Builds Quonset bunkers for a living. Lives in Dome Home in the woods

[Music] look out for a dome house Big B this is the same guy who built the underground quanset Hut there it is cool so should I M should I put it there yeah I think so put it here it's great you got just enough light it's perfect yeah it's a good timing because the sun's going down there what's that you guys got what are those things you just peel it off like this over and then you eat the outside man I didn't know I was going to have to teach him how to do the marshmallows so you have a dome house yeah it needs to get a lot of outside work yet but somebody was just selling a dome yeah and as far as getting a loan on a at a dome house or any of that stuff is there is it different well no cuz this house is completely done to to code this is like an overbuilt structure you know about domes like they're very super strong extremely well-built they had to go through a major permitting process on this thing the guy that sold it to me I ended up getting this for like a super good deal like half price and I still didn't want to buy it cuz the inside was terrible and then it was my son actually that said Dad this is the perfect place for you cuz it's a great it's a great pallet for me cuz that the way I build stuff I I love curved architecture this is a perfect canvas for me you know when I first came in here there was a 7 and 1/2t wall straight across from there to there but that's all all it was it was really really just you know disaster so I build everything I do all the physical stuff unless I need help but I do once I get this canvas is where I'd really love doing all that myself you really just come in here with a a blank canvas and you say okay what do I want to do and I literally Drew this on the floor here so I could get the feel of what I really wanted to do I I made these out I'm like no that's too long that's too far out and then I I eventually got to this point where the longest beam I could buy was 24t okay so from here to that back of that beam is 24 ft so I decided that that would be my radius I would go with this beam and everything would graduate back according to the wall and it would step back according to the step back of the wall so that's how I got that curve uh decision on how much to hang over right so this is all new here with the spiral staircase and all that it wasn't really functional so I put that curve in there that 6t it's a 6t radius that wall right there it's a serpent wall so right from this point of this stairs I did the circle and then that's how that Circle wall ended up being exactly 6ot radius and then it comes into a different uh spin on it it reverses Direction and curves that way and these doors are actually built with a curve on them as well so they kind of follow the wall it's a slight curve it's not 100% curve what it is it's got a 5° angle cut in there and these doors will put back together cuz I tried hanging them when they're straight but it wouldn't work it rubs on the wall so I had to get some some cavity behind it so you wanted more curve I mean you already have a dome but you wanted I I if you if you ever see some of my stuff I build I do a lot of Curves like I I'm always doing curve radius sealings I do barrel roll ceilings I do that a lot you guys come on I have some water that's all I really got is water coffee or wine which I think you'll probably [Laughter] go what it really does a curve the frequency of a arch structure when you're in it there's a guy put a a sound recorder inside the structure a square room and it was complete silence but the recording was chaos because you got the 90s angles the 90s everywhere flat ceiling walls and then he went into a structure that was curved and he said was like a symphony yeah it's right there that's why people love it when they come into a curved structure because they just naturally feel comfortable you know because it's something going on in there so a dome is the the perfect structure because it's like as nature as it gets right I've only ever seen two other domes about 10 years ago I never saw until I got back to here you know the more research you do on a dome the more you'll want one think of this you know our value this is considered r80 most homes are like R40 or something so this place it costs in the coldest months cost 80 bucks a month to to heat for the uh propane stove the propane dryer and then of course the water heaters propane this has like a this has an old propane stove and I just kind of like it it's like a it kind of looks like something from the 80s you know and I just left it CU I like the oldfashioned thing you know yeah is it off grid is that why things are on propane I mean yeah it has solar panels in the back and it has a whole solar system that it runs off of but then you can flip-flop between it so you can have the solar on and if it ever needs extra power it'll pull it on and the Sun comes out and then it goes back on the Soder so it only costs 80 bucks a month to heat and that's in the coldest season when it's like ice outside so it's a little warmer in here than normal but it's cuz I had a fire going for 3 hours now now in the summer when it's 95 outside or 100° this place will stay as long as you don't open up the windows it'll stay about 70 so you don't even need air conditionings so a lot of people say that round structures are difficult for furniture that you're this wasted space but you seem to have found ways to even have like a music Nook I don't think it's a big issue the nice thing about a dome is you get a lot of space at the bottom side right you got up to there that kind of comes down kind of straight on the bottom it's not that curved on the bottom and you got some straight walls in here too and behind all these cabinets I mean they they built the interior walls that are straight and behind the fridge is got the curved kind of cave looking there right but I am