will stay there forever until the log rots. just as a "what if?", I went to the permachink website and entered the details for my cabin in their calculator, and found out it would cost me $13k to chink my cabin.

Sand, lime, and cement only cost me about $500 so far. It is a natural substance that will last darn near forever. It breathes with the logs so moisture can pass through it and not get trapped. Folks will say, "yeah, but I don't want ANY water getting in my logs...." yeah, well - that's what roof overhangs are for: 3' of overhang for every 10' vertical or something like that.

cutting the logs flat on both sides will definitely give you less gaps to chink. Just look into how logs shrink and settle - you'll have to allow for settling in your window and door frames, your 2nd floor height*, as well as making sure the roof can be lowered (look into "screw jacks") to keep everything tight. the formula will be something like "1/4" per foot of log", so a 16' wall will shrink about 4".

*I actually don't know how they do the 1st floor framing in a 2-story chinkless cabin. I assume you have to attach your studs to something, but you also have to watch out for the 2nd floor to settle along with the logs and not crush your first floor framing.

Another thing to remember: logs shrink radially, but not longitudinally. So this means if you cut down a tree that is 40' long, it will stay 40' long practically forever. so a cabin with vertical logs won't experience settling. But it will shrink towards it's center, so you'd have to account for that when you screw your windows and doors in. I'm sure there's a discussion somewhere on how to do this. On mine, you screw the door and window frames directly into the center of the logs - because the logs shrink towards their centers - this is the area of the log that won't move in my design.

so yeah, there's benefits and drawbacks to each style. chinking really did suck on mine - it took me about a month to do each wall, working about 2 hours a night. straighter logs would've made it go faster, but I love how mine turned out - the logs look like they are floating in a river of chink:

I also need to account what trees am I using and at what elevation? If in the Appalachian mountains there's alot of birch trees. As you mentioned they don't change length wise which is why I'm liking the vertical style.

In this video Dave goes in to depth of what he did to chink his cabin. https://youtu.be/L0SfzInJ2E4?si=fvRs1KCCHb-owjCY. He and his wife build it in 2017 and chinked it in 2021. So they had some time for the logs to season. I wonder how ever to permachink the out side and sand and line the other (but maybe I'm over thinking that ). I also wonder about putting in perforated tubing where the chink goes to act as a moisture breather. What I like most is how it's applied. If sand and cement method, mix it outside put it in a bucket and have a caulk attachment to apply it.

Oh another piece of equipment along with a sawmill is a log arch to attach to a tractor or atv. https://logrite.com/Item/ATV-Arch. Either way that and a sawmill=free lumber.

[mudflap]

testing out the night shot on my phone (had to get a newer one because the old one stopped charging):



full moon tonight...

[Momma J]

Your home makes my heart happy! Well done

[Libertas Est Salus]

testing out the night shot on my phone (had to get a newer one because the old one stopped charging):



full moon tonight...

I feel dumb asking this, but what are those plants in the foreground?
Your cabin looks amazing.

[mudflap]

testing out the night shot on my phone (had to get a newer one because the old one stopped charging):



full moon tonight...

I feel dumb asking this, but what are those plants in the foreground?
Your cabin looks amazing.

they are bananas. got them from a lady about an hour north of here - she is able to get bananas to grow at her place. One of these put on fruit this year, but lost it a few months later. So we haven't picked any bananas yet, but maybe next year. They are currently about 12' tall.

going to build a hoop house this fall to put them in for the winter. along with the pineapples.

[Libertas Est Salus]

testing out the night shot on my phone (had to get a newer one because the old one stopped charging):



full moon tonight...

I feel dumb asking this, but what are those plants in the foreground?
Your cabin looks amazing.

they are bananas. got them from a lady about an hour north of here - she is able to get bananas to grow at her place. One of these put on fruit this year, but lost it a few months later. So we haven't picked any bananas yet, but maybe next year. They are currently about 12' tall.

going to build a hoop house this fall to put them in for the winter. along with the pineapples.

Okay, I feel SO much better about asking my question now. I was looking at them thinking, if I didn't know better, I'd say those are bananas, but then I struggled with cognitive dissonance cuz I didn't think bananas could grow where you are. That's so dang cool.

[mudflap]

I feel dumb asking this, but what are those plants in the foreground?
Your cabin looks amazing.

they are bananas. got them from a lady about an hour north of here - she is able to get bananas to grow at her place. One of these put on fruit this year, but lost it a few months later. So we haven't picked any bananas yet, but maybe next year. They are currently about 12' tall.

going to build a hoop house this fall to put them in for the winter. along with the pineapples.

Okay, I feel SO much better about asking my question now. I was looking at them thinking, if I didn't know better, I'd say those are bananas, but then I struggled with cognitive dissonance cuz I didn't think bananas could grow where you are. That's so dang cool.

everyone says they can't, but there they are. For me, it'd be a valuable trading item in a grid-down situation. Bananas are the most popular fruit in America by far. and America imports like 99% of them - we don't grow them domestically at a commercial rate.

not that I could grow them commercially.... They take 15 months to mature - you need like 6 months of that to have temps above 50 at night to get them to mature. One banana plant can produce 200 lbs of bananas - and it's a one time deal - they die after that. But the roots send up a ton of shoots. I started with 4 and doubled them by the next year. Last year I gave away 4 more, and have replanted 2 new ones. Not interested in propagating them at this point until they produce, so I'm just whacking the shoots at this point to try to get the main plant to produce fruit.

