Why do you think prefab homes are not more popular?

[penroyaltea]

djswan: so you don't like the Eames, schroder or Farnsworth House???
brave words my friend!!!

[djswan]

I was running out the door when I edited that. Just a shot across the bow. I'm waging a war against OSB, engineered floor joist, microlams and drywall too, amongst the other garbage that goes with steel. I've done lots of demo, my sense of what is garbage is keen.

It would be fun to put limits on what material you can build with just for the sake of putting limits on the material you can build with. Dare I say an order?

Prefabs like anything else built from crap isn't going to be popular for long. Heck, shipping containers are prerab, that's a use of steel I can understand, but for houses? garbage.

[JWmHarmon]

Pre-fabricated single family homes are not common for a variety of reasons:

1. Lack of familiarity of the buying public. - Solution: better marketing
2. Lack of pre-fab resources close to the building site
3. Image problem from association with cheap & shoddy manufactured homes in the past.
4. Impression that design choices are limited with pre-fab homes. - Solution: better marketing; flexible designs
5. Perceived cost premium for quality pre-fab.
6. Lack of flexibility in on-site design changes.
7. Lack of trained work force for installing pre-fab units.
8. Opposition from construction trades people whose perceptions may be that their jobs would be threatened by pre-fab units.
9. Pre-fab styles presented to the public are often not a style that appeals to "traditional home" styles. Pre-fab styles presented often cater to a niche market and have limited initial appeal and a problematic later re-sale appeal.

The pre-fab market is wide open for companies that can come up with marketable solutions to the design, supply, and cost issues.

[Checkpoint43]

I wouldn't say that all pre-fab is met with opposition.

After all, engineered wood trusses are fairly common an in many cases preferred over rafter framing.

[JWmHarmon]

There are many prefabricated components. Roof trusses, windows, and doors come to mind immediately.

However, the complete pre-fab home is still falls far short of the stick-built home. We still see siding cut to size instead of using a design that uses the full length without cutting. We could build roofs with large component panels instead of OSB board with shingles.

We are still a long way from integrating solar panels with roof panels.
They are still too often an add-on after the conventional roof has been built.

We still do not routinely incorpoate a power generation system with a water and space heating system.

We still do not incorporate a cold storage unit with houses built in cold climate environments that would be computer controlled and provide ice storage for use with air conditioning needs in the warmer months.

All components of a house could be constructed in modular units and assembled on site. Whether the storage, transportation, and construction of these modules would cost more or less than traditional stick built homes is an open issue.

One option for modular construction is to invent a transportable modular factory that would go directly to the site. The modules would then be constructed on-site. The factory would then be transported to the next building site.

Computerized changes in drawings could be fed into the computer controlled machinery that would produce the specified panels on site.

This would increase design flexibility.

Another option is to design computer models of the homes with consumer chosen fixtures and furniture. With large screen TV's the customer could see a video of what the finished product would look like. Putting the customer on a flat treadmill would give the illusion of walking through the house.

Who out there will take the ideas of Frank Lloyd Wright, Buckminster Fuller, the Lustron homes, and similar ideas and incorporate them into a 21st century marketable product?

[JWmHarmon]

There are many prefabricated components. Roof trusses, windows, and doors come to mind immediately.

However, the complete pre-fab home still falls far short of the stick-built home. We still see siding cut to size instead of using a design that uses the full length without cutting. We could build roofs with large component panels instead of OSB board with shingles.

We are still a long way from integrating solar panels with roof panels.
They are still too often an add-on after the conventional roof has been built.

We still do not routinely incorpoate a power generation system with a water and space heating system.

We still do not incorporate a cold storage unit with houses built in cold climate environments that would be computer controlled and provide ice storage for use with air conditioning needs in the warmer months.

All components of a house could be constructed in modular units and assembled on site. Whether the storage, transportation, and construction of these modules would cost more or less than traditional stick built homes is an open issue.

One option for modular construction is to invent a transportable modular factory that would go directly to the site. The modules would then be constructed on-site. The factory would then be transported to the next building site.

Computerized changes in drawings could be fed into the computer controlled machinery that would produce the specified panels on site.

This would increase design flexibility.

Another option is to design computer models of the homes with consumer chosen fixtures and furniture. With large screen TV's the customer could see a video of what the finished product would look like. Putting the customer on a flat treadmill would give the illusion of walking through the house.

