Todd, from North Texas, is building himself an incredible 2,500 square foot house from eight 40 foot shipping containers. I came across Todd's blog a couple of weeks back and asked him some questions about the house and his rationale for using containers.
"I wanted to replace the old house on the property here with something different. Since it was only about sixty years old and falling apart, I wanted to build something that would last a long time. At first I looked into concrete construction but it was expensive and would be covered up with conventional wall finishes. I had seen a few container homes on the internet and thought this was something I could do myself."
I also asked Todd what the most difficult part of the construction process had been so far.
"The most difficult part is dealing with used shipping containers. They don't always line up like they do on paper. The floors are not the same height. And when set side by side the outside walls don't always touch at the top. A few shims usually lines them up. I have a feeling that the difficult part will be the inside walls and floors. I had considered pouring a concrete floor over the existing container floor. After I found on your website that some people have been doing that. I'm much more confident about doing it now."
Todd has also built a garage/apartment, this time not with ISBU's.
"I would also like to say that I built the garage/apartment out of c-purlins to see if that was a better way to build. After removing more than half the metal from the shipping containers I was disappointed with the waste. Building with c-purlins allowed me to have straight walls and little waste."
I'd like to thank Todd for taking time out of his construction schedule to share his creation and ideas. Todd's blog is full of photos and videos of the construction process and is well worth visiting.
