essentially it's just a hodgepodge of sustainable living, passive/net zero home design, and off grid solutions.
a large property, with multiple lots arranged around a central hub which provides utilities to the outer lots (rain/well water and power) and each lot has a leach bed that goes away from the central hub...
like a culdesac centered around a power/water/internet building with leach beds and gardens on the outer edges.
central hub is a large barn that serves as a community area... a wood/metal/mechanic shop, a meeting place, a shelter, a defensible position...
all roofs on property facing south for solar, large south facing windowed walls, essentially earthship designs.
you could get 6 familes into a big property, each with their own house and garden and animals and yard to do whatever they want.
you could go mad max and ring the property with double stacked shipping containers with a sally port secure entrance at the main gate if you really wanted to tell the world to go fuck themselves...
if you have your own water, power, and sewer and food and ammo in a secure compound nobody is going to fuck with you... they can't... you become the fastest guy running from the wolf.
I'm LOVIN THIS 👆🏼 Speaking of shipping containers, I'm very well versed in their utilization in all scenarios. I first marvelled at the possibilities 2004 Mosul Iraq...a guy in a competing contract had setup a living/rec/utility area right on the edge of Mosul Airfield using containers. He staggered/stacked some and made a bar-nightclub, his living area was adjacent. I'd go over & hangout "after-hours"...a lot of the Army gals would come by, as "drinking in theater" was verboten it became fairly popular. That guy & his buddies would go INTO THE CITY on fully-armed booze runs!! Yeah, ballsy. Ended up on another contract in Baghdad adjacent to BIAP-the airport. I took what I saw in Mosul & recreated it. The Airport had a killer cigar/alcohol store so that part wasn't as sketchy but I built a rec area with containers. In the war zone contracts go invisible and everyone shared their resources. I had a big forklift and bartered it's use with the DFAC-chow hall crew for all kinds of foodstuffs. They had to unload trucks by hand previously. Anyway, your idea is solid and I love it. One last...the steel used on most of those containers is pretty thick. I got in one in Afghanistan as Taliban started coming over the walls & strafing my site. 7.62 left nice dents but didn't puncture the steel. Can confirm 👍🏼 Proven American TOUGH.
yeah those cans are all made of corten steel which is an alloy that produces an oxide layer that actually protects the steel underneath. they rust, but they take longer.
they are small arms proof, fire proof, bug proof... if you weld them to a steel foundation it can be pretty much tornado/hurricane proof...
be sure you buy 9.5 tall "high cubes" instead of the 8 foot tall standards, you'll need it.
the weight bearing is mostly done on the posts, but the corrugated side walls are just as important to the whole system... they prevent racking and twisting and keep the roof line from sagging... essentially converting the entire 40 foot span into a sort of I beam but it's not strong enough to rely on for structural integrity.
so long as you focus on the posts it's an easy thing to build, you can easily drop an I beam on either end then use it as a rail to drop multiple side by side containers.
once that beam is part of a foundation (either pinned to piers or a foundation wall), the containers can be ratcheted together tightly before welding them together with stitch welded plates, then stitched tot he beams to lock the entire structure together.
once the first floor is solid... you can add another beam over all the posts and keep stacking.
if you remove walls from any containers, you either need to fully support any door or window openings before you make any cuts, or stitch the top roof rail to a beam allowing you to remove the entire interior wall to join multiple containers together. they are designed to be stacked a dozen high but they will fail quickly if you start cutting walls without supporting first.
floors will most likely be garbage, even if they are in good shape you should tear them out and replace them... the OEM floors are marine grade plywood that start out with all sorts of chemicals to prevent rot... then whatever else gets soaked up in them during shipping... all of that will off gas over time so you at least need to seal the shit out of them... i'd suggest replacing them.
insulate with closed cell spray, then backfill with open cell or anything else that can stuff your wall cavities with.
if you know how to use a grinder and a welder you can build just about anything you want... but they aren't for every application.
there are some other cool building methods as well that should be looked at... hyper adobe bags are pretty fucking cool too... essentially it's a long fabric tube that holds dirt. you can keep filling it and making it conform to any shape or length you want (great for curved walls), then you just pack the bags flat with a tamper to compact it. when you're finished you slap a few coats of cobb on the walls and you've got a super insulated wall for next to nothing cost wise... just takes a ton of labor.
it's similar to the old tires packed with dirt that get used to make "earthships" but without having to register your home as a dump site in the new mexico desert.
at this point though we are sorta late in the game, i'd suggest if you plan to build something you should get the superstructure up fast and finish it out over time. stack up a bunch of containers, weld them together, slap a roof on it and finish out a few rooms to start. you can finish out the rest of the house over time.
GTFO ASAP plan starts with a big pole barn you can park an RV or camper in... provide it hookups...
Excellent follow-up. Those adobe bags remind me of the HESCO fence-walls utilized in OIF & OEF for quick force protection. There’s a guy on YT that does container build videos & he’s got great tips too...but lost his info after YT banned me & shut down my Channel. Yeah cutting window holes etc into containers needs serious beam reinforcement as structural integrity gets comp’d. I wish I’d started all this sooner in life...
