This 5000 sf Canadian House can basically be heated with a hairdryer!

on the build show today we're gonna be touring this incredible 5,000 square foot house being built here in Canada that's gonna use basically a hairdryer to keep it warm it's built so efficiently today's build show brought to you by sigue and it's AG windows and quad lock it let's get going hey guys we're outside of Vancouver British Columbia I want to introduce you to the Builder and the homeowner right here Mike Cairns with initech windows and doors now Mike this is your personal family's house right it is and this is not a small house we're like 5000 square feet is all right that's right yeah all right now the title the video that I put on this was that you could heat and cool this house basically with a hairdryer let's talk about that before we get into it tell me about what's going on with that well what we're building here is a passive home so the whole concept is we put a big thick sweater on the outside so even though we've got some pretty awful winters here now we don't require much energy to heat it or keep it cool in the summer time and how much energy are we talking for else like this we're talking like 1600 watts Wow so maybe like 15 to 20 dozen BTUs of heat for this giant house and that's it because it's built so well and there's two things that we're talking about here right we're talking about lots of thick insulation which you can see here from already so what's the other big part or the other big component on that the big component is the high quality windows and doors and air tightness in general and house there tightness lack of thermal bridges continuity and out of thermal envelope there's lots of details that go into it but once they come together it looks really good for sure now Mike we took a tour earlier of your factory and I got to say I was really impressed y'all make some incredible products now one thing that not everyone might be familiar with is the frame material you guys are using which is you PVC very different than a standard vinyl window that most people think of can you can you give us kind of a brief explanation of what you PVC is the basic difference is the U stands for unplastered size so it doesn't have all those chemicals and fillers and things that typically go into what you think of as plastic windows or PVC so it's not like that you know the Chinese toys that are gonna you know poison your kids and stuff like that it's it's a product that is recyclable that's manufactured in a clean environmentally friendly manner a totally closed system and it's a strong product so we can build out of it expect multi decades of use and at the end of life we can recycle it and turn it back into brand-new windows and doors yeah in fact I was talking to the the founder owner of the company earlier he was telling me that when you recycle that you PVC you could actually recycle it up to eight times and even gets stronger over time in terms of recycling because there's less contaminants and it over time so that's that's pretty incredible I didn't realize you could do that and the other thing I thought was really cool was the testing that y'all did in your facility let's cut to the factory real quick and show you how they test their windows alright guys so they just ran a test for me behind me this is an expensive test rig like a million plus bucks on a test rig and what they're actually doing is pulling windows off the line somewhere between five and ten percent of the windows that they're making here they're testing and the cool thing about this test rate compared to most the ones I've seen is this is a non-destructive rig so see all the clamps these look like woodworkers clamps all the way around the window they're taking the window right off the line they're pressurizing it with the clamps and then they're testing it and then they can unclamp it and send it back out to a job so they're actually testing units that are going in the field but check out the numbers on this unit in particular this is a point two five you factor so basically an R for window and then we've got a solar heat gain coefficient of 0.1 nine that's for this operable and then they've moved this thicker but this sticker is for the fixed side 0.25 and points you to this would be a great window for a Texan great numbers and then of course as we've seen today they make this in triple-glazed as well but one thing I wanted to point out is typically mauled windows I try and stay away from them because I find that when windows are mauled together that's a weak point and and that can be water can migrate in but check this out look at this top rail the top rail on the frame is continuous and then this Center rail where that where they're not mulled together but it's basically one big unit is continuous and they had this thing cranked up a minute ago and they're talking about six gallons per square foot per hour at 15 psi which is equivalent to 77 miles an hour no leaks very very impressive these are high performance windows and I got I got I kind of squeezed out of them a little bit of price to a unit like this where we've got like maybe a four by six fixed and then we've got this tilt turn operable right here which is maybe I don't know thirty inches by four feet something like that I'm talking about maybe 1200 issue dollars not bad at all for those numbers and then if you want to add triple-glazed to that and get down to a you factor of like 0.16 we're talking about a 20% off charge not bad at all now this is standard white remember this is uPVC you're gonna pay a little bit more if you want to color on there again that's like a 15-20 percent of charge but for those kind of numbers this is an incredible