actually buying I'm getting a couch so you can imagine that couch sitting right here I have added this coach I had coming that I had made I've been looking for a half round couch for like about 6 months and finally I found this one you know and it's it's a perfect couch originally when I first moved here it's a very odd phenomenon that happens I was standing over here and I could hear somebody in the back corner talking but it sound like it was coming from here it was just like they're talking right here even though they're in that back corner so what's happening is the sound rolls up over top of the ceiling and come back down and you hear it on this side so cuz the sound will travel like that instead of straight across to me from here it'll go up here and you'll you'll notice that if the longer you're here you'll notice that if I talk and you're over there you'll hear me from over there but now that I got the ceiling done these walls are here it interferes with that trajectory of the sound waves oh the bedroom has lower ceiling because of the upstairs yeah this is this is where I built that the kind of like the office is upstairs now right I built this way a lot I built stuff with exposed beams and finish I love this look the final look is the tongue and groove and it's actually I think it's cheaper to build this way because it's already finished you can see that this particular Sawmill has a big b it's it's a big saw blade it's not a band saw it's a saw blade so you can see the marks in there and I wanted to have that saw blade look in there cuz I wanted that rustic feel you know and then if you can see these beams actually don't go into the Dome they actually are hanging on bolts that go through the Dome walls that's what sucked in there to hold that to the wall so that's all stable like super strong sheer strength like that thing will take 10,000 PB pound and then obviously the wall itself is the supporting wall for the other side and then of course once the whole thing gets nailed in and tied together this thing it can't move you know because there's so much going on right so and then you have in the back you like a little Library yeah well this is actually the entrance into the master bathroom but I'm actually renovating this part of my renovation is to remove this wall okay and then this will become the whole bathroom yeah come on in have a look this was not designed very well yeah they got this tub which I'm going to take out and put a claw foot I'm going to move the sink shower I got a lot of stuff on mine that's going to happen here W yeah but it's you know you can only do one thing at a time right yeah especially when you're not hiring people cuz I I do all this stuff on my couple days a week you know I do all my own work my trade for 30 years as a carpenter this is what I love doing I don't ever get tired of it D come on up okay now I'm going to warn you the upstairs is not really finished but it's it's underway right but so it's an open Office yeah this is the open Office this will always be like this yeah yeah so now what will happen here these doors will access event eventually we'll access the other bedroom here okay so did you want this kind of balcony was it important to you that you could be like perched over the downstairs yeah I like the can to lever over just for design cuz when you look up from below you see all those beams coming off and I definitely wanted to have the access to be able to stand up here and look down and see see the living room down there so it's kind of fun you know you can see people down there it's like any house with the balcony an upper floor looking down yeah and then that bedroom over there will be quite private yeah this was a little tricky because it's so close to this wall right yeah so I I couldn't slide that door that way so this is how this will eventually work okay is it'll go like this that's how it's going to be eventually okay so it's a sliding and opening door yeah it it opens out of the way so you can have it like that you know and um and then when you when someone's ready to go to bed or whatever they want to do then they just pull this like this and then slide it over so there'll be a handle on here and then this will this will open up like this eventually you know now now close it shut there's a lot of tweaking to do on this thing but it's it's just an idea I came up with because I didn't know how to make this door work because you can't really have a door there and try to open it because it hits the Dome so this came out after a lot of thinking how can I get a door to work on this balcony and not just put a tiny little door here I wanted it to be Broad and open so when you're up in this bedroom you can really like you know get the nice view instead of feeling like a little door you know so this is how I come up with this little trick here so it is interesting now we're really inside the Dome you really feel like you're in the roof of the Dome yeah yeah it's really cool I mean and just think about it from our feet where we're standing here look at how much height there still is left right there's a ton of height yeah it's you know yeah I wish I would have had that railing on here before you got here I won't step over so imagine having this as the guest bedroom so this will be all carpeted and then I'm going to have pillows around there so it kind of acts like your own little couch in your bedroom these solar skylights used to come into the kitchen they have quite a few in here there's three solar skylights in here and then we got the division wall here which is also curved similar to the downstairs wall if anybody's staying here they'll have their own bathroom up here too they can have their own access yeah this place has been on this has been in construction zone for like a year wow so this is the utility room back here okay so this whole system runs the floor heat and this is an OnDemand heater and this