Design

Saw Sammy yesterday and we went over some things on costs. I had been thinking of running four courses of logs up onto the second floor loft wall to give it a knee wall rather than have the roof line come right down to the floor. But considering the cost and the fact that half the upstairs will be open to the ceiling it seems like a frivolous expenditure, so I will probably pass on it. It really would have only been a benefit for half the upstairs, but I would have been paying for it for the entire second floor.

Also the difference between having a 25 x 35 house and a 28 x 38 house wil be about $23,000. So, do I need that extra footage? It would be nice, though. We'll see. In addition, I really would like an extension on the bedroom of about 12 x 8 and that will be another 7 grand if I do it. I will see. So many decisions.

Also I am going to go with concrete blocks for the double chimney and I can face them with field stone later.

Sammy doesn't think we will have to put in the required 4' frost wall on the walk out basement side because we will probably hit rock. We did hit horizontal shale at 5' on the knoll when we were digging for the 1st perc test. In one spot I think we even hit it at 4'.

I wasn't sure if this was the level of rock code counts as suitable to anchor the foundation into or not. Like, does the rock have to be limestone, granite, impervious to drilling, or whatever.

Because I think realistically a huge rock smasher could bust up the horizontal shale, but Sammy thinks it counts and we will be able to anchor to it so i won't need that frost wall.

(Frost wall equals more $).