# What is the design Life of a stick built home?



## Inner10 (Mar 12, 2009)

> A TJI holds up the floor? Is it a piece of wood?


Spoken like a true landscaper


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## BrianFox (Apr 6, 2009)

trus joist i-joist
or
this just in


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## BobsLandscaping (May 25, 2009)

I just make the area around the house pretty. My knowledge of how to build a house is near nil.

Anybody have a picture of a TJI?


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## BrianFox (Apr 6, 2009)

this just in


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## BobsLandscaping (May 25, 2009)

Thank you. So how does it work? I'm assuming the ends get bolted to other pieces of wood and then the floor is bolted on top?


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## Inner10 (Mar 12, 2009)

Bob, it works just like a floor joist; but thanks to the I-Beam principle you can have a stronger joist capable of spanning longer distances built out of very cheap materials.


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## RayGoerdt (Nov 13, 2008)

I look at the question in two ways, design as in the floor plan or layout, size, and other asthetics, and also as structural.

structurally, depends on the builder and quality of materials used as well as how well it has been taken care of.

working with logs, I have repaired buildings over 100 years old that needed less work then ones less then ten years old.

asthetically, there are some neat looking and some butt-ugly houses from every time period:w00t:


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## Deadhead Derek (Dec 3, 2008)

I am obviously an old house guy, but i will admit this, I love TJI's. I have saw horses built out of the scraps, and they are light, sturdy, and have been outside in the elements now for over two years, and are just as good as the day made. me likey. Which is contrary to how I feel about osb.. meh, I can live with contradictions.. 
The point I think is telling is that in an old house, it is possible, through the use of the materials of the time, to actually nail... with a hammer... a piece of trim into place. I think the nailgun has been the single most detremental tool ever created in the arena of housing longevity. I use them ( cause ya cant nail MDF to a modern wall without) but I would rather they not be needed.



PS, I don't actually use mdf.. just using it to illustrate my point... but you know it's true.


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## Inner10 (Mar 12, 2009)

> ( cause ya cant nail MDF to a modern wall without) but I would rather they not be needed.


Can't screw it easily either; why so anti nailgun?


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## Vithar (Jul 3, 2009)

Thanks for the great discution. Let me movie it a tad. So this proposal I'm working on wants a recomendation for they type of homes to be constructed in the development. They are particularly concerned with sustainability. This won't be a ritzy area so no stone or brick houses, but what's bettter in a case like this, modular or stick built? Any noticable difference in the life expectancy of the two methods?

Sorry for the bad spelling, posting from my G1 and I have no spell checker...


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## reveivl (May 29, 2005)

I'm off to visit my sister in Winchester, England next week. There are buildings there that were built in the 15th century. Thats over 500 years ago. These are timber frame structures, but I suspect that is not the point.

When I got into carpentry (not 500 years ago), a teacher told me that if you keep the feet dry and the hat on, there is no reason for any structure to fail.

I've done enough reno's of newer and older houses (less than 150 years only), to know that the older houses were not necessarily built better or built with better materials or by better craft/tradesmen. The ones that really need help had moisture problems. From the ground up, the roof down, or the inside out. 

One of the biggest scams around here in decades was the 'Leaky Condo Scandal'. Condos were built to the latest codes and yet 'leaked'. Most of the 'leaking' was moisture not getting vented from the inside that condensed in the walls and rotted the buildings from the inside out.

It used to be said that a building built to CMHC standards (Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp.) would last as long as the mortgage.

Maintenance is everything, the building has to be built so that it *can* be maintained, but if you put the worst built POS into a sealed environment it will last forever.


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