Quote:
Originally Posted by redpoint5
I question everything about the homebuilding industry. It boggles my mind why most homes are a bespoke work rather than built from a large number of existing plans. Then, why are we still cutting lumber and nailing it together? There's got to be a better way were either the frame is printed on site, or the materials are all precisely measured and cut at a factory, and then Ikea assembled on site.
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Look at the supply chain. Dimensional lumber is universal application.
The moment you cut the wood and bundle it as a kit, you ruin its usefulness for anything else. I've built some random stuff from the popular sizes of wood at the lumberyard, but I'm not going to figure out which shed kit I need to buy to get the wood I need to build something random. And once you do bundle your kit, you introduce another supply problem, getting your kit into the hands of the customer- and then to his jobsite. Even the shed kit I built said "get pavers to use as a foundation" and "go buy particleboard for the roof and floor". Because even though the panels needed to be trimmed, there was no point in loading the kit down with something you can buy anywhere. What that kit taught me was that aside from the prehung door, I can build one better and cheaper on my own without a kit. And I'm confident that with a little thought, I can get a door too.
Quote:
Originally Posted by freebeard
In the 1920s Bucky Fuller talked about having a car handbuilt in the driveway as an analogy. His Dymaxion bathroom and houses were his response.
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Except cars are much easier to ship than houses, and much harder to build properly on site.