90-pound roofing felt, see roofing felt

Accent lighting, type of illumination, 227

This light reveals a featured detail, such as a painting on a museum wall or an ornamental tree in your yard…

Accessibility, see ADA Guidelines

Acoustics, see sound transmission

Active noise canceller, eliminator of annoying sound in HVAC ducts, 433

A clever eliminator of duct noise is the active noise canceller, as sketched below. In the duct near the noise’s source is mounted a sound pickup which records the offending sound and sends the data to a programmed controller, which creates a 180º mirror-image waveform that exits a loudspeaker mounted further down the duct which cancels the offending sound…

ADA Guidelines, guide for handicapped design, 81, 108–09, 278

Commercial buildings today must be designed to accommodate the handicapped. But they should do the same for such encumbered occupants as small children, pregnant women pushing strollers, and retirees carrying groceries. Hence accessibility is not design for the “Disabled” so much as for the “Encum­bered”, which can…

Adobe, type of masonry, 165, 176–78, 258, 362

Earth is one building material the world will never run out of. Its viability increases with every decrease of other ma­terials, and any post-construction waste can be recycled in a garden. In this country earth con­struction dates at least back to the Pueblos of the 1300s. It can be built anywhere there is dirt if you know the recipe, which is…

Aggregates, in concrete, 158

As for aggregates, most are crushed rock, from sand to boulders. An aggregate must contain no silt or organic matter. Rough rocks are better than smooth, because they…

Airborne sound, sound occurring in a room or space inside a building, 418–27

Airborne sound passes through air; in this case, inside a room in a building. The room may be large or small, and each sound occurring in it has a source (where it originates), a path (where it travels), and a receiver (where it ends), as detailed below…

Air cooling, 384–85

This is usually a large air conditioner mounted on a flat commercial roof from which extend one or more ducts that serve the floorspaces below, and some units have return air ducts. Another common installation is…

Air filtration, remover of impurities from indoor air, 408–15

We breathe about 1,000 times an hour, and every breath should be a labor of love. Hence every lungful of indoor air should be filtered of particulates (dust, dander, pollen, lint, smoke, soot, and other minute solids), microbes (bacteria, viruses, spores, allergens, molds, fungi), odors (fumes, food aromas, vehicle exhausts, volatile gases from furniture and finishes), and toxins. Many of this nebula of impurities arrive from…

Air gap, vertical space between bowl and spouts in plumbing fixture, 275, 326

An air gap is at least one inch of vertical space between the flood rim and the faucets that keeps water rising in the basin from possibly contaminating the…

Air heating, 384

This is generally a furnace which heats air that flows through ducts to occupied spaces, and some systems have return air ducts. This is your standard residential duct heating system. Supply ducts should be…

Air heating/cooling, 385–86

This is your big-building HVAC system. One operates as follows. (1) Fresh outdoor air and stale return air enter one end of an air handling unit (or AH unit), a long box that may be as big as a mobile home; (2) the air is preheated in cold weather, precooled in warm weather, humidified if too dry, dehumidified if too moist, and filtered to remove impurities…

Air-water heating/cooling, 387

These systems are much like air heating/cooling systems except the ducted air flows at high velocities through pipelike tubes called Spiro­pipes that are notably smaller than sheet-metal ducts.

Aluminum, structural material, 154

Steel has a few structural cousins of lesser mettle, the chief being aluminum. This is lighter than steel and won’t rust; but it is only about half as strong, it corrodes when it contacts concrete, and it tends to…

Aluminum, electrical wiring, 90

The most common electrical wiring is copper, followed by aluminum. Copper costs more, but it is 64 percent more conductive than aluminum; so a copper wire can be significantly thinner and carry the same current. But aluminum is 30 percent lighter, which makes…

Ambient lighting, type of illumination, 227

This is general illumination that fills every part of an area between its task and accent lighting. It makes every part of a space at least slightly visible, it softens shadows, and…

Amp, also amperage, unit of electric power, 188, 190, 196, 201, 204–05, 223

The cable’s voltage multiplied by its amperage is its capacity (what is available if you need it), which is not its actual usage, which is seldom more than one-third its capacity…

Architect, how to work with an, 34–52

However, if the candidate is an architect, s/he will examine every item of information you have, and think not so much what it is like as your reason for it, and may suggest whole new ways to implement the essence of what you truly desire, and envision any potential conflicts that may occur … an architect is more likely to see a group of related spaces not as a jigsaw puzzle but a Rubik’s Cube…

Architectural Plans, also plans, 39–48

The Archi­tectural Plans, sometimes called the Drawings, or simply the Plans. This is a sheaf of large pages, bound along the left, which when opened may occupy most of a conference table. Each page, looking broad as a linen ta­ble­cloth, is covered with sketchy but photorealistic drawings accompanied by notes and symbols. Each page has a title box, typically in the lower right corner, that lists the…

