anyone done this

[snowman]

Next summer I'm going to start erecting my post and beam house. I'll be useing 8x8 post spaced 10' apart and am thinking of filling in between them with 6x6 squared logs instead oif framing , insulation siding etc. I'd caulk between the joints and nail them together with big screw shank nails.I guess ill kinda toenail or screw them individually to the post.I'm doing this 1, because I have more time and logs  than money and 2 ,I think it will look and work good. I'ts kinda like the cordwood house thing except horizontal timbers instead. Any helpful hints or pros and cons on my proposed shack would be appreciated.

[Radar67]

What would the insulation valve of the 6x6 logs be compared to a normally insulated wall? What are your insulation requirements in Idaho? Down here we have to have a minimum of R13 in our exterior walls.

[TW]

The old European way would be to cut grooves in the posts and cut the infill log ends to form tongues. This leaves the infill wall free to settle as the infill logs shrink. The infill logs would be joined to each other with some kind of tongue and groove or scribed long groove. The infill logs were pegged to each other with two or three pegs per seam in order to create a shear stiff panel, which stabilizes the building against horizontal loads. The plate log would fit in the forked tops of the posts. This slot in the post top was cut too deep, in order to transfer all vertical loads to the infill panels, and to allow the plate log to settle with the infill panels.
This means that no gaps developed as the wood shrunk.
I have never done this myself, and what I wrote here is all I know about it..

My immidiate and uneducated reaction is that your walls may get draughty over time as there is nothing that can prevent the infill logs from twisting and nowhere for the shrinkage to go.

Waiting for some replies from those who know more.

The method is called "skiftesverk" in swedish and I think it may be called "piece en piece" in English.

[maineframer]

The R-value for wood is R-1 per inch. So a six inch log wall would be R-6.

[snowman]

From what I'm hearing R value doesn't matter in log type construction because of the thermal mass index or something like that. As for the old European way of doing this, it sounds great and I do have more time than money but not THAT much time. :D.Maybe I'll do 1 wall that way, see how it goes.

[Don P]

The mass effect really doesn't begin to come into play until a log or timber gets above 8" thick. I'll try to dig up the chart if you're interested.

We have discussed this before, here's a couple of related threads I could remember, there's probably more;
https://forestryforum.com/board/index.php?topic=10049.0
https://forestryforum.com/board/index.php?topic=25812.0

[Dave Shepard]

A friend of mine built a log kit house, and the R value was 8.7. :( Something that slipped through the cracks, bank wasn't too happy either. Fortunately the second story was stick, so there is some insulation, at least.


Dave

[Don P]

Glass house= R2  ;D

I got a kick out of one of our clients. We had R40 something in the roof, R 30 something in the wall assembly, and tons of glass. Kinda like putting on a down parka and then leaving it unzipped.

You can do a whole house energy check using DOE's Res-Chek. We've had many kit clients with low R walls pass the whole house audit by using their tradeoffs. Usually more hat on the house does the most good the quickest  ;)

Also remember that R19 fiberglass in a wall does not mean the wall itself is R19 except on a piece of paper .

[barbender]

There's a good book on this method "The Craft of Modular Post and Beam" by James Mitchell if I remember right. He has some really good ideas in there.