4 Reasons to Choose Slipform Stone Masonry for the Home
Building slipform stone houses is really a labor of love. The technique is time consuming, physically difficult, and time draining. It isn't a prospect that your average owner/builder should take on without doing a great deal of research. This said, building your personal stone house utilizing the slipform method could be one of the satisfying experiences of your life, provided guess what happens you're getting into. As a strong proponent of slipform masonry, I thought I'd share five reasons that you might consider the technique.
Slipform Stone Masonry is simple to Learn
In the same way any building technique requires care, attention, and a bit of trial and error to master, building with slip forms does need a bit of effort to master. Even so, when you can use a level, move some rocks, and count, you can learn the basics of slipform building in a weekend. If your corners are square, your forms are plumb, and you also pay attention, the craft is more forgiving than many techniques, and lends itself well to learning as you go.
Stone Houses Require Little Maintenance
There's a lot to be said for permanence. Click here! guess that a well-built haybale home could have a useful life around 90 years - a few hundred year-old haybale structures do exist and so are still in use. NATURE News indicates that even a neglected cordwood house can be expected to last one hundred fifty years. On the other hand, there a many, many stone houses in use that are more than five hundred yrs . old, and several thousand year-old stone houses throughout Europe have already been continually inhabited since their construction. Couple this with a modern metal roof (with an expected useful life of a hundred years or more) and you will expect your slipform home to shelter your family in comfort for generations.
Stone Houses Are Valuable
If you're thinking about building with slipform masonry, you are likely also considering a number of other alternative and owner/builder options including Earthships, Hay Bale, Cordwood, and Post & Beam. With the possible exception of a traditionally build post and beam house, a slipform stone house is the only option that'll be as valuable or higher valuable than a traditional stick-built house. The market value of an attractive stone house generally exceeds that of other homes. Stone is lasting, stately, and speaks of permanence. These qualities appeal to buyers, and if the housing market is struggling or not, that may give you an advantage over other sellers, and a significant edge over those seeking to sell alternative homes - typically among the most difficult houses to sell.
Stone IS OF INTEREST All economic considerations aside - considering things on a purely aesthetic basis, stone looks great, also it looks great to everyone. More helpful hints of other popular owner-builder techniques is pretty subjective - some like one approach, others just like a different one. Earthships, for instance, have become attractive homes if you ask me, while my wife describes them as "weird-looking." No-one would describe a stone house as weird or unattractive, adding to the selling point of the style.
Whether slipform stone is for you or not is not a decision you possibly can make predicated on any online article, but as soon as you make the decision, there are a great number of reasons to feel good about stone. With luck, this short article has given you food for thought, or served to reaffirm your commitment to stone building.