Architectural Program, 35–39, 204–05

An architect will also assemble all your information into a definitive Archi­tectural Program which s/he will use to design the building. This document will describe the building’s required spaces, how they relate to each other, and how you would like them to be furnished. While preparing this document the architect may…

Arctic regions, moisture problems in, 327–28

In Arctic and high montane regions where temperatures go below minus 40 degrees, weird things can happen where air moisture exits a building. Icicles can form at tiny holes in a facade, and moisture leaking through an exterior doorknob can cause it to freeze solid. Then one’s “house key” may be an electric blow dryer hanging outside the door, with a…

Area light source, type of lighting, 252

An area light source has one or more bulbs mounted behind a prominent translucent facing that emits a diffuse light. Examples vary in size from EXIT signs to theater marquees…

Artificial lighting, see light bulbs

Automated lighting controls, 252–54

Some dimmers are automated so when a cloud passes over the sun and reduces the light entering a window, the dimmer increases the artificial light by the same amount to maintain even illumination indoors. One dimmer can do this for dozens of luminaires. An automated dimmer should have a…

Backflow valve, in plumbing, 289, 296

These have hinged discs that lay against the incoming opening where they allow full flow when the water is running and close if the flow stops or reverses. They eliminate…

Ballasts, in light bulbs, 236, 237–46

Phosphor-activated bulbs [i.e. luorescents] require a ballast, a small transformer that creates the high voltage needed to ex­cite the phosphor and maintains even voltage afterward. But some ballasts hum, some take a…

(Aline) Barnsdall Residence, also Hollyhock House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, Los Angeles, 144

Wright occasionally designed ornament for its own sake in some of his buildings. When he de­signed such ornament, he would evolve it from a local plant. A superb example is the stylized hollyhocks in the frieze around the living room and second floor of the Barns­dall Res­idence he designed in Los An­geles, Cal­ifornia. Wright said: “A bit sentimental, Miss Barnsdall had prenamed the house for the Hollyhock she loved for many reasons, all of them good ones, and called upon me to render her favorite flower as a feature of Architecture how I might.” The result appears in figure 3-31.

(George) Barton Residence, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, Buffalo, NY, 110–12

If ornament must exist on or in a building, it should be spare, and it should evolve from a functional aspect of the building’s construction. One architect was exemplary in doing this: Frank Lloyd Wright. … Let’s see how he did this. Figure 3-28 shows the roof above the entry of the George Barton residence in Buffalo, NY, which Wright designed in 1904…

Baseboard heating, 354, 379, 381, 404–05

This system involves mounting against the base of a wall a long heating element [either an electric wire or hot water pipe] that radiates into adjacent spaces. When these units are located against an exterior wall, part of the heat conducts through the…

Bathtubs, 280, 326

Give each tub two sturdy handlebars to enable anyone with old or slippery feet to safely enter and leave. In the wall above the tub replace the puny soap dish with an expansive three-shelf recess 3 inches deep, 12 inches wide, and 24 inches high that can hold all kinds of…

Batteries, storers of electricity in natural energy systems, 206–07, 221–24

Often a natural energy system’s production will vary so greatly between extremes of resource availability that a bank of batteries may be necessary to collect the electrons when the system produces a surplus and dispense them when the system has a deficit. Today’s battery technology is dependable and widely available. But batteries have a few minuses. They are expensive, dangerous, messy, and heavy. They also need constant attention, have a limited life, and require precise design to work well; because a little inefficiency goes a long way backward with batteries. Three general kinds are…

Beams, type of structure, 132–136

These are usually horizontal members that collect weights resting on them, then they carry these loads plus their own weight down to their supports. Beams are usually the principal load gatherers in a building. They include…

Belvedere, rooftop ventilator, 407

Another clever rooftop ventilator is the belvedere. When this is perched on a roof’s peak, prevailing breezes blowing through its vented sides create a slight vacuum in the flue-like void below that sucks stale hot air up from the spaces below like soda sucked up a straw. A belvedere needn’t be…

Bioswale, also bioretention area, remover of pollutants from water runoff, 72–74

A bioswale is a scientifically designed and carefully constructed water retention area that collects runoff from nearby turnarounds, parking lots, public roads, even large flat roofs. It is usually long and narrow, has gently sloping sides planted with low-maintenance and deep-rooted wetland vegetation and…

Blacktop, on driveways, 75–77

The best toppings are concrete and asphalt. These are smooth and durable, and after snowfalls you can plow them without tearing them up. Asphalt, also known as blacktop, requires no formwork or control joints or reinforcement, is easily laid on inclines, takes only 2 or 3 days to cure, and melts ice and snow quicker in winter. But asphalt is not as…

