Duke Smart Home: Entry 18: Wrapping, Windows, and Green Roof

Hello friends,

This week has been in my opinion the fastest week of changes for the house. Just last Friday, the house was wrapped in the waterproofing material Tyvek. Also, the Anderson windows arrived and have been installed during the week. At the end of the week, the green roof installation donated by American Hydrotech should commence.

Photo of the outside wrapped in Tyvek.

In some behind-the-scenes news, the bi-weekly OAC meeting took place Tuesday morning and we accomplished a great deal of tasks. At the moment, there were 3 major sections of the agenda concerning the project status: HVAC, exterior siding, and metal roof color selection. The first is a redesigning of the HVAC system ductwork for two heat pump units and the Train CleanEffects air purification system (see the Entry 16). This is in the works and I will give an update, when I hear back.

Inside view of the first floor (note temporary stairs).

The exterior siding selection was a very interesting point of the OAC meeting. Patty Boyle, architect from the Smith Group, brought in samples, photographs, and descriptions of 9 different products to discuss. Patty had compared them ahead of time and graded each product based on the following categories: cost of material, time to get the product, installation, any maintenance required LEED/Environment, and a change to the aesthetics from the current design. We have ruled out 5 of the products and ranked the others in order of preference mostly based on cost and color selection and we should hopefully decide by the end of the week. Don’t worry if you don’t understand what I’m talking about, when we have picked out a siding product, I will describe it to the best of my ability.

New construction sign with Jordan.

The metal roof color selection was probably the easiest decision from the OAC meeting. Due to uncertainties in the color selection, we had to decide upon a color that would go well with most. White was the unanimous color of choice because it is has a clean look, is very energy efficient by cooling the house due to reflection of sunlight and would be a nice accent to match with the white windows. In any case, most of the roof space is green roofing and some solar panels.

Second floor atrium view of windows and secondary staircase.

On Thursday afternoon, a couple of us walked through the house and inspected the rooms. We noticed that the windows are so large that they begin at floor level. The nicest bedrooms in the house were the two back ones on the second floor because the roof is at such a steep angle that it creates almost another story of space. This made those two rooms feel larger and more open than the others.