Here we go again!

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Minuteman, Jan 1, 2007.


  1. RightHand

    RightHand Been There, Done That RIP 4/15/21 Moderator Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    You've gotta love a smooth transaction. After your last tightrope walk, this must have seemed a stroll on a country lane. Good luck MM
     
  2. E.L.

    E.L. Moderator of Lead Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    Congrats MM, if anyone deserves a quick and painless closing it is you.
    I look forward to reading about your progress with the new house. Leave a little room for a "monkey den" complete with gun portals. [shiftyeyes] You may have to defend it against Pancho [mex] if he follows you home from work one day.

    Maybe you should have Melbo drive down and build it for you. He's had a little [winkthumb] experience will log homes.
     
  3. BAT1

    BAT1 Cowboys know no fear

    Cool

    Nice place. That move could of saved your life, I'm gald you had the foresight. I wish I could get the the little lady to go for some thing like that. I'm working on one or two acres like that. All her friends are here. My heart is out there.[angelsad]
     
  4. Tango3

    Tango3 Aimless wanderer

    Gonna build a 100meter range??? With covered firing points?
     
  5. Minuteman

    Minuteman Chaplain Moderator Founding Member

    The new house is going to be my own design. An energy effecient, inpenetrable, aesthetically pleasing, retreat. A kind of survival chic.

    The basic design is re-enforced concrete walls. Either solid concrete or cinder blocks with each 3rd row filled with concrete and re-enforced with rebar. A steel frame, including roof joists. With a steel baffle sytem (in the roof joists) that is impenetrable to small arms fire. A basement with ground level windows too small to crawl into but big enough for gun portals. A fully functional fallout/tornado shelter with Hepa filter air purification system.

    The outside concrete/cinder block walls will be sided with split 6" log siding. Giving a total wall diameter of 18" plus whatever paneling or wall material is used inside.

    The ground floor windows will all be non opening and made of triple layers of plexi-glass, with a nitrogen filled air gap between each layer.
    The doors are solid 10" thick wooden doors that open to the outside and are set into steel frames.

    Geo-thermal, solar and generator back-up. It will run on conventional energy supplemented with alternate methods with the ability to go totaly off grid.

    All of the hallways leading to the different sections of the house will have wrought iron gates, for aesthetics and also for functionality. Each "wing" of the house will be able to be shut and locked away from the rest. Each door and window, any entryway to the home will have a small window/portal that overlooks it thereby giving the ability to "cover" all entrances.

    If you have ever seen a "Guns and Ammo" story on the home that Jeff Cooper designed and built in Arizona then you will know what I am talking about. Many of my ideas came from that.

    Needless to say I have been designing this home for many, many, years. I have bought and remodeled several old junker houses, trying to get to the point where I could afford to build my own design.

    By the grace of God I have finally gotten to the point where anything I can design, I can build. So any suggestions, recommendations, or critiques, are entirely welcome and solicited.

    This will be a total "Monkeyhouse" and I will invite any who can attend to an open house once it is completed. So any ideas or advice, send it on. And BTW I am budgeting and anticipateing at least two years to complete this project. So don't expect to see it in the next couple of months!!
     
  6. monkeyman

    monkeyman Monkey+++ Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    I dont know justhow practical itwould be to do but as far as the walls, if you were to do an inner wall and outer wall say 12" apart, both covered inside with something along the lines of rubber or similar 'self healing' material and fill the space with sand it should provide even more protection from small arms fire and I THINK would give a better R factor than the cement as well. I know based on what I saw at 'box of truth' none of the small arms penetrated more than IIRC about 9" of sand. Enouph rounds fired at cement will work like a jackhammer though and open a hole, the sand on the other hand will close up behind the bullet and be just as hard for the next to penetrate. So as long as you have a material that will make it hard for the sand to spill out even if the walls are broken it should do even more in that regard and I know sand insulates very well in a lot of applications.

    One thing I did notice missing (perhaps for the sake of not publishing it?) was that while there is a lot of attention to makeing the house hard for anyone uninvited to get in, I didnt see anything mentioned regarding means of egress. Aside from any kind of attack that could lead to a need to get out or say a storm that caused the doors to beblocked by debris, also something like a house fire could create a true need for the ability to get out of the house by means other than the front door or even the back. So especialy if the windows are sealed then some other means of egress (hopefuly some thing at least like a window that could open from the inside in every room or as many as possible) would strike me as being just as important as being able to keep anyone else out.

    Just my thoughts, sounds pretty cool though.
     
  7. E.L.

    E.L. Moderator of Lead Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    Wow! I am green with envy. I can't wait to see it.
     
  8. Minuteman

    Minuteman Chaplain Moderator Founding Member

    Good points MM. I was thinking more of some large decorative windows in the front that would be plexi-glass and non opening. I have always cringed at large picture windows or glass in doors. An inviting means to gain entry. But I think a small window in each room to use for ventilation and also for escape in a fire etc.. Maybe bars that can only be opened from the inside.
    I like the sand idea. I researched different ways of making walls bulletproof. One thing I read was to get bags of small decorative rocks. Or aqaurium rocks and fill the voids between 2x4's in conventional frame homes. Fill it at least 3' high and this would protect you if you were lying on the floor.
    One article I read was about the re-inforced cinder blocks. It will stop any shouldered fired caliber. Even .50 BMG. And with the re-bar to hold it together I think it would take dozens if not hundreds of rounds in the same spot to ever penetrate.
    Also to clarify, I said "10 inch thick doors" I was thinking of something else, should have said 4". I have a place in NM that makes custom solid wood doors. The old mission style with the small door that opens to look out.
    Also I would incorparate an escape sytem that would connect the safe room/shelter to the outside. I have seen numerous reports after tornados where people have been trapped in their cellars or safe rooms and couldn't get out. I always thought that if I built one it would have an escape tunnel.
     
