These photos are of the setup of my SIP walls and roof for my shop
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My SIP's are from
www.kcpanels.com . I am in Tucson AZ, where KC used to be located, but
they recently moved to Animas NM for production reasons.
The panel thickness is 4.5" for the walls (4' wide) and 6.5" for the
ceiling (4' wide). The skins are 7/16" OSB. The panels are urethane
foam, not styrene, so the R value is greater per inch. They are a
little more expensive than Styrene panels but when you do a cost per
inch for the R value, add in the extra cost of the 2 x lumber
needed, the up cost is negligible. The
manufacturing process is very different. Styrene foam is cut to the
thickness needed and then 'glued' to the OSB. Whereas the urethane
foam is mixed and expands to fill the void between the panels. From
people back east that use SIP's, I am told that the
adhesion of the
urethane is superior to that of the styrene.
Also one thing about KC is that they
only charge you for the sq ft used. Others charge you for a full
panel even though you have a doorway or window in that panel.
This is a shop. My purpose is to put in the
systems I want and get the kinks worked out of them before I build my
house. The roof panels are 28' long and there is a support beam
running down the center. 13' is the max span Tucson allows without a
2x spline between panels. The crew, boss and 3 workers, took 2 days
to do the shop, 24 ft x 32 ft with a 24 ft x 15 ft covered work
porch. The porch has a 2x6 roof. The sides and roof are
going to be covered in metal, Grandrib by
www.Fabral.com, I picked that
up yesterday and some friends are coming over tomorrow and we'll put up
the roof.
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| This is the finished slab with a stain of
ferrous oxide and clear protective coat. It is beautiful, mottled, it
looks like leather... it came out much better than I expected. I used some drip edging on the
corner of the slab just as precaution against termites. You can also see
the green wood sill plate that the SIP's will sit on. (Under the sill
plate is just sill foam, which is one of the things I will change in my
house. For my house I'll put down a seal of silicone or other similar
sealer to make a watertight seal between the sill and slab.) The slab also has fibers in it to act as a binder, so it is actually hairy. They will slowly wear down. I watered the slab and covered it for about a week then I stained it. So far there are no cracks at all.
The things sticking up in the slab are a dust collection system that is embedded in the slab and in the center you can sort of make out the Simpson Strong-Tie holder for the column to hold up the Glulam beam which in turn holds up the roof SIP's. In the right corner of the photo you can see my 40 ft container and the 5th wheel that I am living in. |
| KC Panels delivered the panels on a 28 ft trailer. He got here around 8 am and left Animas NM around 3 AM so he was a little tired. This photo and many of the others were taken from the top of my 40 ft container that has all my shop and household stuff in it. We are looking south. The land to the south and east is state land. |
| All the panels were stacked on the slab, in the order that they are to be installed. You can also see the beams and columns on the right side. In the left background is Kitt Peak Observatory. |
| This is the first corner. Foam was put down on the sill as a sealant filler, and also between the panel connection. The guy with the long hair is the boss, Keith Langen. He had a crew of three regulars. |
| Keith has a couple tricks, this is one of them. There is a window that goes here, he puts in the 2x4 spacer, then puts the next adjacent panel in place and pushes up the 2x4 with the window header into position and fastens it. They used staples as fasteners. |
| This will become a doorway. KC Panels does not take a full panel and then cut out a door way or window. If you look at the door way you can see that they have made the 4x8 panel doorway optimally fit with the 2x4 windows that I have at the top as solar gain windows for the winter. In the next picture you can see the finished doorway. |
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All 4 walls are up... . The south side with the solar gain windows.
Another part of SIP that is strange are the chases for the electricity
which are represented by the black spray paint you see on the corner
panel and on the other inside panels in the pic above and below. Since
this is a shop I wanted the electricity at 3 ft high. The chase is
actually a 1 1/2" hole that is made in the foam that the wires can be
fished thru and the outlets and switches mounted in the OSB. A couple of
the chases go down to the floor because some houses sit on a wood framed
floor and the wires can be run in the floor. I am running EMT pipe just
cause I like the look and have some left over 1" pipe. You can also see on the corner black dots that are the heads of the 6" screws that hold the corners together. |
| Here it is from the top of the container... all 4 walls up, the support column and Glulam up after 3 hrs... WOW The picture looks distorted because this is a stitched photo. In the right background is Kitt Peak. The mountain on the left is called Baboquivari by the Tohono O'Odham People, It is the belly button of the world, where we all came from, |
| Another view of the same, the beam is not really bent like that, the photo is stitched. |
| The crew is starting to work on the porch framing in the front. The front doorway is 6 ft wide, French doors so that I can get equipment and products in and out easily. |
| End of the first day. I was just amazed at the speed the walls went up. You can see where I put in one of the windows just to see if it would fit. It did. I had ordered them months ago, low e, vinyl and got a great deal on them. |
The 2nd Day
Take care Rush
The crane got here about 8AM the next day, set up and had the first
panel up by 8:30. You can see the eye hooks attached to the panel on the
left that the crane hooks to. The sling is slightly longer on one leg so
that the panel sits at the slope needed for placement.
More than halfway done on the roof, 45 minutes. On the right you can see
the Pex tubing sticking up that is in the slab for Radiant Heating.
The inside with all the roof panels up - lots o light comes in. Jim and
Yuki, friends, are framed by the window.
This is the overhang that the panels have, about 2 ft all the way around
The last panel being put in place. The roof is screwed to the top plate
in the wall panels with 8" screws, 12" on center.
Now the crew is starting to finish the porch roof.
View from the roof, showing about 270 degrees, looking southeast to east
Sunset of the 2nd day, I put in the windows
just for the effect. In the foreground are my parabolic radiant heaters,
Sol-R-Beams, that will heat the floor.
01/31/2005
Questions? or comments let me know.... thanks for taking the time to
view the photos.