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The FALCONFIVE crew have done a great job building Zero Cottage. Both Passive House construction and building in a tight urban location are complicated and demanding and Jon Blandin’s team has been up to the task. www.FALCONFIVE.com
San Francisco's First Net Zero Passive House
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This morning was the first scaffold-free day revealing the west-facing metal rainscreen wall. The shingles are cut from scrap from Zahner, sheet metal fabricators to the starchitects, new material, and some odds and ends, such as the road sign I bought at a the Alameda Flea Market. The stainless steel clip system we designed and micro-manufactured allows any tile to be swapped easily with no tools. I’ll do a post detailing exactly how we built this soon.
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In preparation for adding the final layer of exterior finish material we screwed cedar battens through the 2” layer of foam into the plywood sheathing. The theory is that the Grace Perm-A-Barrier water/vapor barrier will stop any moisture from getting through to the plywood. The battens serve a couple of purposes: they provide a robust 3/4” vented space so any water outside of the waterproofing barrier can dry out. Also the foam is very weak in compression so aligning the clips for the metal rainscreen would be difficult.
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The foam insulation board in covered with GreenGuard RainDrop house wrap. This is a robust building paper that has built in micro drainage channels to provide a passage for any water that might get behind it to migrate down and out.
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Finishing the exterior system continues with placement of the 2” of XPS foam on the exposed exterior walls. This insulation is installed outside the Perm-A-Barrier membrane and will (theoretically) prevent moisture condensation inside the wall cavity as it moves the “dew point” outside the wall. It will be wrapped with “Green Guard” building paper, mainly to protect the foam from UV degradation. Vertical 1x4 battens of composite wood, Hardy Trim, will go on top of that to mount the clips for the interchangeable metal shingle rain-screen system.
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The triple glazed Sorpetaler windows are being installed now. The frames are taped tight to the exterior Grace membrane after being held in place with thin plywood tabs (replacing the thermal bridge steel tabs supplied with the windows). The exterior trim is screwed to the frame on top of the tape. It’s made of FSC Machiche, a super durable tropical hardwood. This is proving to be a challenge due to the variations in the Machiche. Next time I would go with a metal fin.
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Salvaged Pasta-Factory Floor
A couple of years ago we renovated an abandoned pasta factory in Oakland into affordable housing. This is part of a larger project for the Oakland Housing Authority called Tassafaronga Village - www.dbarchitect.com/Tassafaronga.
It had a beautiful wooden floor that had to be removed to install a shear diaphragm. The contractor removed the flooring and gave us some which we put into storage.
The floor has to be carefully sorted before being diagonal nailed down. The goal is to finish it in a minimal way so that it shows some of the evidence of it’s history.
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December 10th: The framing is topped out to the roof, including the south facing monitor to provide solar gain. The black membrane on the wall is Grace Perm-A-Barrier. It’s stuck to the sheer ply to form a super tight moisture and air barrier. 2” of XPS foam insulation will go on over it, then the green super building paper, then the rain-screen system.