Blackwater, type of water waste, 328–29

[Blackwater is] chemicals and toxic liquids draining from usually commercial or industrial operations. Even in residences this waste should drain into dedicated containers and be taken to recycling facilities. Blackwater should never empty into public watercourses, and residents should never…

Blowout valve, plumbing, 289

Every low point [in supply water plumbing] should have a blowout valve and a floor drain below, as in figure 7-9, and plenty of space around it for…

Blueprint, architectural drawing, 40

When you examine a set of architectural plans you are looking at a copy: a blueprint (this word derives from the pre-World War II method of reproducing architectural drawings as white lines on dark blue pages). The original drawings are kept in…

Bollard, outdoor light fixture, 71

A driveway may be illuminated at night with lamp posts, bollards (waist-high posts with lights on them that also serve as vehicle barriers), and…

Book of entries, construction record, 54–55

Another tip for owners about to embark on any construction project, large or small, is to keep a Book of Entries. This is a record of every material delivered and every hour of work performed, as suggested in figure 2-11. This is one of the most thorough ways an owner can show an interest, keep informed, be involved, and have the confidence to assert oneself when necessary. Also if any construction or legal dispute arises, you will likely have…

Boundary surface, surface that a sound wave strikes, acoustics, 42

A sound arriving at an enclosing surface, what is known as a boundary surface, is incident sound, and the portion that returns from the surface is reflected sound. If a surface is smooth and flat…

Braces, structural, 138–41

This is why wind is Public Enemy Number One to many buildings. Since these Aeolian forces can blow from any direction, every beam and column in a building must be laterally braced in every direction –north, east, south, west– to withstand strong winds … Here’s a rundown of the best structural engineers have yet de­vised…

Breaker box, also circuit box or panel box, 188–89

Then the primary enters a panel box (also a circuit box or breaker box) which in small buildings is a wall-mounted metal box resembling a medicine cabinet. Inside this box the primary divides into a couple dozen or so conductors known as circuits, each of…

Brownfield development, method of building on inferior sites advocated by LEED, 22, 130–31

LEED awards points for building on brownfield development sites; or, as it says in its reference guide: “build­ing on sites that have been damaged by environmental contamination as a way of preserving undeveloped land.” What twisted logic is this? To whatever extent natural habitats may be lost by building on them, this simply cannot compare with…

Brownwater, type of water waste, 328

This is effluent draining from toilets and urinals, food scraps from restaurants, mulch from hospital sinks and grinders, and the like. This unsightly and smelly waste must empty into closed drains that flow into…

Bubble fabric structures, 182–83

While many fabric structures are held aloft by cables, a second kind is held aloft by air pressure from below. You’ve probably seen such bubble fabric structures mounted over swimming pools and tennis courts. Each is a domed enclosure whose bottom edge is typically fastened to the top of a low foundation wall, then air is pumped into the bubble to hold it up. These structures can cover very…

Bubblepak, use as translucent insulation, 399–400

As for making the panels [of solar insulation] translucent, a simple material has probably laying around your house or place of work for years: bubblepak. A sheet of these tiny enclosed airspaces is a good insulator. If you stack many sheets of this material until they are…

Building envelope, insulated construction in outer surfaces of a building, 19, 29, 206, 347–61, 402, 409

Once you’ve analyzed the weather and the landscape around a building, your next line of defense toward making its indoor spaces economically comfortable every hour of the year is insulating its lowest floor, outer walls, and roof: what is known as the building envelope. This cutaneous construction may contain…

Bureaubed, type of efficient furniture, 95–96

In many a bedroom lies another few dozen cubic feet of wasted space. Think of that monstrous boxspring under that mammoth mattress. If you replace the mattress and boxspring with four inches of foam plus a memory foam topper and add a 3-inch toespace at the bottom, you would have 20 inches of emptiness between the top of your toes and the bottom of the foam. Then you could almost move your attic under your mattress…

BX Cable, electrical conductor, 191

BX cable: the wires are clad in a spiral metal jacket. This is used where the wiring could be damaged by physical force or fire, and is required in commercial buildings…

Cable, conductor of electricity, also conductor, 190–91, 196–97, 199, 202

A 110-volt conductor (also known in the electrical trade as a cable) contains three thin wires clad in different colors of insulation: a black positive wire carries the current to the outlets, a white negative wire brings…

Cable, in fabric structures, 179–81

The cables are stranded corrosion-resistant flexible steel; and the bolts, clamps, and plates are usually hot-dipped galvanized steel plate or stainless steel … All these parts are designed by engineering specialists who know the hardware and the microstresses that occur in every nut, bolt, plate, clamp, and cable through which a fabric’s forces blindly find their way from the sky to the ground. Here is truly a case of a chain being only as strong as its weakest link. The masts are often a…

Caisson, deep columnar structure in soft soil under a building, 130

If these soil test borings indicate that the soil beneath the planned building isn’t strong enough to support it, long column-like piles may be sunk deep into the earth below. There are three kinds … A caisson is a big hole drilled with a huge augur whose base is excavated to create a bell-like cavity, then the void is filled with concrete. After all piles are in place, a…

Canopy, also soffit, type of lighting environment, 255

These are overhangs whose undersides contain bulbs that brighten the area below. They provide excellent downlighting for counters, desks, vanities, workplaces, walls, niches, and…

Cantilever, as beam structure, 133, 163, 346

A beam that extends beyond its supports at one or both ends.