value for a really high performance product higher mic you got to tell us how this house is built it looks like a big foam box let's walk up and take a look shall we okay so we're seeing strapping on the outside that's not like a standard one before I've ever seen before it isn't it's actually the crates that we bring our materials from Germany in so we pull them apart and make use of them wherever possible sometimes they're garden boxes sometimes it's soffit and in this case it's this traffic that is crates from his German suppliers how cool is that it's basically kind of like a pallet material right yeah and and what's the species of that wood so that's a large okay and it looks thicker than than a 3/4 inch what is that it's a true 1 by 6's 1 inch thick yeah so it's a 5 quarter as we would say in America that's awesome and then talk to me about the foam that I'm seeing there is this an ICF house is this wood framed house how much foam do you have here there's a lot of foam it's a calm so it's an ICF foundation okay with a standard two by six wood framed wall with another six point six seven inches exterior insulation for our 25 on top of the regular value holy cow and I'm loving how deep set your windows are here with these beautiful metal pans that you've got a mock up for us to take a look at how about we can meet you inside and we'll show you the mock-up all right guys check out these awesome mock-ups that Mike did to kind of explain to people how his systems and how his passive house was built first off here's these foundation Mike you were telling me that you actually laid this quad lock pretty quickly is that right yeah it was just a couple days a couple days and you and your dad put all these blocks in yourselves all the blocks as well as the rebar and everything man that's incredible and these kind of snap together like a Lego block is that right that's exactly how okay and and what did you tell me originally it took you like two days to put all the blocks in and get the rebar ready to go yeah that's incredible for what's the crawlspace height downstairs three four feet it's three feet at the bottom it's actually a five foot foundation wall okay a six foot at this end gotcha hey guys coming to you from probably the nicest condition crawlspace I've ever seen we are in the snowy cold Vancouver area and yet this crawl space on an unconditioned house under construction when it's like 30 degrees outside has to be 50 or 60 and Mike the owner the Builder has literally like a space heater upstairs just keeping the temperature up and when this house is completed we're talking about a heating load for the whole like 5,000 square-foot house of like under two thousand watts this is crazy now a couple benefits of a conditioned crawl space number one we're in the air conditioned envelope or conditioned envelope at a house down here so all our services are ducting everything is going to be within the envelope and because it's a passive house and because it's so airtight and so well insulated and it requires such little heat in fact he's heating and cooling the house and you can see down there with one Zender unit that has basically a heat pump attached to it it gives the heat that we need for the entire house and so those little tubes right there are bringing in fresh filtered and heated air to the entire house now the foundation of the house is quad lock and we're going to I'm going to show you the kind of mock-up but Mike the homeowner and his dad actually did it themselves and they laid out this entire foundation ready for the concrete guys in two days with a quad lock system two guys that were handy but have never done it before this is this is impressive now we've got room down here in this crawlspace to crawl around to creep her out in this case to do a remodel to service things to take care of a plumbing leak in 30 years if we were had one or two run new cat 27 wire that we need in twenty-fifty down on this end of the house it's pretty nice I got to say very impressive so it's it's tall enough to get all your utilities in but not big enough to make a true basement out of that someday yeah and this two by here is meant to simulate the top of concrete now talk to me about your air tightness details because you've got a bunch of different sigue tapes you're using and some other products to maintain that continuous air barrier right yeah so we used a poly down in the basement to make it very easy to tie in to the ugga slab and guy was also Paulie ran that up we use some high quality takes to ensure that we had a good seal between the two different substances there paulien and Tyvek yep we do have an exterior barrier that ties down in there's basically a tarp around the footing okay so that carries it up the exterior waterproofing and that's hard that's Harper on your footing I'm starting rub that's for capillary break right not for air tightness because we want to make sure that soil water is not sucking up into this concrete right it serves both purposes at the same time okay all right good do I'm sorry keep going yeah and then that layer brings up and we have some more high-quality tapes that bring us in to continue that air barrier detail on the exterior so it's really about we've got two different layers just to make sure that we're covered no matter what makes sense now on the quad lock this is your standard block from those guys but then you decided to add some additional insulation on the outside right I did so there's an extra r12 on here I could have just ordered it I didn't find out till afterwards I could have just ordered it as six inches instead of three inch and throught I guess yeah but my understanding is when you started building and