Who out there will take the ideas of Frank Lloyd Wright, Buckminster Fuller, the Lustron homes, and similar ideas and incorporate them into a 21st century marketable product?

[JWmHarmon]

There are many prefabricated components. Roof trusses, windows, and doors come to mind immediately.

However, the complete pre-fab home still falls far short of the stick-built home. We still see siding cut to size instead of using a design that uses the full length without cutting. We could build roofs with large component panels instead of OSB board with shingles.

We are still a long way from integrating solar panels with roof panels.
They are still too often an add-on after the conventional roof has been built.

We still do not routinely incorpoate a power generation system with a water and space heating system.

We still do not incorporate a cold storage unit with houses built in cold climate environments that would be computer controlled and provide ice storage for use with air conditioning needs in the warmer months.

All components of a house could be constructed in modular units and assembled on site. Whether the storage, transportation, and construction of these modules would cost more or less than traditional stick built homes is an open issue.

One option for modular construction is to invent a transportable modular factory that would go directly to the site. The modules would then be constructed on-site. The factory would then be transported to the next building site.

Computerized changes in drawings could be fed into the computer controlled machinery that would produce the specified panels on site.

This would increase design flexibility.

Another option is to design computer models of the homes with consumer chosen fixtures and furniture. With large screen TV's the customer could see a video of what the finished product would look like. Putting the customer on a flat treadmill would give the illusion of walking through the house.

Who out there will take the ideas of Frank Lloyd Wright, Buckminster Fuller, the Lustron homes, and similar ideas and incorporate them into a 21st century marketable product?

[djswan]

http://www.bensonwood.com/ Proud to post my competition and mentor. I'm not much compitition, but I have won all four bids against Bensonwood when they have been at the table too. He swears by prefabrication.

[sutcac]

I think one of the primary reasons that pre-fab homes have never gained much traction in any market, and in fact have become historical pariahs in some cases (i.e. some of Corbu's housing schemes which were abominations, IMO, in the way they treated their occupants), is that they, by their very nature I think, end up being structures in which you may exist but do not live.

First, each site is unique and a home in which you live must respond to this in ways prefabrication will likely never be able to respond appropriately to (sun, wind, climate, geography, etc., etc.) for this and other following reasons.

The market in materials is ever shifting and changing, and if anything is shifting and changing at an ever expanding pace. It's just not logistically possible for a pre-fab home to keep up with this pace. Prefabrication would, IMO, depend largely on a stable palette of materials and building systems, not to mention building codes, which are also constantly shifting.

And I think pre-fabrication is more about profit and less about humanity and whether people conciously realize this or not, they do in fact "get it". It's one thing to prefabricate whatever gadget or widget that meets one specific need or another, but a person's home is a bit more complex a problem and is not so easily pigeon-holed.

[sutcac]

I think one of the primary reasons that pre-fab homes have never gained much traction in any market, and in fact have become historical pariahs in some cases (i.e. some of Corbu's housing schemes which were abominations, IMO, in the way they treated their occupants), is that they, by their very nature I think, end up being structures in which you may exist but do not live.

First, each site is unique and a home in which you live must respond to this in ways prefabrication will likely never be able to respond appropriately to (sun, wind, climate, geography, etc., etc.) for this and other following reasons.

The market in materials is ever shifting and changing, and if anything is shifting and changing at an ever expanding pace. It's just not logistically possible for a pre-fab home to keep up with this pace. Prefabrication would, IMO, depend largely on a stable palette of materials and building systems, not to mention building codes, which are also constantly shifting.

And I think pre-fabrication is more about profit and less about humanity and whether people conciously realize this or not, they do in fact "get it". It's one thing to prefabricate whatever gadget or widget that meets one specific need or another, but a person's home is a bit more complex a problem and is not so easily pigeon-holed.

[sutcac]

I was just wondering why there were duplicate posts above, some weird error notice which says it didn't post but in fact did.

[djswan]

Eh don't worry about it. a glitch.

I got a case scenario right now. A cabin in Idaho. The client wants a 12 x 20 cabin and a three sided 20 x 25 hay barn . It's reasonable that I could build the cabin in my shop, and trailer it over there. I visited the site today, plenty of materials there. Hmmmmm A combo order?

[J.Saravana Balaji]

According to me any prefabricated buildings have more no of joints than a cast in situ buildings.This encourages water seepage in the building.That's why prefabricated structures are not so popular.