Carbon dioxide, 78, 174, 205, 311, 370, 374, 409;
type of fire suppression, 320, 323–24

A human ex­hale contains about 38,000 ppm (3.8 percent) CO2, while outdoor rural air has around 400 ppm and urban air about 550 ppm. Though several people in an unventilated room will deplete its oxygen and increase its carbon dioxide at the same rate, they will…

Caryatids, columns shaped as female figures, Athens, Greece, 136

Columns essentially hold the building up. Each can also be expressive of its function, as the Greeks eloquently demonstrated twenty-five centuries ago when they built the Caryatids, the draped females who hold up the roof of the Erechtheum at the Acropolis in Athens. These ladies show that columns can serve two architectural purposes: act as structural support, and be a mannikin for ornament. A column also doesn’t have to be…

Casement window, as ventilator, 341, 406

The best ventilator is an open window. Its cost is low, its “hands-on” technology is simple, it comes in many sizes, it is widely available –and you can’t look out a furnace or an air conditioner. Especially adept is the casement window. Hear what Frank Lloyd Wright said of these little doors with big panes: “I fought for outswinging windows because they associated the house with the out of doors …

CCA, toxic wood preservative, 146

A common preservative over the past few decades has been chromate copper arsenate. CCA-treated wood is used to build decks, playground equipment, and other outdoor construction that must stand up to warm humid weather. But CCA leaches arsenic over time. Do you want your children playing on this?

Ceiling system, type of lighting environment, 255

In this lighting, areas of ceiling-mounted fixtures have just below them sheets of milky plexiglass or patterns of tiny eggcratelike openings that diffuse the light into the spaces below. These systems are common in commercial offices. The areas of lighting tend to look dimmer around their edges, which is countered by…

Cellshade, movable translucent insulation, 400–01

Another movable trans­lu­cent insulation al­ready on the market is the cellshade, as sketched in figure 8-28A. This contains a number of slatlike cells that compress when the shade is raised and open when the shade is lowered to form a barrier of translucent insulation. Howev­er, this thermal barrier’s R-value is…

Cement, also Portland cement, ingredient of concrete, 158

The most important ingredient in concrete is the cement. The most common is Portland ASTM Type I, which reaches required strength in about 28 days. ASTM Type III costs more but cures faster, so it is used in cold weather or where…

CFL, type of fluorescent light, 97, 238–43

Fluorescent bulbs are made as tubes, circles, U-s, and corkscrew-shaped CFLs. All provide excellent short-distance illumination … A controversy presently exists regarding the comparative economies of incandescent (I) lights, CFLs, and lately LEDs. Let’s first compare I lights versus CFLs…

Change Order, legal document for enacting changes in construction, 56

This is a written order issued by the architect to the contractor authorizing a change in the work that is not the fault of the contractor; wherein the contractor…

Chiller, type of dehumidifier, 393–94

There are two kinds of dehumidifiers: chillers and absorbers. Chillers refrigerate air to below a prescribed dew point which causes moisture to fall out of the air. They are used in small buildings in southerly and lowland regions where air is often warm and humid. They also remove excess moisture in basements and other rooms filled with cold clammy air which keeps…

Chimney flue, used as chimney cap, 166–67

Another adaptable ma­son­ry product is chimney flue tile. A clever chimney cap can be made from a flue tile by removing a side with a masonry blade in an electric saw and mounting the cap on the chimney, as in figure 4-3…

Chinese sheetrock, toxic use in USA, 27–28

Are we to innocently lie prey to the kind of toxic disaster that struck possibly 50,000 homes in the South a few years ago that were built of Chinese sheetrock? This toxic product made these homes smell like rotten eggs on humid days; it dissolved copper in wires, pipes, appliances and electronic equipment; it caused occupants to have headaches, nosebleeds, and other illnesses; it lowered property values; and it…

CINVA RAM, portable mold for making adobe bricks, 177–78

As for the forms that will make the adobe bricks, the best is the CINVA RAM, an adobe brick-size metal box with a cover on top and a jack below that compresses the soil placed in the box. After filling the box with…

