Just a little vent about materials

As you know we're trying to make sure our house gets a 5 star rating from Austin Energy's Green Builiding program. It's sort of the Austin specific LEED. Well in order to be rated you have to have products that fits the guidelines and are energy efficient. This is great and right in line with our personal and professional design goals. The problem is we're on a tight budget and trying to use alternative materials. In most cases the material will meet the requirements but is not rated by a valid third party and so is not acceptable for the AEGB rating.

Specifically we've designed a covered east facing wall to be clad with translucent plastic panels. It has been so difficult to find a manufacturer that meets our criteria. I finally found a product, Kalwal, that would work perfect for our project but the price is exubernant because it's used on commercial projects. So it's back to the drawing board to either keep looking for a material that works or redesign the area to use a more traditional material. You would think there would have to be something! If any of you are entrepreneurs you should get in on this underserved market ASAP.

If anyone knows of an affordable product that offers translucent panels with a U-value of <.35 and a SHGC<.30 that is NFRC rated please let us know.

Roof Update

 

The South face is finished!

The roof we selected is a metal roof called "snap-lock" roofing. Basically it's 16" wide panels that snap down tight to one another. So you put the first piece in, and fasten it with some screws along one side, and the next piece snaps onto a little ridge seam so that the new piece covers the screws of the last piece. The idea is that when you're done, the whole roof has no exposed screws anywhere. The only exposed fasteners are a few rivits on the ridge piece at the top, and they're located where even if they fail they'll leak water onto the top of the roof panels. I've discovered that I love this system: the panels snap together very easily but very securely, and there's nowhere for water to find a way in. The only difficult part of installing the panels is that you have to make several cuts and folds at the bottom edge so that the panel can fold over a cleat and have a nice seal with the adjacent panel.

Metal roofs can be ordered painted or have a galvalum finish, which is slightly cheaper but doesn't weather quite as well, and can be blinding when the sun hits it just so. We didn't want to have motorists cursing us every day around 10am when our roof will reflect sunlight up Chestnut Street. So we considered a very striking white, and were sort of enthralled for a day or two with the idea of a brilliant white roof, but ultimately went for a less bold but very handsome light gray color.

Our custom fabricated gutter outlet, made from scraps left over from the rake flashing

Chris helped get the rake trim on, and then we did the eaves and the gutters. We're going to have rain chains instead of downspouts, so we made sure to put a sturdy gutter strap right over the holes we cut into the ends of the gutters. We also used some leftover scrap metal to fabricate some nice looking outlets to make the transition from the gutter to the rain chains, and prevent water from dribbling across the underside of the gutter.

Moving the next panel into position

I work the folded bottom edge onto a cleat while Chris tugs and jiggles the panel in a helpful manner

P.S. We finally spent a night in the new house! The sleeping porch is designed to capture the breezes from the South and make a cool comfortable space during the hot nights, and it works perfectly. Our cats were freaking out with the excitement of the jobsite camping trip... Oliver discovered that metal roofs are slippery when damp and would have fallen about 25 feet if the gutter didn't catch him. I had to climb to the top of the roof and coax him along the gutter to where there was an easier way up. Trinity and I slept great. (Although I had to fall asleep to the sound of all the neighbors running their a.c. units, cooling off their houses from the trapped daytime heat.)

Trinity and Major Tom enjoying a Sunday morning snooze on the sleeping porch