[mudflap]

bit of a life lesson here.... When starting a big project, there are bits of information you know, and there are bits of information you don't know. If you want to ensure the best outcome, you try to maximize the "known knowns" and minimize the "unknown unknowns". This is true in all of life, take from it the lesson you need...

friends of ours built a log cabin in Washington state. They did an outstanding job - it is the most perfect example of an LHBA / "Skip's Butt & Pass" log home I've ever seen. They did what they could themselves, and hired contractors for the stuff they didn't know how to do themselves. One of the problems they had was the contractors that knew the code, but didn't know what my friends wanted for their home (unknown knowns). They ended up with this chimney pipe that is correctly installed, according to code, but they will have to bend their chimney pipe to connect between their stove and the ceiling box, or move the ceiling box and patch the roof if they want the pipe straight (which they do):



It's not the end of the world, but it is a PITA to fix.

Contrast with my build: we did everything ourselves, and taught ourselves the things we didn't know how to do ourselves (to minimize the unknown unknowns). There are pro's and con's to each. The pro's being, if you hire the right person, you can save yourself a lot of trouble. The cons being, if you hire the wrong person, you can cause a lot of problems. On our side, we made a lot of mistakes that a professional wouldn't make (unknown knowns). Like: our ceilings are about 3" too high for a normal 8' stud + floor plate + ceiling plate. So we had to get an extra piece of drywall to fit in there. no big deal, the place isn't going to fall down, but it made it a little more expensive.

One thing we did right though: the chimney pipe. A lot of it was dumb luck, but not all of it. Not knowing anything (known unknowns) about chimney pipes, I researched everything I could find on how they work, fire codes, building codes, manufacturer recommendations, talking to contractors. Once I was satisfied with the parameters for a safe installation, we set about trying to figure out what would look good. I asked on several wood stove forums, but everyone was playing dumb and would say something like "you need to call a professional" (umm, see my friends above who hired a professional to see how that turned out). Also this is another "unknown known". How much space did we want on either side of the hearth? where would the stove pipe penetrate the 2nd floor? the roof? what size of a walk space would this give us around our kitchen and living area. What WASN'T luck in our situation was that we decided where the chimney pipe would go before we even framed in the kitchen or set any cabinets ("known knowns"). On the first floor, the chimney had to fit between two 4x12 beams running north and south. On the 2nd floor, we had to attach the chimney pipe to a support structure in between the rafters, which run East & West. I ended up dropping a plumb bob from the roof to the hearth to get the exact location for the stove pipe.


Is a little bend in the pipe a bad thing? not at all. But a straight pipe minimizes the amount of creosote buildup you'll get in your chimney.

anyway, you can sort out your problems and put them in buckets using this table, and minimize the unknown unknowns, and your project will be more successful. Life lesson.

[mudflap]

if you ever wanted to join LHBA....but emailed them and got a reply that said, "we're not offering classes at this time...."
.....
....
you might want to try again. The two owners just came to an agreement, and they are opening up classes for membership again, starting this week. The price is $497.

for that price, you get:
- complete instruction on how to build your own #log #home that anyone can understand - no background in construction needed.
- to save a few hundred thousand on getting your own debt-free mortgage-free home.
- an extremely strong home that will last more than a couple hundred years, compared to a cookie cutter home that will only last 75 years.
- lifetime membership in LHBA.
- access to the online class with a workbook and tons of video instruction
- access to the members forum - ask any questions from hundreds of other active members to get help on your build.
- access to the weekly zoom call - brag about your build, ask for live help, see other's progress, trade labor and deals, cheer each other on (truly: I've never been involved in a group with more camaraderie and support than LHBA)

What do I get if you join? nothing, lol. I just get to laugh at the bank with you after you're done.

THIS IS THE AFFORDABLE HOUSING ANSWER GEN Z IS LOOKING FOR. The cost is a fraction of what a normal home costs to build - mine was $60k for 3,000 sq ft - that's $20 / sq ft. Don't get sucked into that "tiny home" nonsense for $60k - you end up with no storage for tools, hobbies - only enough space to cook one meal at a time.

Compare that to what you would pay for a cookie cutter home in my area - about $500k, or $166 / sq ft. Differences being: I don't have a mortgage for mine (that's 30 years of debt slavery, if you're doing the math), and since it's a custom log home, it's definitely worth more than cookie cutter home. Of the LHBA homes I've researched, it looks like if you sell one, you get a 13:1 resale advantage. So, build for $60k, sell for $800k, pocket $740k.

No exotic building materials or specialized equipment needed - just trees, rebar, concrete, regular framing lumber. The chink is just natural mortar chink made out of sand, lime, and cement.

My wife's favorite part: we designed the entire thing. Instead of trying to make your furniture fit the home, we were able to make the home fit the furniture. we put windows and doors where we wanted. We designed it to fit the way we live.