designing this you weren't thinking it was gonna be a passive house at that point is that nice right and what made you make the decision hey I should go ahead and add some more foam and really thicken this house up and tighten it down it was just that I had learned enough about passive house to realize I would be kicking myself for the rest of my life if I didn't build that standard yeah I love it and this is not a house that you're gonna resell in three years right you're gonna be here awhile well if somebody you know comes in with a big giant offer hello alright so then let's continue back with this air tightness detail so this RIS am tapetum sigue is taping to your Tyvek and then you're tying that to your sill sealer which is tied with some adhesives to this front piece of Tyvek and then talk to me about what's happening with your WRB into the face over here yeah so we've got them my best coming down the face of the building and then at the very bottom we've got two taped off to the Tyvek we also ran the Fen trim tape down at the bottom to connect it to this we'd love no cuts on top of the foam so that gives us a seal for the air and also a shedding surface down out to the face gotcha and you're you're probably not gonna get a lot of water here based on what I saw on the outside cuz you've got big overhang pretty much on the whole house but what I thought was really cool and I should have pointed this out earlier is all of your overhangs are built on top of your phones all right that's that's right to make it as few thermal bridges as possible we didn't want to have great big lag bolts you know going in we didn't want to have that wood pressed up tight against the sheathing here we wanted to make sure the phone was continuous yep so we just attached everything and screwed it to those that nice thick one inch material that's in there so good all right now walk you through this this is some seriously thick foam on the outside of your house Mike what do we got going on there so this is a six and 5/8 inch thick it's just basically regular EPS foam this is also from the guys at quad log okay so you bought all the exterior foam from quad lock-on yep and it's a pretty convenient to put on to be honest because it actually just stacks up like Lego blocks - me enough so you just stack it right up stack it up and then throw your your rain screen huh yeah I saw you've got one or two screws maybe holding it on until you put the rain screen on one screw per block is that all it needs any one size me those blocks there were by H sheets I got the only way like 14 15 pounds each alrights not bad at all all right now this details cool talk us through what's going on here with this angle on the phone yeah well we had actually decided on the fill detail first so we copied the angle of the sill in the foam we just cut it with an angle on the circular saw and hand sawed it to finish it off any any rough tooth handsaw works great gotcha way better than like hot knives they fill your lungs in the atmosphere up with chemicals yeah so the window is taped so this is the window flange right here being taped with some fence room tape and obviously you go so the window is already sealed off to the building the WRB everything is airtight everything's watertight so now we're just making sure that the window ties into that and watertight layer and we've taped down on to a piece of blue skin that I put on top of the foam so that just easily sheds all the water out to the face of the rain screen so anything that happens to weep out of the system the the window is designed to channel water through it gotcha so if something were to get past the seal right here basically or this one there's a weep that's down here that would let that water out exactly so then that water can easily escape it's set up this foam is on top to add some insulation value to the frame and that decreases the internal temperature so that's fantastic for comfort and condensation and the sill just sort of plunks on top I like that man is it somebody locally made these cells for you yeah this is just been touched by my friends Dave so he does a great job it's nice heavy gauge steel look like 24 games maybe steel right here that's pretty painted yeah we're ready to go yeah and once we put that on throw some trim work on top and I put an apron underneath none of the stuff is gonna go anywhere and we never have to maintain it I love it and then what's your final siding that's going on the front of the building it's actually going to be a metal cladding so it's gonna butt up against the wood trim so it again everything's prefinished in it it even comes in pre couple links we order it to the exact size we want and just pop it in hey Mike before we close it out let me show these guys a couple of the cool products that I saw at your showroom let's cut over the showroom okay y'all we're at the Innotech factory and they've got a showroom here let me show you a couple cool things they've got here including a mock-up I really like all right so Intertek that I would consider kind of not standard from the North American market and some even that I didn't even see in Germany so check this out this is a double french-style door but one of their hallmarks is extreme engineering and a really tight window indoor products that are going to perform really well and one of the reasons why they do that is because they've got multiple seals on the door so for instance on this door you've got two sets of weather stripping when that door closes against and then there's a third weather stripping actually on the doorframe itself also notice the hinges are on the inside so they're not restricting these at all but check out how many locks we've got we've