Building Gypsy Rose

Today’s temperatures were in the mid-70’s, but cooler weather is in the offing. In another week or two we’ll be towing Gypsy Rose to Vermont and getting ready for winter. Before heading north I want to have all the insulation in and the walls closed up. I began with the underside. By the end of a day of inching my way around on my back and driving screws from awkward positions, I was beat.

The floors are insulated to R-19 and then sealed with a hardboard skin.

Next, we took a break from the insulation to build the ladder to the loft.

Marion has been spending lots of time with a brush and polyurethane, sealing the pine and fir.

While brushing the bottom of the ladder, Marion glanced up and was struck by the patterns of wood and glass.

Moving into the kitchen and bathroom, I set about creating new patterns of red, white, and blue PEX piping for Gypsy’s water system. I had originally thought I’d be plumbing in copper. That’s what I grew up with and I’d hardly given a thought to other options. When I sat down to design Gypsy’s plumbing layout I did a bit of research and discovered that flexible PEX (cross-linked polyethylene) has a lot of advantages. The most obvious for me was the ease with which it can be snaked through the walls. (All of our plumbing is installed in the exterior wall cavities, in contrast with homes where the majority of the plumbing is run from basements or crawlspaces up through interior walls). Because PEX does not require 90 degree elbows, very few fittings are required and less energy is needed to push water through the lines. PEX is less vulnerable to freeze damage, it looses less heat in the transfer of hot water, and it scores high marks among the various green builder networks. As an added bonus, PEX is much cheaper than copper.

In the photo above, you can see the bathroom water lines as well as the run of 12-volt electrical wires. Tomorrow, I’ll insulate the bathroom and kitchen and start sheathing the walls with more pine.