Circuit box, see breaker box

Circuit breaker, electrical, 188–89

The primary divides into a couple dozen or so conductors known as circuits, each of which runs first through a circuit breaker (a protective switch that automatically turns the current off if the circuit is suddenly overloaded or shorted), then each cable extends to part of the building where it supplies power to several electric outlets in the area. An example of one circuit, which…

Circuits, electrical, 188, 193–98

Inside this box the primary divides into a couple dozen or so conductors known as circuits, each of which … extends to part of the building where it supplies power to several electric outlets in the area. An example of one circuit, which electricians often call a “home run”, appears in…

Circulation, of people in or near buildings, 79–86

In many a building, up to thirty percent of its floorspace is devoted to lobbies, foyers, halls, stairs, elevators, and other passageways occupants traverse from outdoors to each essential interior space. Architects know how to minimize these areas and make…

Cistern, onsite reservoir of water, 312–315

Another simple cistern many a house could have is a barrel placed under a gutter downspout. A single mother in Oregon built a system like this. She mounted nine 60-gallon barrels on one side of her house and six 30-gallon barrels on another side. When the first barrel fills, the overflow fills the next barrel until up to 740 gallons are stored. Opportunities like this exist almost everywhere in America today, and often you can obtain the containers for free … Cisterns are typically built as follows…

Cleanouts, waste plumbing, 334

These are Y or T fittings with a threaded plug in one stem that can be removed to allow the waste pipe downstream to be inspected or cleaned. These openings must be located at every change of direction of 45 degrees or more, no more than 75 feet apart, and within 5 feet of where the waste main exits the building. Today a plumber can insert a video camera into a cleanout to locate any buildup before it becomes…

Clearwater, type of water waste, 328

Essentially clear but undrinkable water. This includes rainfall from roofs, HVAC condensates, water residues from industrial operations, cold water draining from a fixture while someone waits for hot water to arrive, and the like. When this waste doesn’t mix with other wastes downstream it can…

Clustering, of homes, 24–26

LEED awards points for clustering homes in ways that encourage walking, biking, and public transit, thereby minimizing dependence on automobiles and their adverse environmental impact. At first this may seem laudable because walking, biking, and busing to nearby schools, markets, and other community resources would use less energy. But a deception lurks here…

Coffer, type of lighting environment, 256

These are usually ceiling recesses in which the lights are mounted on any inner surface. They are usually rectangular but can be any shape, their sides usually incline in toward the top, all inner surfaces are reflective, and…

Color rendering index (CRI), ability of a light to portray colors accurately, 237–39, 243, 244–46

Also important is a bulb’s CRI (color rendering index): its ability to render colors accurately … Color rendering hardly matters for highway lighting, but it means everything if you’re displaying clothes in a store window or are matching a picture’s colors at a printing press…

Column, type of structure, 136–138

These are usually vertical supports that collect the weight of the beams and the loads resting on them, then they carry these loads plus their own weight down through the height of the building into the ground. Columns essentially…

Composite decking, see metal decking

Compostable privy, 281–83

Regarding the kind of unit that fits into a normal bathroom (larger models exist for multiple bathrooms) each is about the size of a barrel laid on its side and has a standard cover and seat on top in whose center is a waste inlet port about 4 inches wide and 9 inches front-to-back. This hole is kept in alignment with…

Compressed air, type of nonwater plumbing, 317

In these systems a pump compresses ambient air, then steel pipes (not copper or plastic) extend to outlets with quick-couplers to which connect hoses that operate power tools, inflate tires, and/or clean small areas. Compressed air tools carry no…

Computers, use in architecture, 9–10, 47, 103, 116, 235, 260, 298, 314, 316, 371, 385, 393;
re regulating fresh airflow in ducts, 370;
re eliminating annoying sounds in ducts, 433;
re electrical systems, 195–198, 200;
re operating filters in ducts, 409;
re operating lighting systems, 252–54, 269–70;
re operating no-touch controls in plumbing fixtures, 276–78;
re solar air heating systems, 398–99;
re solar water heating systems, 308;
re operating thermostats, 373–75

This volume may interest you for a more pleasant reason: the way it details how computers are fast becoming a favored companion to all we do indoors. Now we have or are on the verge of having not only computers on our desks but…

Concrete, type of structure, 157–64

This is a mixture of cement, water, and aggregate wherein the cement and water form a paste that coats each aggregate, then the coating around each particle sprouts microscopic needles (a process known as curing) that entwine with the needles from other directions to create an interlocking mass that is hard as rock. But the needles can be…

Condensing water heater, plumbing, 301–03

A recently developed gas water heater that is more efficient than the above models is the condensing water heater. This has a helical tube immersed in the cylindrical tank through which rise the hot gases from the burner at the tank’s base, then the water around the tube absorbs much of the gas’s heat that would normally go up the flue. The increased efficiency allows a smaller tank to supply the same amount of hot water. But these units cost a lot, and they require…