got one two three four five six seven eight locks plus the three hinges so when that door closes and locks its locking and really tight all right the next thing I want to show you is this now they do a lot of tilt in turns in Europe and I really like these so this looks like a standard casement again it's got tons of locking mechanisms all the way around and that same weather stripping designs but check this out you can vent it from the top which I like is that you've got your hot air which is going to go out your fresh air which is going to come in but this one's totally unique I see these in Europe this looks like a great design for North America and it looks to me like only initech has it a screen on the till turn because that window is tilting in there's nowhere to put that screen but in this case they've designed a screen that's on the outside of the frame so you're not gonna trap any bugs in between your window and let's walk over I want to show you the lifting slide mechanism doors so lift and slide I really like lift and slide look how easy it is to just slide that door easy gliding and then when you get it closed what's happening here is this handle got a nice long handle it's gonna switch to the lock position and what happens is the door actually sits down on to the frame below no when it sits down under the frame you've got this double gasket system so it's gonna be nice and airtight and that's really one of the hallmarks of Intertek is excellent energy efficiency frames with really good you factors but it's really about air tightness as well and that's why you can get a bunch of Passivhaus certified windows through these guys as well look how easy that hardware operates basically one finger that's really nice and oh by the way you could also if you wanted to say open it 3/4 inches you could close it and then the doors not gonna move but you can get some fresh air through that someone couldn't climb through the door on there that's some nice stuff let me show you some cross sections they have over here we're seeing a lot of this type of construction happening throughout Canada as we kind of traveled around and what you're looking at here is standard wood frame construction this is the outside on this mock-up and check this out we've got multiple inches of rock wall this is probably eight inches of rock on the outside and a lot of guys are making these sheet metal this looks like 24 gauge metal pans on the outside so that when that windows recessed back and it's basically set at the framing level you've got some place for water to come up there and run out and not get this wet it's a really nice mock-up I like seeing all that rock wall up there and then you can see they've got a rock wall in the cavity as well and then this is highlighting the steel that they're using in a lot of their windows so these are you PVC and then they've got these these red pieces that are painted so you can see it this is basically steel that's reinforcing the windows so they're nice and strong they've got both triple-glazed and some really high or in this case I should say low high efficiency but low you factor double glazed windows well and again you've got them they've got a nice pan on this display now that's something the builders gonna make you're not going to get that from initech but I understand they're actually have so that if you have let's say two or three inches of exterior insulation you could specify your windows with this jamb extension which is an aluminum extension and now you've got that thicker jamb depth all the way around we need to see more window manufacturers do that that's that's gonna be a huge game-changer for builders who are going to exterior insulation but haven't used it before Mike to wrap up the video I gotta say initech very innovative product and honestly a very reasonable price point for really really high performance some good stuff we saw today anything else that you wanted to interject or that I missed from from today sewer yeah well I just wanted to mention that coating that we have on the on the window so it's we have sat into the glass serial number and so it tells us exactly what project what job the size of the window everything so if there's an issue down the road glass needs to be replaced whatever it is we can easily reference it and solve a problem nice and quick that's good stuff man tell me what your ideal location is for selling Intertek is are you guys just Pacific Northwest so you guys ship to other places as well we're primarily in the Pacific Northwest but we do ship to other areas and and you guys are pretty much all factory direct right so the builders in this err buying direct from you direct for Meditech yeah good stuff man tell us a website for people who want to get to get out this of your products it's Innotech - windows.com okay good deal guys really appreciate you coming out to tour Mike's house with me Mike impressive house dude and you've got how many generations of your family living in this house coming up here three generations and that's pretty cool well built house hopefully you'll pass this on your and kids someday because this is an incredibly well-built house guys if you're not currently a subscriber hit that subscribe button we've got new content every Tuesday and every Friday on the build show but come back for more from this high-performance Roadshow in Vancouver British Columbia follow me on Twitter Instagram otherwise we'll see you next time on the build show [Music]

Channel: Matt Risinger

Views: 919,455

Rating: 4.866539 out of 5

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Id: _vul4vMFdkA

Length: 23min 53sec (1433 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 24 2020