takes care of everything this is the the only one that's hot in this hole right now is this one it's not even warm actually but at night this will run this little pump and it circulates that hot water through the floor this is the washer that's the dryer Runs Out propane so it really doesn't cost a lot because the only thing that generally uses a lot of power as a dryer and then here's the solar system right here this is the power bank batteries there and there's another big giant battery Bank there behind that one this will run the whole house and actually ran the whole house for 10 years W yeah but I'll show you the other way through the house this comes through the walkthrough closet okay into the bedroom now oh so this will still this will remain a walk-in closet yeah this is this is the walk-in closet yeah I was going to tell you something funny I I was doing the texture on the walls I'm like that kind of looks like a tree and I thought I'm going to try doing a palm tree the only reason I'm telling you that story mainly is because you're going to ask me why did I paint the wall like that well my daughter was 5 years old and I'm doing I'm like Athena do whatever you want and she made almost the exact same palm tree it's nice cuz the house is like it's not conventional so you just going with anything right the walls are what you want them to be right sure you go right ahead yeah that's the one you don't use that other door though cuz that that's just been temporary I literally just put that on like last week but I kept the old door for now until I get it all set up and I like the energy that comes off the fire can mention I used to live in the wilderness up on a lake in Canada so I literally heated my house with a wood stove all the time I was totally off grid and that's actually where I learned started learning my bu building trade was there so I built my first cabin and I started learning my my trade and then I ended up building cabins for people out there about 3 years later I was building a bunch of cabins out there for people nice so now you're in a dome yeah this section here is going to be a renovation I do when I'm done the outside I'm going to take that roof and it's going to become a concrete similar design as that except it will be Cur rolled curve like a eyebrow so you're going to look at it's going to look like a part of this system and that's the only reason I didn't really want to buy this place CU it didn't have a shop and I thought well I can just build one you know yeah well you're a builder so you can build what you need right I can do it it's just it's everything takes time so you're like a little I'm a little impatient so I'm like I want it now when I got the place yeah this was all forested up here I mean a lot of spindly trees like that yeah so it was really kind of not very nice and you can see that I actually literally took all that and piled that last year oh wow yeah So eventually this will get all cleared because this this property goes as far as your I can see that way what do you want to do with the property you want to build more or just kind of well the real the real plan I have is I want to build a hobbit town in there I'm GNA have 10 Hobbit houses undergrounds and I'm building them the way I build my undergrounds so I already know how to do it the insides will be clad with with the facade of actually the architecture of from the Lord Lord of the Rings that's going to be something I do just for fun it's going to take obviously about 5 years to do that wow you can see that thing looks like a something out of Star Wars you know with all the blisters and stuff on it so when I get to fixing this thing in the spring I'm going to get rid of those blisters I got a way to do it I'm going to recat it with a special product they have that you can get it colored you don't have to paint it it's like a spackle what are the blisters the blisters are the canvas on the outside that they blow up right yeah the the structure and then they spray foam it so every once in a while they were having a problem with the adherence of the of the actual spray foam to the so wherever it didn't adhere it creates a cond an area where the it'll swell up in the condensation okay uh whenever there's a heat transfer thing but the good news is below that surface is all spray foam 4 to 6 in so it's a closed cell spray foam so it doesn't leak okay you won't ever get any leaking there's not a leak in that place there's just a couple solar tubes yeah that's one I was mentioning those are those those are those Skylight tubes and then they got actual couple real Skylight which is the one up in the office and one on the other side how old is the house 2006 I believe okay so it's about so it's been around for a while yeah yeah yeah yeah this is in the master bedroom where I was showing you earlier there's actually a lot more light than I originally I was like it's going to be kind of dark in here but it really is not bad at all this is this is a lot of window compared to that other side yeah this is Southern Exposure yeah Southern Exposure yeah it it works great I mean I love it I I I began to fell more in love with this house the longer I live here more I was like it's perfect you know it's just perfect for me there's a fire in there bet you I can break it

Channel: Kirsten Dirksen

Views: 138,034

Keywords: dome home, monolithic dome home, underground quonset hut builder, personalized dome home, round home, underground quonset hut, viking shelters, pacific northwest, survival shelter, fallout shelter, zombie-proof home, hyper-insulated home, off-grid home, owner-built home, self-reliance, insulation, thermal efficiency, whimsical homes, steel-reinforced concrete, polyurethane foam, extreme-weather structures, disaster-proof home, fallout shelters, survivalism, preparedness

Id: fRRwNa9tpU8

Length: 20min 9sec (1209 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 10 2024