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- Housebuilding: A Do-It-Yourself Guide, Revised & Expanded
Housebuilding: A Do-It-Yourself Guide, Revised & Expanded
Housebuilding has always been the book of choice for prospective home builders—and with this extensive, thoughtful revision, it becomes a resource readers will continue to depend on for years to come. In addition to showcasing 800 exciting new full-color illustrations and more than 50 color photographs, an improved two-column design makes the text easier to follow. Photo captions—not in previous editions—allow readers to browse through quickly. Also included for the first time: a chapter on environmentally friendly building alternatives; increased emphasis on safety; information on modern cordless tools; updated techniques, materials, and standards; energy-efficient options, from structural insulated panels to radiant floor heating; a current appendix of major manufacturers, resources, and websites; and much, much more.
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Does not live up to the promise By definition a guide helps show you the way, in this case to building your own house. Instead it is a gathering of topics related to building a home in a fairly orderly manner without any true guidance of how to get from an empty lot to moving. I also wasn’t able to find any meaningful guidance on how or why to chose among the various construction materials and techniques.You would think that 700+ pages would provide a tome of knowledge of every topic, but it is woefully inadequate on all of them. I have a book on framing that provides more information on foundations and roofing than this book does! I give two stars because it has some pretty pictures and if you had zero knowledge on a topic at least you’d end up with slightly less than zero after reading this book. There are so many important details left out that you cannot possibly build a house from the information contained in it. Also, some suggestions like 1/2″ to 5/8″ subflooring over 16″ OC floor joists are crazy…
The Best Bang For Your Bucks: IfYou’ve Never Built A Whole House Before Pros:Easy read! I went through the entire bookstore in my hometown, this was one of the few books that really explained mostly everything necessary to build a house. I’m 55. In my 20’s I worked on houses doing light to heavy duty home repairs, but I never took a course or school training and I wish I had. This book does a good job for covering all of the basics you’d probably learn with formal training, without the professor-talk. Let’s say you couldn’t read, but you can count money and read blueprints like some of my friends in the past have done. If you studied the pictures and memorized them, I’m willing to bet, there’s a good chance you could build a solid, modern home, just from the pictures alone. Now this is a testament to how well this book was written by the now deceased author Mr. R.J. DeCristoforo. Over he years I would buy one of thes500-1000 page tomes’ and might end up reading about 30-40 pages while it eventually would fall apart in the floorboard of an extended…
Packed full of information! I have not begun to start to get through this book and it is a gem! It tells you every step of the way what you need to do and how to do it and what to expect in the way of pitfalls along the way. I am learning something new every time I read another chapter and I have to say, it’s almost information overload! For instance, I never considered that when buying lumber, if it feels heavier than another piece of lumber the same size, it is probably because the heavier piece is not completely dried which means bowing later down the road. Common sense should tell one that, but when building, there are a million things going on in my head and something that should have been easy can slip by you. I am SUPER GLAD I bought this book! All of the great reviews are true!