  9. Quigley_Sharps

    Quigley_Sharps The Badministrator Administrator Founding Member

    You are building in Colorado right?
     
  10. E.L.

    E.L. Moderator of Lead Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    Oklahoma
     
  11. Sojourner

    Sojourner Silverback

    AHHHH, peace and quiet. Beautiful!
     
  12. Tango3

    Tango3 Aimless wanderer

    As far as the house design ideas: I would think it would be fairly easy to incorporate a few "false walls" perhaps turning a 10x12 room into an inside wall to wall dimension of 10X 8, providing a 4 DEEPX 10 wide hidden storage space.with a cleverly hidden entrance. Fun stuff like that.Maybe a few hidden loop holes inthe eves or roof to shoot out of. And you could sink a culvert perpendicular outside a full basement wall, back fill, then remove a few blocks and shoreup the remaining wall to giveyou a better fallout shelter/ hidden storage or the start on an emergency egress tunnel...I'd build a cistern.and a rainwater collectrion system..
     
  13. FalconDance

    FalconDance Neighborhood Witch

    I'm pea green with envy :p but very happy for you! Hope everything goes even better than planned.
     
  14. Minuteman

    Minuteman Chaplain Moderator Founding Member

    The closing is tomorrow. So far so good. Got painters and carpet layers coming and going. Put in a 6' chain link fence around the house for my dogs. Best security measure you can have in the country. I bought the wife a Springfield Armory XD 9 mili sub-compact. Going to pick up the streamlight laser/flashlight combo for it on Saturday.
    Got movers coming Friday so won't be around for a few days. Won't have the satellite internet back up until Tuesday.
     
  15. Quigley_Sharps

    Quigley_Sharps The Badministrator Administrator Founding Member

    congrats MM!!!!
     
  16. monkeyman

    monkeyman Monkey+++ Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    Glad to hear it is going well.

    Another theing you might think about would be evenifyou will have a well or rural water, especialy unless the well is shallow enouph for a hand pump, would be to make sure it has a cystern. What I think would be great on that if you have a basement would be to have a wider shorter cystern burried shallow then in the basement have a line run in direct from it so that if all means of electric went down for any reason you could still drain direct from it by gravity. Just a thought depending on the lay of the land and the rest of the house set up.
     
  17. Minuteman

    Minuteman Chaplain Moderator Founding Member

    Man I'm beat!!! Been moving since Friday. Got the last of the house things moved yesterday. Moved my tractor and implements today. I hadn't done anything at the new house so had to hook up washer & dryer, ice maker, TV's, hang curtains etc. all day. Am headed back to work tonight. I need to go back to work to rest!! But I got everything moved and set up before I left.
    I love Texas. And that borders on blasphemy for an Okie. But they have wireless internet at their rest stops. Too cool. I am sitting here N. of Austin on I35. I'm headed down to Laredo tonight and start work tomorrow. See y'all.
     
  18. E.L.

    E.L. Moderator of Lead Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    Careful T, I35 from Waco through S.A. is a rough stretch, lots of loonies.
     
  19. Minuteman

    Minuteman Chaplain Moderator Founding Member

    I want to clarify a couple of things about the design of the house I want to build. I have had a couple of people ask me if I was building a compound or some kind of fortress.

    There are several reasons for the design. Being able to fend off roving bands of MZB's in a SHTF scenario would be more likely in my opinion than trying to fend off ABC's or even smurfs. But even that is not the primary pupose.

    I believe we will be seeing drastic results of peak oil in a few years time so I want as energy effecient home as possible. So thick, almost adobe type, walls only make for good r values.

    Then this part of the county is very rural and isolated. Plus it is some of the best deer hunting in the state. I have known two families in this area who have had a rifle round come zinging through the living room and another a bedroom. Luckily no one was harmed. So any house I build will have walls that can at least stop a .308 round.

    Also the roof is the weakest point in bulletproofing a home. Mine will sit on a hill, but there is a higher ridgeline just to the West. So a round through the ceiling would not be out of the question. So the simple baffle sytem, using a lattice work of angle iron and flat metal, while not 100% effective, would at least give a good degree of protection. Any round that did manage to penetrate to the interior would have at least a very good chance of ricocheting off of metal before entering.

    Houses in this rural and isolated area are prime targets for thieves. Mine will be as hard to break into and as secure as I can make it.

    A few years ago there was a gang operating in this area that would not rob empty houses they would come to a house when someone was home and kick in the door and rob the occupants. So a portal overlooking any entryway to the house is a smart and practical addition to any design. Ala Jeff Coopers house in Arizona.

    I live in Tornado ally, so anyone building in this area without incorparating a storm shelter or safe room is foolish. And if you are going to spend the money for a tornado proof shelter why not spend a little bit more and make it NBC proof also.

    So, yeah it will be "fortress" like, but very practical as well.
    After all a mans home is his castle. I wonder if the wife would let me put in a moat. Hmmm...
     
  20. monkeyman

    monkeyman Monkey+++ Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    Something you might look into it you havent already for R value (and should be fairly bullet resistant as well) would be straw bail construction. Basicly the outer walls are built out of bails of straw then a good coating (could be as thick as you want) of concrete is added to cover all of the straw. It creates a house that is virtualy soundproof from what I understand as well as super energy efficient in regards to heating and cooling and I doubt that much of any round would do to well at penetrating say 4"+ of concrete, a tightly bailed bail of straw (after already deforming or mushrooming from the concrete) then another 4"+ of concrete. Its also typicaly a very economical (compared to a lot of meathods) means of construction especialy here in the midwest.
     
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