Connections, electrical, 191–92

When a wire is connected to a terminal, the electricity conducts only between the metals’ mutual points of contact plus a microscopically small ‘jump’ area immediately around each contact. In a solid wire curled around a threaded screw…

Connections, structural, 142–43, 179–80

These are the ligaments that hold together the bones. They include nails, screws, bolts, welds –anything that holds one structural member to another. Without these fasteners a house would look like a pile of lumber. A versatile connector is the…

Construction costs, why so high, 59–60

Even more exploitative is the price pyramid that underlies many of today’s construction projects, especially residences … The biggest jump in these profits came in the early 1990s when Congress passed laws allowing banks to lend more money to homeowners; whereupon contractors, being no fools, simply raised the price of their labor to the limits of what buyers could borrow…

Containment piping, protective piping in nonwater plumbing, 316–17

When a network of piping carries petroleums, chemicals, toxins, and other environmentally damaging fluids it requires a dizzying array of subcomponents as follows … A concentric enclosure of larger pipes known as containment piping that protects the carrier piping from damage and keeps any leaks from escaping into surrounding areas, as appears below…

Contractor's Bid, estimated price to construct a designed building, 51–54

Finally comes the fourth document, the culmination of often months of labor and the entree to constructing the building: the Contractor’s Bid. This is the price the builder has placed on his envisioned labor. This offer is written on letterhead stationery, slipped into a business envelope, and opened before all…

Contractors, how to deal with, 51–65

On the whole, there are many competent contractors and subcontractors (these specialize in part of the construction such as plumbing or electrical work) who do their best to give their clients their money’s worth, who do not cultivate adversarial relations with them, and who try to see that the job gets done the way the owner wants. But there is a tendency for a small but significant few…

Convenience circuit, type of electrical circuit, 193

These include the familiar 110-volt outlets for operating small appliances and light fixtures…

Convex and concave terrain, 129

Sloping terrain typically undulates laterally in a series of shallow ridges (convex terrain) and depressions (concave terrain). Since rain drains from ridges into depressions, convex terrain is usually a firm dry strong place to build and concave terrain is usually a soft wet weak place to build, as pictured below…

Copper piping, 218, 283–86, 305, 315, 317

This reddish-brown metal is strong and light, is easily cut, and its connections can be soldered which is quicker than threading but not as strong. Copper pipe is made in four wall thicknesses … For any size pipe each wall thickness has the same diameter, which allows tees, sleeves, and other fittings to connect pipes of the same diameter that have different wall thicknesses…

Copper wiring, 190–202, 305–09

The most common electrical wiring is copper, followed by aluminum. Copper costs more, but it is 64 percent more conductive than aluminum; so a copper wire can be significantly thinner and…

Cornice, type of lighting environment, 256

A cornice is a row of lights mounted behind a vertical projection near the meeting of a wall and ceiling or roof eave where the lights unobtrusively brighten the wall and areas below. This recessed border lighting is usually…

Cost-benefit ratio, measure of a product’s long-range economic feasibility, 224–25

The best way to learn if a system will pay for itself in the long run is to determine its cost-benefit ratio, then compare this with other economic opportunities … Of course the only surefire tool for making such adept comparisons is a crystal ball. Still, whether you can predict the future or not, only if a renewable energy system’s annual savings compared to its original cost will “beat” the…

Counter, type of efficient furniture, 96–97

A bed is a counter you sleep on. A table is a counter you eat or work on. A desk is a counter you work or play on. Most counters are not their ideal length. Take desks. Most are a puny three or four feet long. But imagine having a lengthy desktop like the one in figure 3-25…

Cove, type of lighting environment, 256

A cove is much like a cornice except the projection near the meeting of wall and ceiling is horizontal and the concealed lights brighten the ceiling which makes it look larger. This recessed border lighting may be…

Critical electrical load, in electrical systems, 202, 206

Next, list the occupancy’s critical electric load: the electrical uses that must be satisfied to make the occupancy habitable, such as running water, a few lights, and a refrigerator. If this load will include any appliances…

Cross slope, in driveways, 68–69

Cross-slope: a side-to-side crown in a road. Its chief purpose is to drain rainwater to the road’s sides. Optimal slopes are 3/16 to 1/4 inch per linear foot down from the crown. If less, vehicles tend to hydroplane during heavy rain; if more, vehicles tend to skid…

Crown curve, type of vertical curve in driveways, 67–69

Crown curve: a vertical curve where a road rises over the crest of a hill. Each should be gentle enough so a motorist won’t experience a queasy airborne feeling or sudden reduction in…

Crown fire, type of wildfire, 104–05

In suburban and rural areas, fires may spread from one building to the next due to wildfires. Each may be a surface fire (the flames spread along the ground), or a crown fire (the flames race through the treetops). Advancing flames can also kill a…

Cul-de-sac, efficient indoor space, 94–95

Another efficient indoor space is the cul-de-sac. This is a U-shaped wall with only one door that allows minimum circulation to reach maximum storage. Examples are walk-in closets in homes and…

Daylighting, also natural light, 98, 112, 118, 166, 178, 228–35, 266

Daylight is the king of light fixtures, certainly the largest, one whose lordly rays and princely reflections arrive from that one big bulb that shines so beneficently from afar. Daylight is the primary prism to which artificial light is added, not the other way around. It may enter windows, skylights, clerestories, French doors, and the…

Decibel, unit of sound loudness, 418

Figure 9-2 charts the intensity levels of a number of familiar sounds. In this chart the symbol dB stands for decibel. This is the “inch” by which sound is measured…

Dehumidification, 393–94

This involves removing water from warm humid air which makes it feel cooler, and can also inhibit rusting of metals, minimize rotting in wood, and eliminate slippery floors in moist interiors. These systems are common in…

De-icers, embedded in concrete, 74

De-icers are usually electric heating wires located under concrete surfaces in front of building entrances and in flat pedestrian areas where puddles of water could freeze in winter…

Depreciation, of light bulbs, 236–39, 244–46

Depreciation is how well a bulb maintains its brightness during its life. Some bulbs lose nearly half their brightness as they age, and it often costs less to replace them when…

Diagonal bracing, type of structure, 140

This is a diagonal strut located near the corner of a beam and a post that makes the corner rigid; they are usually installed as inplane pairs at each end of a beam. You’ve probably seen these braces in old barns. These diagonal supports keep…

Dielectric union, type of pipe connection, 285

When copper and steel pipes are fitted together (as when new copper pipe extends from galvanized pipe in an old building), the copper will dissolve the steel until the two metals no longer touch due to galvanic corrosion (which means the con­nection will soon leak badly) unless the metals are joined with a dielectric union, as ap­pears in figure 7-6…

Dimming, of light bulbs, 237–39, 243, 244–46, 252–54

Every light fixture has a switch. Behind this tiny lever may lurk an amazing array of controls. Chief of this tribe is the dimmer. Some are automated so when a cloud passes over the sun and reduces the light entering a window, the dimmer increases the artificial light by the same…

Doubling a room's function, design strategy, 81, 98–99

Another big way to create maximum comfort in minimum volume is doubling a room’s function, as in the earlier “library staircase”. A few other candidates for assigning double duty are…

Driveways, design and construction, 66–79

A driveway is a building’s tether to the outer world. Each is typically connected to the building via a public entrance and a private or service entrance, it may be decorative in ways that public roads are not, and it includes driving lanes, parking areas, service entrances –every surface a tire will tread on. You can’t enjoy using a building unless it has a driveway, nor can you enjoy using any furnishings, groceries, or office supplies in the building either. A driveway should be…

Drum elevator, type of elevator, 84

A miniature version of a traction elevator is the drum elevator. Here a small cab hangs from a cable that passes over a pulley at the top of the shaft then descends to an electric motor-driven drum mounted on a heavy bedplate that acts as a counterweight. You may have seen one of these rise out of…

Ducts, 374–77, 384–87, 394, 409–15, 423, 429, 432–34

A duct is a usually long round, square, or rectangular tube that may be as small as your arm or larger than a residential hallway laid on its side. Each may be made of hot-dipped galvanized sheet steel (the surface with a spangle finish), aluminum, copper, or stainless steel. Ducts conveying…

Dumbwaiter, type of elevator, 86

In a dumbwaiter, the cab is raised and lowered by an electric motor. One’s controls may be push-button, call-and-send intercom between floors, or phones at each landing. The cab’s floor may be 2 to 3 feet square, its height may be…

Earth buildings, type of underground construction, 163–64

These shell-like shelters are buried in the ground, usually in sloping terrain so one facade is above grade to provide light and entry to the cavern within. The roof should be nearly flat (a 3 to 5 percent pitch sheds water without promoting soil shifting), and the soil on top should be…

Earth, use as structure, 176–78

Earth is one building material the world will never run out of. Its viability increases with every decrease of other ma­terials, and any post-construction waste can be recycled in a garden. It can be built anywhere there is dirt if you know the recipe, which is…

(The) Ecological House, 1981 book by Robert Brown Butler, 12, 445

In 1981 Mr. Butler published his first book, The Ecological House, which introduced many ideas that are further refined in this volume…

Ejectors, in waste plumbing, 332–33

In buildings where a few plumbing fixtures exist below the sewer main, ejectors pump the effluent up to the sewer. This res­ervoir is generally sized to hold a day’s supply of effluent, built of a nondegradable ma­terial, in­stalled with an alarm that warns of any malfunction, and is usually…

Electric heating, 379–80

This system involves mounting against the base of a wall a long heating element as pictured below, which converts electricity into heat that radiates into adjacent spaces. When these units are located against an exterior wall, part of the…

Electric heating and cooling, 381

This is typically a compact unit having registers with adjustable vanes that is mounted under a window or in a wall where it heats, cools, filters, and ventilates the air in its zone. You’ve probably seen these units under windows in motels. When producing cooling air it usually creates a…

Electric heating cable, also heat tracing cable, 74, 380

These are electric wires installed along water pipes and roof eaves to keep them from freezing; they are also embedded in entrance aprons to melt snow and ice …

Electric meter, 188–89

Whether arriving from above or below, the primary runs through an electric meter just outside the building where the public utility periodically records the electricity used. In commercial buildings the meter may be…

Electric outlets, 188–91, 193, 198, 353, 358–59, 367, 376;
design checklist for electric outlets, 204–05

Below is a checklist of a building’s electrical outlets, which should be part of a planned building’s Architect­ural Program…

Electric thermal storage (ETS) units, type of thermal massing, 405

Another fine method of thermomassing heat is with electric thermal storage (ETS) units. These are heating cabinets (one is 24½ inches high, 10½ inches deep, and 58 inches long) that contain an electric heating element mounted in a mass of high-density ceramic bricks. These prisms can sponge up a lot of Btus at night when…

Electric water heaters, in plumbing, 300–03

As you can see in figure 7-18 on page 303, an electric water heater has one or two plate-like anode shields mounted on its side. A gas unit requires … However, an electric unit requires…

Electricity, 188–21

The electricity generated by your local utility arrives at your house or place of work via a thick primary cable, or primary, that carries a certain voltage and amperage. Typical for homes these days is 240 volts at 200 amps. The cable’s voltage multiplied by its amperage is its capacity (what is available if you need it), which is not…

Electromagnetic interference (EMI), also reactive power, electrical disturbances in wiring caused by electronic equipment, 195–98

But all this e-wizardry has a dark side. When electricity runs through a conductor, it generates a magnetic field around it even if insulated; and if two conductors are laid close to each other, the field around each will induce a current in the other. These fields cause little trouble if the currents are nearly the same –but if one is significantly larger…

Elevation contours, see topography

Elevation, type of drawing in Architectural Plans, 42–46

These are pictures of the building that show how it will look from the outside. Each picture is of one facade, and it shows in addition to the building’s shape its doors, windows, vents, and exterior finishes. Out­lines of the floors, walls, and ceilings just inside the facades usually appear in…

Elevators, 82–86

These moving rooms carry people and objects up and down in multistory buildings. They can be as simple and plain as a showerstall-size cab in a two-story house, or as complex as the vertically-to-horizontally moving cabs in Eero Saarinen’s Gateway Arch in St. Louis or as showy as…

Embodied energy, total energy consumed in creating a building product, 17, 77–78, 187, 205, 311, 369

If [conserving energy] this is our essential concern, we must consider all the energies consumed in making and maintaining a building. This includes all the energies consumed in making a product; in packaging and transporting the product to the building site; in operating and servicing the product; even in disposing the product at the end of its useful life: what is known as a product’s embodied energy. If this is more than the energy the product will save during its useful life, then…

Emergency lighting, 260–61

In commercial buildings this illumination is installed near exit doors, stairway entries, floor level changes, major corridor intersections, and abrupt changes in direction. Each fixture should be operable by a…

EMI inhibitor, minimizer of electromagnetic interference in wiring, 198

Another way to minimize electromagnetic interference in a room containing a lot of electronics is with an EMI inhibitor. A company named Less EMF Inc. sells such esoteric EMI inhibitors as Staticot™, VeilShield™, and Ex-Static™ Conductive Fabric. One of this company’s customers fashions these metallic fabrics into scarves which she wraps around her head to ward off EMI radiating from her cellphone. Could EMI-inhibiting bikinis be next?

Entries, also foyers or front halls, efficient design, 100–01

Here an occupant transforms from an “outdoor” to an “in­door” person and back again. Hence this space is best designed as an “airlock entry” with two doors: one leading outdoors, one leading in, with the floor between at least…

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), 26, 2242, 405

Hear what the Envir­onmental Protection Agency (EPA) has said more recently about the presence of this toxin in today’s residences: In homes, the most significant sources of formaldehyde are likely to be pressed wood products made using adhesives that contain urea-formaldehyde (UF) resins. Pressed wood products made for indoor use include particleboard (used as sub-flooring and shelving and in cabinetry and furniture), hardwood plywood paneling…

Escalators, 81–82

An escalator is a giant revolving chain, with each three-foot-wide step a link, that is fitted into an inclined truss that bridges two floors. Each tread rests on rollers attached to the gliding chain, and on each side runs a flexible rubber handrail that wraps around a large half-round newel projecting from each end. