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Folks are building houses and retrofitting existing houses with increased airtightness, and this is great. They use a blower door to help measure leakage, and this is also great. But then they think… Read More

Decks are disarmingly simple. The ones we are going to deal with have conditioned space under them. They are nothing more than roofs that you walk on. But we tend to mess them up royally. Perhaps it… Read More

Historically, so many problems have occurred with parapets that we have a name for it: “parapetitus.” They have a long history—which of course is not always clear—that allows me to embellish without… Read More

Spray polyurethane foam (SPF), the high-density stuff,1 is the only product (so far) that can perform all of the functions of the principal control layers of the “Perfect Wall.”2 The functions are… Read More

Blue Hawaii[1]Hawaii is a magnificent place – except if you want to build there.  Huh?  What’s so difficult about building on islands in the middle of the Pacific?  Check out Photograph 1.  Waikiki… Read More

…. at Fulton and his steamboatHershey and his chocolate bar….OK, this is one of my all-time favorite songs.  George and Ira Gershwin.  Performed for the first time by Ginger Rogers.  But everyone… Read More

General Limit States Design, Hygrothermal AnalysisAt a basic level a wall is an environmental separator.  It keeps the outside out and the inside in.  Easy to say, not always easy to do.To function… Read More

There.  I said it.  It just does not work.  OK, it works sometimes1.  But it does not work in tight building enclosures and certainly not in new houses, apartments, townhouses and row houses. … Read More

* Credit to architect Edward Mazria: I think he said this first, if he didn't say it first he sure says it well.Many “green” buildings don’t save energy (see “MIS-LEED-ING” sidebar). Why? They have… Read More

Buildings today are hollow and multilayered with numerous air gaps or void spaces. Chases, shafts, soffits and drops abound. Everything is connected to everything else, typically unintentionally.… Read More