4 cans, 2 on each side, gives you an 80 foot long pole barn. if you mono slope that roof with some standing seam you'll have a ton of sqft to mount a huge solar array and an insane amount of surface to collect rain water off of.
get the roof rafters custom built out of metal, order them pitched to match your sites solar profile for optimal gain.
make the opening big enough to park a camper or RV and you've got a super quick home to live in.
essentially it's just a hodgepodge of sustainable living, passive/net zero home design, and off grid solutions.
a large property, with multiple lots arranged around a central hub which provides utilities to the outer lots (rain/well water and power) and each lot has a leach bed that goes away from the central hub...
like a culdesac centered around a power/water/internet building with leach beds and gardens on the outer edges.
central hub is a large barn that serves as a community area... a wood/metal/mechanic shop, a meeting place, a shelter, a defensible position...
all roofs on property facing south for solar, large south facing windowed walls, essentially earthship designs.
you could get 6 familes into a big property, each with their own house and garden and animals and yard to do whatever they want.
you could go mad max and ring the property with double stacked shipping containers with a sally port secure entrance at the main gate if you really wanted to tell the world to go fuck themselves...
if you have your own water, power, and sewer and food and ammo in a secure compound nobody is going to fuck with you... they can't... you become the fastest guy running from the wolf.
Fantastic!
I'm LOVIN THIS 👆🏼 Speaking of shipping containers, I'm very well versed in their utilization in all scenarios. I first marvelled at the possibilities 2004 Mosul Iraq...a guy in a competing contract had setup a living/rec/utility area right on the edge of Mosul Airfield using containers. He staggered/stacked some and made a bar-nightclub, his living area was adjacent. I'd go over & hangout "after-hours"...a lot of the Army gals would come by, as "drinking in theater" was verboten it became fairly popular. That guy & his buddies would go INTO THE CITY on fully-armed booze runs!! Yeah, ballsy. Ended up on another contract in Baghdad adjacent to BIAP-the airport. I took what I saw in Mosul & recreated it. The Airport had a killer cigar/alcohol store so that part wasn't as sketchy but I built a rec area with containers. In the war zone contracts go invisible and everyone shared their resources. I had a big forklift and bartered it's use with the DFAC-chow hall crew for all kinds of foodstuffs. They had to unload trucks by hand previously. Anyway, your idea is solid and I love it. One last...the steel used on most of those containers is pretty thick. I got in one in Afghanistan as Taliban started coming over the walls & strafing my site. 7.62 left nice dents but didn't puncture the steel. Can confirm 👍🏼 Proven American TOUGH.
yeah those cans are all made of corten steel which is an alloy that produces an oxide layer that actually protects the steel underneath. they rust, but they take longer.
they are small arms proof, fire proof, bug proof... if you weld them to a steel foundation it can be pretty much tornado/hurricane proof...
be sure you buy 9.5 tall "high cubes" instead of the 8 foot tall standards, you'll need it.
the weight bearing is mostly done on the posts, but the corrugated side walls are just as important to the whole system... they prevent racking and twisting and keep the roof line from sagging... essentially converting the entire 40 foot span into a sort of I beam but it's not strong enough to rely on for structural integrity.
so long as you focus on the posts it's an easy thing to build, you can easily drop an I beam on either end then use it as a rail to drop multiple side by side containers.
once that beam is part of a foundation (either pinned to piers or a foundation wall), the containers can be ratcheted together tightly before welding them together with stitch welded plates, then stitched tot he beams to lock the entire structure together.
once the first floor is solid... you can add another beam over all the posts and keep stacking.
if you remove walls from any containers, you either need to fully support any door or window openings before you make any cuts, or stitch the top roof rail to a beam allowing you to remove the entire interior wall to join multiple containers together. they are designed to be stacked a dozen high but they will fail quickly if you start cutting walls without supporting first.
floors will most likely be garbage, even if they are in good shape you should tear them out and replace them... the OEM floors are marine grade plywood that start out with all sorts of chemicals to prevent rot... then whatever else gets soaked up in them during shipping... all of that will off gas over time so you at least need to seal the shit out of them... i'd suggest replacing them.
insulate with closed cell spray, then backfill with open cell or anything else that can stuff your wall cavities with.
if you know how to use a grinder and a welder you can build just about anything you want... but they aren't for every application.
there are some other cool building methods as well that should be looked at... hyper adobe bags are pretty fucking cool too... essentially it's a long fabric tube that holds dirt. you can keep filling it and making it conform to any shape or length you want (great for curved walls), then you just pack the bags flat with a tamper to compact it. when you're finished you slap a few coats of cobb on the walls and you've got a super insulated wall for next to nothing cost wise... just takes a ton of labor.
it's similar to the old tires packed with dirt that get used to make "earthships" but without having to register your home as a dump site in the new mexico desert.
at this point though we are sorta late in the game, i'd suggest if you plan to build something you should get the superstructure up fast and finish it out over time. stack up a bunch of containers, weld them together, slap a roof on it and finish out a few rooms to start. you can finish out the rest of the house over time.
GTFO ASAP plan starts with a big pole barn you can park an RV or camper in... provide it hookups...
that gets you out of the city fast.
Excellent follow-up. Those adobe bags remind me of the HESCO fence-walls utilized in OIF & OEF for quick force protection. There’s a guy on YT that does container build videos & he’s got great tips too...but lost his info after YT banned me & shut down my Channel. Yeah cutting window holes etc into containers needs serious beam reinforcement as structural integrity gets comp’d. I wish I’d started all this sooner in life...
4 cans, 2 on each side, gives you an 80 foot long pole barn. if you mono slope that roof with some standing seam you'll have a ton of sqft to mount a huge solar array and an insane amount of surface to collect rain water off of.
get the roof rafters custom built out of metal, order them pitched to match your sites solar profile for optimal gain.
make the opening big enough to park a camper or RV and you've got a super quick home to live in.
it's never to late, buy some land.