Perkins47

Log Cabins and Timber Frame etc homes look very nice but in my immediate family there have been two family homes completely burnt to the ground. I am now a believer in FireBarrier and sheet-rock etc. No one exposes the beauty of wood with the thought of it ever burning but unfortunately it does. Sometimes "code" makes sense. Back in '97 or '98 a very strange situation developed with lumber shortage when all metal frame buildings mimicking traditional wood structures were cheaper to build and if you selected the buildout materials properly would be fireproof with thousands of dollars of insurance savings over lifetime of home.

Brilliant ! Just when I think we have exhausted all the possibilities you come up with something else. I can see the many advantages for the slight extra cost. Btw, my original inspiration for he 16 x 16 cabin was from looking at the following two plans and selecting the design layout of the smaller 12x12 prospectors cabin and increasing the size to be closer to the Pioneers cabin which is actually 16x20. I felt that by utilizing the entire 2nd floor space instead of an keeping an open loft, enough space could be saved to scale back on the footprint size to 16x16. I think that is easily achievable were it not for the "regular stairs" requirement instead of using a ladder. http://www.tinyhousedesign.com/pioneers-cabin-16x20/ http://www.tinyhousedesign.com/prospectors-cabin-12x12/ Here is the site that has further ( in addition to the Home Depot video) educated me about modifying the Gambrel roof components http://www.backyardbuildings.com/products/16x16-Everest.html take a look at the 16x16 garage shed and look at the interior photos. Eric, early on you referenced two different kinds of exterior insulation and I have not had a chance to research those two techniques.... Since you live in Arizona I know you must be well schooled in insulation and I am wondering now if these "exterior insulations" are additive to what is already done inside a wall resulting in a super insulation system overall. At this point it seems crazy to me to think about hollow walls with insulation on the outside but all you guys in Arizona the hottest state must be the experts.

Eric, you always give me a lot of thought provoking ideas and we have seen a large list of temptations most of which result in unarguable enhancement but with overall scope creep that I am trying to avoid for a while but want to keep in reserve for later options. Yes roofing is more expensive than siding but be fair about the cost of siding... also add the cost of roofing on top of the siding and the extra framing for the roof on top of the siding .... I am not so sure a whole 2nd floor is cheaper than Gambrel but you are absolutely right about windows. I just see the Gambrel now as a 25 percent more expensive roof that brings the most space at a super lowest unit cost when averaged out. It is not deluxe but 7 ft ceiling downstairs, and loft space enlarged by Gambrel does in fact provide the absolute least unit cost volume space and it is generously livable without having to climb ladders and crawl around on hands and knees upstairs etc etc. Re the foam on the exterior.... If I lived in the Arctic or Arizona the hottest state in the country I maybe could place thermal properties over ruggedness but I dont know how I could toughen the exterior foam affordably.... It would ( in my mind require another layer of siding) ? ? ? I envisioned the 2x4 post in the 2x6 wall as being on the interior side leaving 2 inches of space to the outside so as to not increase thermal bridging all the way to the exterior. But you are right, it is a tradeoff of structural vs thermal considerations... Gotta have a little give and take and I needed a way to drop the ceiling and support the 2nd floor loads ..... Maybe I could notch out 2 inches of the 2x6 wall stud and inset the 2x6 2nd floor joists in the notch and supplement with some kind of Simpson strap ....and/or bracket the floor joist inserted into the wall stud notch much like they do with the gussets on the Gambrel truss members.... That would sturdy up the connection and not reduce the strength of the 2x6 at the notch to any lower than a std 2x4. The mid span support for the 2x6 was what you pointed out to me and what a great idea that can be taken advantage only with certain floor plans. There are many more deluxe options but I am fairly convinced that for any given footprint size a Gambrel in this manner will provide the most useable floor space per unit cost. The Home Depot shed really opened my eyes to the Gambrel design. and still use the

I revisited the HomeDepot video and it occurs to me that the Gambrel components may be larger than my six foot sections as they look really big in the video and a whole lot of space on the 2nd floor. I may enlarge my Gambrel components as I evaluate options but it does appear that it is easier and cheaper to gain 2nd floor volume by increasing Gambrel members than by adding higher and higher knee walls although I am swapping my desired "Farmhouse" look for a "Barn" look unless you are from Holland. Just think... an extension of the outside two members of the Gambrel roof by one foot just about raises the interior ceiling height by one foot as well. Regarding the modular stairs... it would be a shame to conceal them in a closed stairway but I must find a way to close off airflow between floors and I guess it will have to be done with a landing up top with a door there. Sliding doors are convenient but cannot approach a conventional door in air tightness.

Here is a pretty interesting video of a 16x16 shed that shows the impressive space available on 2nd floor without extensive extra effort. Gambrel roof 16x16 shed at Home Depot I would have 3 ridge beams for strength and stick build each gambrel member (?) on the roof It will be overbuilt for reasons of insulation but being extra strong isnt always bad. I would mount at top of 2x6stud exterior wall a 2x12 as a third top plate with the excess hanging to the outside and shimmed slightly so that as an overhang for the outside wall it would tilt down slightly for water runoff. This 2x12 will also exist as a beam at the top of the walls to resist pushout from the weight of the Gambrel roof even though I plan to put gussets on both sides of the 2x8 Gambrel members. I could probably use 2x6s but I need the thickness for foam insulation. Each Gambrel truss member cut so that it will take one and a half sheets of plywood or 6 ft total to minimize plywood waste. So to span 16 feet I will have 24 feet of linear roof across the top spanning four truss components. I want to place the 1st floor ceiling height at 7 feet mimicking the 1800s Cape Cod houses and use 2x6 floor joist members to have the lowest possible 2nd floor height which will provide a little bit more head room on the 2nd floor. I will be using 8 ft exterior wall studs and I will be creating somewhat of a knee wall effect. The slight knee wall plus the Gambrel roof shape should result in a surprising amount of space on the 2nd floor Along side (sistered) the 2x6 exterior wall studs I will have shortened 2x4 studs which the 2x6 ceiling or 2nd floor joists will rest upon. No 2x6 will span greater than 8 feet. This is kind of a balloon framing or post and beam technique. I just dont want to rely on hangars and connectors etc. A 2x4 is cheaper and more reliable as a post anyway. some modular stair photos attached providing non code compliant rise over run performance with conventional hand rails and appearance while actually using the theory of alternating stair step tread design. See attached photos of these stairs installed. These modular stairs have about an inch and a half in rise adjustment per each stair So that should give them a lot of utility in my application as far as getting the perfect fit. Unfortunately my Home Designer program will not allow me to design for these stairs as it will not allow stairs beyond typical code angle of ascent. These stairs and the low floor will reduce some of the overall footprint taken by the stairs and may allow for other design options which I have to explore. I anticipate the stair total package will cost about $1500 and seems justifiable although stairs could be hand built for much less but could not look as nice for the same price I feel.

I have been around Personal Computers since they were invented. ( Before the IBM PC-AT I was a salesman for a company that had the fastest personal computer in the world and demoed at NASA etc. AND it had a dual boot feature as at the time the IBM PC-DOS was not the absolute dominate Op System) All of these work-arounds are risky which is fine unless the stuff you risk is important and valuable. (Mission Critical) Even when safeguards are taken the investment is always a great deal of time which is the most valuable of all. It would appear that if I cannot find an older Ver 10 or 2012 or 2014 version I must either decide to abandon Chief Architect or buy a new computer to run the latest version. My project at this time does not justify the expense of new hardware, new space for new system and new software. I hope Windows 10 version is the answer to everyones wants but Microsoft never gets it right ... on purpose actually because they build themselves a path for needed improvements and upgrades to generate corporate revenues. So I wil wait to see if an older version comes available and until then I will do conceptual stuff with Ver-10-Suite and probably resort to 2D CAD for the essential cross sections and precise framing dimensions. My skills in Sketchup are improving and I may just ditch the old fashioned 2D. I have four or five months before I break ground on the new cabin and we should know a lot more about Win 10 by then. I am currently running six partitions on two hard drives with Win XP and am no stranger to odd setups but I just cannot afford to "play" with my "production" system at this time. It is nice to see how our members here are multitalented in many areas. Thanks for the suggestions. Kinda too bad actually as Chief Architect is foregoing some nice revenues on an older product that they provide no support for and it would be all pure profit if they were to sell an older version at this time. Scott

I am a little skeptical about the amazon offer since it is a digital download affair. I talked with chief architect customer service and sales and they said in no uncertain terms they were not and would not participate in any products other than current version. SO if I ordered at amazon where would I be downloading it from ? ? ? The reason I am stuck on XP is I have two other essential software programs that run only on XP as well as scanners and special large format printers etc I also noticed Amazon is offering 2012 and 2015 HomeDesigner Pro versions..... arent they also supposed to run on XP? ie 2016 version was the first version to NOT run on XP...... is that right ?

I will pay more than the upgrade rebate if someone is thinking about upgrading... I am stuck on Win XP that is the reason why and the latest version 2016 will not run on my computer.. Scott Perkins 2scott@bellsouth.net

Eric your latest plan is certainly appealing though I might have some difficulty in framing the 2nd floor roof as drawn. I think when we get into the complexity and extra details we can just go ahead and get the full 2nd floor with a flat ceiling with little or no extra cost and a smallish uninhabitable attic if we were to use for instance a low slope 4-12 roof pitch. With a full height 2nd floor and obligatory full 2nd floor bath I think the dwelling could become a full time residence again even in a 16x16 footprint. I am still trying to max out what I call the economy car version with a full bath downstairs and mini fridge and 2 burner stove and single bowl sink kitchen . I did see something interesting in your latest downstairs bath sink (with the wrapped around stairway) area.... It occurs to me that bath sink area is very close to being a shower area as well..... a shower that you would step through to get to the toilet. It might require a swinging shower door in front of the toilet right where your kneecaps would be when sitting on it. I say swinging because I have never seen a waterproof sliding shower door anywhere but on the top of a bathtub side about 18 or 20 inches high. We can easily draw a sliding shower door in the plans however. Or we could omit the toilet stall door but I could never imagine sitting on a wet toilet right after someone took a shower. A shower in this location would provide a dual function for the normally required front of toilet clearance area with a very minimum of inconvenience.... or none if there is only a single occupant in the dwelling. Speaking of low slope roofs ..... I 've always questioned the wisdom of some of those nearly full width dormer shed roofs and thought to myself, why not just go an extra foot on both sides and make it a full house width roof. The framing, and siding and roofing are all much simpler but perhaps not as "fancy" looking. I say spend the money on improving the quality of the things that really work and not waste a lot of money on gimmick looking details. And BTW, I very much like the wrap around outside porch. I cannot think of many things that give a better return for your money than a covered porch. And if we are evolving to full 2nd floors... we might as well have a 2nd floor deck to walk out onto.... actually from an inside shower stall on the outside wall with clear glass patio doors .... Just slide the outer door open and you would be very close to taking a shower outside. When I built my mom a house 15 years ago, she wanted a lot of fake dormers all over the house and I suggested we simply take the same money and put it in extra insulation and higher grade maintenance free windows. Today she is very glad we followed my suggestion.

Outhouses to Bathrooms.... I have a collection of old House plans going back to 1885 and up to 1942 and in these 18 or 20 sets of plans the first appearance of a Bathroom or any special room to go potty in in any of the plans is in 1920. And some of these plans were gigantic 3000, 4000 sq feet 3 story mansions etc. It is the weirdest thing to not see any restrooms or dedicated bathing areas in a house that size. Certainly no showers but I thought maybe there might have been rooms with tubs etc. But nope !

Eric, I am continually thinking about your suggestion for taking the stairs outside the 16x16 space as nothing is too crazy... In fact I am reminded of my early favorite Cape Cod style homes where in the 1800s whenever the wealthy built their home they had the resources to build something like a partial basement but I think the space may only have been for storage of veggies. ie "root cellar" ? ? Anyway, all these Cape Cods had what looked like not much more than a large dog house connected to the rear part of the house side ... certainly not as much as what we see for small front porch stoops etc and this little dog house had the entry door and stairs down into the root cellar. I dont think there was access to the stairs from inside the house. I was just kind of thinking what a little bump out might do for our stair way headroom situation.... As well. we could put the entire stairs outside and maybe enter the stairwell from inside and then reenter the house on the 2nd floor. I saw a photo last night in a book with exterior stairs that did not look too bad, I have not had a working scanner for a few years..... BUT I DO have a digital camera. Let me work on it a bit and I will try to share. In fact there were five or six pics of interest. The book was called Small Houses of the Future I think. Regarding spiral stairs... other than the higher cost of building... I wonder if spiral stairs with the same diameter as the width of two stairways feel as comfortable climbing and descending ?

Regarding doors in stairways. Some here seem to be not sold on the benefits of a structure that can close off floors from one another from an air movement standpoint. We have been led to appreciate the cathedral ceilings the sky high foyers, the balconies looking down into the family rooms etc. I can tell you they are the stupidest things any architect has ever done excepting those designing for folks wealthiest enough to not care about utility bills. You can build houses with 9 and 10 foot tray ceilings and have luxurious winding stair cases in the foyer and still have doors at the top and doors at the bottom (or top) of stairs into the basement etc. that will not make you feel like you are in a lower tier economic class. You lose nothing by closing off the floors but if you have the opportunity to have separate HVAC systems on the different floors and whole house, attic or window fans, you can have different activities going on in the different floors. It can have a monstrous effect on the need for heating and cooling the floors you are currently occupying. If you ever have a chance to affect the design of a structure please remember what I am telling you here. You will never regret it. I'll say it again.... You can have a whole floor serve as insulation for another floor. The effect can be massive regardless of how big the structure is ! My other best kept secret..... In all my properties and designs, I have installed kitchen wall cabinets in the bathrooms. People LUV em ! even over the toilets. Always 12 in deep.... sometimes 15 deep on the walls.

I am very sorry for my extended absence as you all know life sometimes interferes with our fun. I hope everyone here is learning and having half as much fun as I am with this collaborative project. It occurs to me that many people go through life without ever being able to be part of a collaborative team of highly talented individuals and being able to take part in development on a deeply intellectual project that one person could not do by themselves. For some reason our minds are fixed and cannot always see all the alternatives I think because we are genetically inclined to pursue a path. Twenty years ago I had a software development company and I would have regular staff meetings where I would ask for all the craziest wildest ideas so that we could record them for analysis as at some point in the future some of the crazy ideas in a different circumstance would seem to be a very good idea. I regularly go back and read over the many different suggestions to see if some of them now fit better in our "evolved" structure or solve some problems or represent better tradeoffs depending on an individual occupants priorities etc. Certainly is always a good idea to consider the practical technical aspects such as trying to align downstairs plumbing with upstairs plumbing etc.... I also want to mention that we can sometimes design things that cannot practically be built... the program we are using as good as it is does not have much experience framing a house as we have to always be asking ourselves... yea really neat but how do we build it ? My concern is in the area of knee walls. In these kinds of peaked roof structures, the roofs want to push the walls out and someway we have to contain these forces. In simple structures the ceiling joists might tie the opposing walls together and in a lot of roofs we would put collar ties about two thirds of the height from the floor to the peak holding the roof rafters together. When we raise the walls with knee walls we have to work hard to contain the forces trying to push the walls out. One way to do this is to extend the 1st floor wall studs into the 2nd floor much like is done in Timber Framing and the push out forces are contained by the vertical wall studs in a somewhat vertical cantilever manner. When we get an exterior wall top plate height beyond 10, 12 or 14 ft I dont know if simply the use of 2x6s as studs is enough to contain the roof push out loads if those plate heights mean 2, 4 or 6 ft knee wall heights.. Large houses I've built with the attic built out and with 2ft knee walls, I've had to install braces from the floor 4 ft in from the outer wall to the top of the knee wall. It was not a problem because the interior walls of the attic rooms usually were about 5 ft in from the outside wall and the braces existed in the unoccupied space. In addition I also used collar ties at the 8 ft ceiling height of the roof structure. So what I am saying is...... there is probably a limit to the use of knee walls in these super small structures with attics so small we dont want to use any collar ties which would lower the effective ceiling height. There is kind of another technique to contain some roof push out loads and that is to use 2x10s or 2x12s as top plates or maybe two of them as we are now creating lateral beams on top of the walls. With some fancy carpentry the inside view of these beams can look like weird crown moulding etc. I realize I have hit a dead end with the limited functionality of the version program that I have but I am always trying to think of the important structural issues and have not been able to master the terrific 3D rendering skills that seem so abundant here. Thank you everyone for all these masterpieces. When I build this cabin .... whatever the ultimate shape, I am going to print all these design ideas on a color printer and create a 3 ring notebook showing the evolution of the design. To be honest ... I have looked at all of the suggested links to other houseplan sites etc.... and I am not as impressed as I am with the designs created here. OF course those other sites are extremely educational and I want to thank everyone for them.... I also hope that every one agrees with my characterization of the different plan suggestions as all good, just different interpretations like the economy car, SUV, Pickup and Sports car etc. at different price and complexity levels. Please give some thought as to how exactly we would frame the 2nd floor structures for each of these suggestions. Have a good weekend all and again many Thanks Scott

regarding the Cape Cod living rooms with low ceiling photos.... Actually one of the rooms has open framing with the 2nd floor wood strips showing above even though the framing bottoms are at 7 ft height. Open Framing is a possibility with the economy car model using the 2x6 joists overhead for aesthetics but it would be better efficiency wise to install a regular ceiling below with insulation stuffed in between the 2x6 joists. This is an individual value judgement. Efficiency vs Looks. Remember one goal is max efficiency and by closing off air movement up the stairs during super hot and super cold periods the 2nd floor space insulates the lower floor space. But if you live in a very moderate climate area go for the looks and the open frame ceiling above might not look that really low. The open framing sure gives a lot of opportunity to hang things.... I mean all kinds of things.... Almost like the ceiling becomes a storage closet.

I think it is time we invent a fold down sink. I was thinking about a bathroom with just a shower and a toilet and realized what a shame we have flowing water and a drain in the shower but it is difficult to use just to wash your hands. We are already half way there with the shower/tub spout valve but instead of filling a tub we turn the valve to get the water to come out of the lower spicket into a bowl that would somehow fold down or slide in from the wall or on a shelf for sink like use. The prisons already have put a sink on top of the toilet bowl.... The Urapeeans already put sinks and toilets in the shower but our shower is too small. Maybe the super micro RV sinks that are already mounted in RV showers is the solution. So, jump off the toilet and step into the shower and wash your hands in the sink. I guess leave the shower door always open until you take a shower ? ? ?

Eric- please step out and take a bow. What fantastic design ideas. I try hard to think outside the box but you are really talented in that area. You have also shown me that I was not specific enough when I said 16x16 as a target. You have presented 1. an economy car model with efficiency and lowest cost, 2. a Maximum Social Accommodation model, (BMW) 3. an SUV model I think which is an upscale Pickup Truck with comfort and 4. a Pickup Truck model for maximum occupancy and utility. In time I would like to take each of these approaches and fine tune them within the 16x16 footprint but thanks to a few of your brilliant suggestions, I am bound to pursue the economy car model first as a test of my creative abilities to see just how far pure design ingenuity can take us. Specifically the economy car model being the structure with 8ft exterior walls and the bare minimum sleeping area on the 2nd floor although maximized as much as possible through optimum design choices. Let me introduce a few ideas before continuing... It was mentioned that higher ceiling heights create a bigger feeling but I want to point out that it is inefficient in terms of heating and cooling and utility for cost. Further in our case higher ceilings presents more problems with stairway headroom clearances. So let me go in the opposite direction and propose that "lower" ceilings can create a cozyness and certainly is more efficient than the high cathedral ceilinged rooms we have all seen. In the 1800's in the Northeast, Cape Cod homes were popular for reasons of efficiency and durability. I'd like to show you some actual interior photos of Cape Cod family rooms with 7 foot ceilings. This dovetails right in with Erics suggestion that with a certain floor plan layout the joist spans are short and 2x6 can be used as 2nd floor joists. So with a combination of several of Erics suggestions..... I'd like to propose for the economy car model that we consider an 8 ft exterior wall as actually a knee wall application if we use a 7 ft ceiling on the 1st floor and 2x6 joists. This would provide a further benefit with the headroom height on the stairways and coupled with the use of Eric's winders on the landings we can have a stairway opening into the middle of the upstairs attic space. This is all coming together in a way that is too attractive not to pursue. Additionally, In the event that we still need some help with headroom on the 1st stairway landing I am proposing many roof options to give us the needed headroom. Realizing we are already gaining some small assistance from the 1ft effective kneewall with the 8ft wall and 7 ft ceiling 1. A steeper than 12/12 roof as used with high snowfall chalet type structures. ( also helps with 2nd floor space ) 2. A Gambrell roof ( also helps with 2nd floor space ) 3. Partial width shed dormer or Full width shed dormer over the stairway ( also adds 2nd floor space ) 4. Two different approaches to bringing the front porch roof up to the main structure roof. ( also adds 2nd floor space ) a. midway up b. all the way up ( see the attachments ) ( also adding 2nd floor space ) 5. Of course extending exterior wall heights to create higher knee walls ( greatly expands 2nd floor space ) somehow I believe that when we begin to use greater than 8ft exterior walls it then takes this structure out of the economy car category...... I certainly have no objection and it may well prove to be more cheaply implemented than some of the other options mentioned...... In fact, I hope to design a full 2nd floor model option with an attic space over the 2nd floor as an ultimate expression ! I'll never outgrow my kid desire to someday have a firemans pole to slide down and a 3 story slide would be the ultimate. [firemans pole will likely be mentioned in my obituary] Further in this economy car plan, I can see that we can make better utilization of the under stair area by putting a sink by the understair area instead of a toilet..... Or maybe no bathroom sink at all. Use the kitchen sink instead and have more space for storage etc.

In the above images I wanted to upload three camera shots that I had and then go back and delete the two worst ones but I cannot find how to delete any of the images. Anyway while not pretty because of my ineptitude with the program it is pretty evident that the top stair entrance in unacceptably and needlessly low. So my decision to create an upper landing one or two stair treads lower on the stair section which should place the entrance very close to the peak of the roof ceiling height. Also see the 1st floor camera shot showing my additional stair tread to the landing and gazing into the bathroom to see the bottom of the stairway sticking through slightly into the shower stall at an agreeable height. Amen ! Further you can see the tip of the toilet and the sink in the bathroom. and a slight glimpse into the kitchen with the fridge and counter showing a bit. Wow this is really turning out nicer than I expected. Long term I predict that I will be totally sold on probably a 12 foot exterior wall ( 4 ft knee wall ) with the full bath moved upstairs like a couple local geniuses recommended. In that case I will place a toilet where the shower now resides and giving the bathroom space back to the living area. An advantage to this is that beside the toilet would be a cabinet door offering access to under the stairway for storage if not a door from the living area accessing the under stair area. The hazard is that someone could get lost wandering around in all that newly found excess living space. Maybe I could build a whole subdivision of these..... not totally kidding. Anyone ever hear of Levittown and the thousands of Cape Cod design homes ? This little cabin is very very close to what was known as a "Half Cape"

Eric, I am building this as a weekend getaway on a stream about 20 miles north of Atlanta, GA. 20 years ago I bought some rural land crazy cheap because the the children of parents were squabling over inheritance after parents passed away. They wanted their money now and were in a hurry to sell the family property. I like all your ideas and apologize for not immediately implementing all of them. The problem is that I dont really know what the program is doing and since head room space on the stairs and in the shower and on the 2nd floor is my biggest problem, I need to figure out exactly how the program is figuring heights and whether the cross sections are reflecting my inputs as far as 2nd floor joist size etc. I lowered the 1st floor ceiling a little and then added back 11.25 inch for 2x12 joist size plus about .75" for plywood subfloor. These are what I set my defaults to for 1st floor and I dont know if the photo cross sections and under roof clearance and stairway generation is reflecting these values as the roof rafters will be sitting on the wall top plates etc. I took your advice and have continued to play with the stairs and now have three treads leading to the lower landing which gives me a higher takeoff point to clear the shower and to enter the 2nd floor room at the highest point of the roof. I plan to add back the top stair landing and I think I need one or two steps in a top 3rd section of stairs to enter right under the peak of the roof. Again I am not sure how low the upper landing can go before it interferes with a minimum height of 76 inches in the shower below. I am really down to fine tuning this plan to the inches which I want to do..... to see how close I can come to acceptability before I explore 2ft and 4 ft kneewalls. I want to fine tune several different exterior wall options and then pick the overall best in terms of mostly my wifes desires. She is demanding the stairs otherwise I would go with a ladder or alternating tread stairs going up and a firemans pole coming down ! etc. There is something to be said for the safety and insurability of stairways. A best kept secret is that insurers will not insure homes with ladders and absence of fire barrier throughout etc. You are right in a way about multi story dwellings but I have tamed them and used their disadvantages to my benefit. I have owned and lived in a couple of townhouses and homes with cathedral ceilings and balconies etc. just terrible all ! But I have built a couple of 2 story homes with stairways and doors shutting off air movement in the winter and summer time. When most of the occupancy is spent on the lower floor, the entire top floor when closed off then becomes another layer of insulation barrier resulting in unbelievably low utility bills. Right you are about the 2x4s under the top stair landing...... Sometimes I am so close to the forest I cannot see the trees. Let me go back and wrestle more with the stairs to try to get them to do what I want. Over the weekend I had a 2nd top stair landing and one or two steps to the 2nd floor and then took them away and now I am adding them back again. When all is said and done we can always say we had a couple hundred versions before we got the plan right. Wonderful stuff this modern technology. But sometimes and maybe this time I will have to resort to pencil and paper to draw ironclad cross-sections for dimensions. I havent played with the CAD in the program yet and dont know how capable or flexible it is but I will get there still. Porches are a definite for this structure ....it is just that I have come so far so fast I am out of breath. But I will be adding them. I expect problems with getting a shed roof to intersect up on the regular roof however. I am not familiar with REMOTE or PERSIST insulation but I would not like interior exposed framing. I cannot see how they could get the thickness needed on the exterior to get some really good R values. However, whatever they are doing on the exterior, I would consider adding to what I do between the 2x6 studs on the interior for a super insulated structure. I am not familiar with the term "winders" on the lower landing. I now have three treads leading to the lower landing which is raising the landing off the main floor about 32 inches. Here are a couple of camera views. 16x16 cabin stairs-on 09Jb.plan

Thanks to some incredible support from Kbird, Solver, Jo_Ann and Elovia I have made such rapid progress on my design that I am not sure how I got to where I am with the plan. Unusually, while this is a relatively miniature structure, my wife insists on full conventional stairway to a 2nd floor sleeping area and it has proven difficult to shoehorn it in with a kitchen and full bath downstairs. Arguably the space taken by the stairway is about the same I think as the space on the 2nd floor devoted to sleeping to where it could be easier and cheaper to put it all on one floor. A lot of things we do dont always make the most sense so the objective here is to have a 2nd floor. While I have been convinced that knee walls on the 2nd floor provide a fantastic return on investment, I want to first take the std 16x16 plan with 8 ft exterior walls and sleeping area jammed into the attic area and see how far I can get. Then later look at 10ft and 12ft exterior walls to see how it improves the 2nd floor space and the use of kneewalls may be the only way to provide the much needed head clearance in all areas of the stairway. There are always options for enhancement and it has been pointed out that dormers could be very useful as well as expanding laterally instead of vertically. ie 16x18 or 16x20 footprint instead of using higher exterior walls to raise the roof up. In fact, a reference to some other plans has shown me that there could be some merit to a more rectangular than square footprint such as 12x22 that might provide more utility while keeping essentially the same interior space and could address some stairway problems without having to raise the roof. I am attaching the latest version of my plan for everyones review and keep in mind that the stairways display option has to be turned off to see the shower stall that the stairs pass over. So far it seems the biggest bug in the ointment is the head clearance on the 1st stairwell landing and head clearance at the top of the stairs as you enter the 2nd floor.I can possibly cut a hole in the roof over the lower stair landing because over that hole will be the shed style roof that covers a front porch and intersects halfway up the regular roof. This is not shown in my home designer plans but I know I can do it in the real world. Part of the problem is that I need slightly steeper stairs than the program will allow.... OR a second landing at the top of the stairs over the shower that will allow a stair climber to enter the room at the highest point of the roof. There are too many ways that this house would not meet code so I wish the CA higher ups would just allow total manual override of the stairway parameters. I would like to add that I intend to make this cabin extremely energy efficient. I am already starting with 6 inch exterior walls and the ability to control air movement between floors ( you gotta love those full stairs in such a pipsqueak of a structure) . Imagine that with the 2nd floor closed off, the ceiling R-Value for the 1st floor must be around R-75...... so it will be super easy to heat and cool etc. Lastly while I have not yet drawn into my plans the open front porch or the rear screen enclosed porch I plan for them both to be full width and utilize the traditional shed roof that is seen so often on typical Farm Houses. Hey, if we are not careful before long this will have a 3rd floor with deck on the roof and a diving board for the pool in my backyard. It could happen and still be a 16x16 ! Seriously thanks for all the helpful computer and real world design suggestions. Scott 16x16 cabin stairs-on 09H.plan

Elovia, funny you should mention dormers. I was joking with my wife that if we had to crawl into and out of bed hunched over on the 2nd floor because of low roof height....... I told her that I would create one dormer space we could stand up straight in that was dedicated to putting on and taking off pants. That is an activity that just about demands that you be able to stand up straight. Eric, no I have not seen it but I will of course follow your generous link to the Homesteaders Cabin. Thanks

Solver and Kbird I have run into a brick wall in several different areas and I need to go back and figure out how I got to where I am and why. The stairs function seems to want to limit us to perhaps code legal parameters but I wish there were a simple manual override switch so we could just force in the parameters we want. I realize now I mistakenly forgot to start a new thread for this 16 x 16 minimalist project and I will probably do that tonight so as to not confuse with the sample plans inquiry. The original objective was to build within 16 x 16 footprint and I did not think about the possibility of stretching the structure skyward but indeed, I may play around later with even pushing it to 3 stories. But first I want to max out the 16x16 with 8 foot walls as a quaint but surprising little Farm House and then try 2 ft knee walls and then 4 ft knee walls to see the effect on the 2nd floor and stairway clearances etc. Indeed, if a 2nd floor is used merely for sleeping maybe we dont really need to stand straight up in a lot of area. Kinda like a sleeping loft I guess. Also I must choose among temptations as in addition to using various knee wall height options, I could just as easy (?) expand the structure to 16x20. Ah the age old "tradeoffs" contemplations. For those following how difficult it is to shoehorn traditional stairs into a 16x16 ..... I thought of another way to gain headroom height with program constrained rise over run stair parameters. The first floor landing height might be increased by another stair riser or two by fitting the front porch shed roof midway up the roof on the regular dwelling. That way if I have for example four steps in front of the landing on the 1st floor, I can cut a hole in the original structures roof to gain headroom at the landing since it would then be covered with the front porch shed style roof. In any case, I plan to start construction in January of 2016. BTW, Mick that 9 foot bigger feeling will bite you in the butt in trying to make the stairway work. Funny thing... those unintended consequences. Originally said about airplanes... but any designed structure is a "collection of compromises" Thanks to modern technology and Chief Architect, I'll just have to try out all the possibilities.

Eric. Wow wow wow. Terriffic ideas. I never would have spotted the opportunity for a pocket door at the landing. The wall height is a two edged sword as it pushes the 2nd floor up and increases the length of the stairway..... UNLESS something like 10 foot hi exterior walls were used but the 2nd floor height was kept at 8ft. That creates what I think are called "knee walls". Is that what you are talking about re adding wall height ? I dont know how to do that in Home Designer but I am going to explore and see. Do you know if it can be done ? I also fell into the trap of adding more steps before the 1st landing but I soon discovered that I might bump my head against the roof when standing on the landing. ( but raising the roof 2ft with 2 ft knee walls would solve that problem.) The full bath on 2nd flr is entirely doable with a raised roof due to 2 ft knee walls. I would like to try to keep the full bath downstairs also since the shower should now fit more easily under the stairway. On the other hand the shower space under the stairs could be used for HVAC or water heater space and give me back the coat closet by the front door. As additional note, there is much discussion in the minimal house / small house movement that a single sink should be shared between kitchen and bathroom activities and I am trying to find the most convenient layout for this to occur and I think the emphasis on convenience should be with with the kitchen activities. ie. easier to brush teeth in kitchen than wash pots pans in the bathroom. Early on I really didnt think I could fit everything into a 16 x 16 footprint but this is coming out surprisingly better than expected. Thanks very much for your ideas and suggestions etc. PS also thanks for showing me the front and back porch can be added under shed roofs.

Yes I have a project and I think I have taken it as far as Home Designer will take me. There is a large movement currently call the Tiny House which are actually usually built on trailers but I have some rural property where I wanted to build the smallest possible cabin. One caveat... Wife says no way in hell she is climbing on a ladder and if she has to descend stairs for bathroom in middle of night the stairs better be normal. SO.... Within a 16' by 16' footprint I have created 2 story cabin with full bath ( shower not tub ) kitchen, bedroom upstairs and family room. The major obstacle was getting the stairs over the shower with enough head clearance to stand up and bathe. I had to use all the cross section tricks to see how the stair bottoms were impacting shower stall space. I think I succeeded and will probably build this cabin. It is intended to look like old Farmhouse and I will add screen porch in back and large open porch in front under shed roofs both. I did not include the porches because I dont think Home Designer can handle them. Also for some reason.... my full exterior camera view stopped allowing me to spin it around and tilt to get custom views right after I added bath fixtures from the library. This now prevents me from getting the custom cross section shots of the interior to see how adjustments affect the space utilization. Further, an absolute requirement is to have a door at the top or the bottom of the stairwell to close off air movement from the 1st floor to the 2nd floor. I am showing doors at the top and bottom so I could see which was most efficient in terms of space expense and it is obvious the 2nd floor stairway door has to be removed in favor of keeping the downstairs stairway door but some might choose differently because all the downstairs "living " space is at a super premium. I assume in the pro versions or Chief Architect I could actually know the inches of clearance from floor to ceiling in stairways and closets etc. That would be nice. My main point of reference in this design was knowing the height of the tops of the windows. That tells me the 2nd floor room is just barely habitable. I'll try to upload the plan if anyone else is interested in looking at it. One last thing, in order to see the shower, the stairs/landings display has to be turned off. 16x16 cabin stairs-on 09F.plan

If it was just the app software I would upgrade but I have to buy a new computer and printer etc and I have some other legacy programs that only run under Win XP or earlier and not the latest operating systems. I just cannot afford the industry planned obsolescence scheme. QUOTE: "I am not aware of any Site other than this one where Files can be Shared" Is there a file folder somewhere on this site with a repository of plans files ? I only saw a photo gallery of JPG images Where ? Thanks much for the help.

Thanks for the Templates folder suggestion as there are an additional eighteen plans in that folder but for some reason ten of them will not load into the program. Curiously there are plans with names like "Traditional" and each one has another corresponding "Traditional-M" plan. Also "Colonial and Colonial-M" etc. Oh well. I realize I am using a five year old version and will not receive any official support from the company but I thought it would be good enough to invest a lot of time into learning in the event I found a position where I could justify purchasing a new computer and current version of the program on a higher level. If anyone knows and can comment.... Is there a group files area anywhere where Home Designer files were uploaded for sharing ? Also, what are the rules of file compatibility between different versions of Home Designer both in terms of age and entry level to Pro level ? ? ?