Casa de Cowboy remodelling plans

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neb

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#259776 21-Oct-2019 23:52

We're finally getting closer to the big rebuild/bugfix of the Casa de Cowboy and I'd be interested in feedback from the peanut gallery. Here's the current state, a 1970s Universal home pole house:

This is the proposed updated version, first the only floor, now the top floor:

And the new bottom floor, dug out of the bank where the poles currently are:

I assume people will have various questions, so I've left the plans to speak for themselves for now...

mdf

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#2341566 22-Oct-2019 08:16

Woah, that is *palatial*! Just to confirm, you're rebuilding to enjoy all that space rather than with an eye to immediate resale?

BlinkyBill

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#2341567 22-Oct-2019 08:20

How is the house positioned relative to north?

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neb

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#2341737 22-Oct-2019 12:36

mdf: Woah, that is *palatial*! Just to confirm, you're rebuilding to enjoy all that space rather than with an eye to immediate resale?

Only if your name is Happy, Sneezy or Dopey. The plans don't show scale because that was at the edges of the scanned sheet, but the rooms are tiny. The master bedroom, bottom left, has just enough room for a king bed and nothing else, even a slim dresser would block access. The two other bedrooms are sized for a single bed and a writing desk up against the wall. Look at the bathroom size compared to the bedroom size, e.g. the smaller two are only a third bigger than the bathroom.

Reason for the rebuild is to enjoy the space for quite some time (hopefully decades), but also eventually to add to resale value, presumably the downstairs area will be turned into separate living/rental space by whoever buys it, because I'm pretty sure Auckland will have a housing shortage in $whatever_year_we_sell.

The other reason is to fix up a pile of the cowboy stuff like the deathtrap deck, the &#^&*# roof, the lack of insulation, etc. It needed a fair bit of work anyway, this is just rolling it all into one.

neb

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#2341739 22-Oct-2019 12:38

BlinkyBill:
How is the house positioned relative to north?

The left side is approximately north, so the master bedroom and downstairs office will get most of the sun. The living room gets afternoon sun and lovely sunsets, and the library will get morning sun. The revised layout was done with optimising sunlight into the house in mind.

duckDecoy

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#2341746 22-Oct-2019 12:47

Would it be useful to have a deck, even if tiny, on the LHS top level? This way you can easily put a ladder or movable scaffolding if you need to access the walls. This is my biggest regret on our pole house, should have put *something* outside our high side for no reason other than getting access.

Do you have a warming towel rail in the ensuite? If not, is it because there's a slider? Could replace the slider with a door, or move it inside the bedroom rather than the bathroom if you wanted one.

Can you put a door on the bottom/top of the stairs (or at least a frame so one can be put in later). If the bottom is rented out in the future this might be nice.

neb

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#2341765 22-Oct-2019 13:31

A deck there would block at least some of the sun to that part of the house, also there's a path leading down to there, and in general it's not terribly practical to put it there. It's also an area that doesn't really need external access much... no heated towel rail, that was one of the cowboy fittings I took out from both bathrooms. There's plenty of capability for air-drying.

There's a door at the bottom, next to the laundry, and one can be added at the top if required. I assume whoever buys will do some remodelling there anyway, thus the somewhat vaguely designated "work room".

duckDecoy

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#2341768 22-Oct-2019 13:34

neb: I assume whoever buys will do some remodelling there anyway, thus the somewhat vaguely designated "work room".

Will it be possible later to retrofit a kitchenette into the work room? Or will the rebuild be the only chance to get the plumbing etc in place.

neb

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#2341769 22-Oct-2019 13:35

Thus the laundy right next door, all the plumbing will be set up so it's just a case of bringing it through the wall. Or the laundry can turn itself into a kitchen once the house is sold.

kiwi_64

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#2341858 22-Oct-2019 14:20

just to confirm I'm reading this correctly; you're going from a 3 (small) bedroom home to a 1 (large) bedroom plus truckloads of living space?

I assume, if you were to sell, the 'Library', the 'Master', the 'Study' and the 'Work Area' could be dressed as bedrooms?

looks good

neb

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#2341885 22-Oct-2019 15:17

Yep, it's an extension of living space. The two smaller bedrooms are doing (poor) duty as offices/work areas, so we're making it official. Mrs.Neb is a psychologist so having a separate work area split off from the rest of the house would be good, thus the downstairs office with its own entrance.

When the place gets sold the rooms can be repurposed, they may go to someone with kids, or professionals who want to keep them as office space, it should be pretty flexible.

mdf

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#2341904 22-Oct-2019 16:08

I, for one, am concerned about the workroom. There's no way you will be able to get a table saw or full-bed CNC or laser cutter in through those 760mm doors. You might want to add external access there too? Or perhaps utilise those incredible German push-tilt-turn windows and deploy a sophisticated block and tackle set up under the upstairs deck? 😀

More seriously, looks pretty amazing if you only need one bedroom or dual purpose one of the library or work rooms.

Only substantive suggestion is whether you keep the HWC, or have the potential to go for infinity gas. You might be able to get the boiler for that in the downstairs subfloor space (along with central heating?). That would free up more storage space or perhaps even a network server cupboard.

And I guess thinking about cavity sliders instead of hinged doors on the bathrooms if you need a little bit of extra space for a washing basket or similar.

neb

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#2341911 22-Oct-2019 16:29

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Ah, yes, good point! There's currently a large, solid workbench in the small upstairs bedroom next to the living room that's stuck in there, having been assembled inside the room (we'll get it out when the dividing wall is removed), so having the same problem with the workroom would be an issue. Problem with adding an external entrance there is that that part is mostly inside the slope of the hill and surrounded by rocks, trees, and so on, so no easy access. That's also why that area was buried there and designed as a work room, it doesn't matter if it's a bit gloomy. Will have to think about that.

Hmm, hadn't thought about gas, I've experienced problems with flash heaters in the past which has made me a bit reluctant to use them. The existing HW cylinder is heavily insulated and relatively efficient, so it should be OK for now.

In terms of cavity sliders, the main reason not to use them is that the wall running across from the bathroom to the laundry is carrying the weight of a significant part of the house, the grey circles are the locations of the current piles that will be removed so the wall will be providing the replacement carrying capacity. It's not just a generic load-bearing wall, it's a LOAD-BEARING wall.

I'm also not a big fan of the things, they tend to have mechanical problems and get dirt and (sometimes) dead things trapped in the cavity. There's a slider on the upstairs ensuite and it's almost permanently open because it's such a pain to deal with.

Just as an additional note, for the walls we're going with Ytong concrete blocks instead of the usual blocks, since they provide both good strength and insulation in one unit.

Jase2985

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#2342095 22-Oct-2019 20:39

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i honestly wouldn't have them on the plans and council files as work room library etc, have them labeled as bedrooms. you can use them for what you want but it just looks better for buyers in the future.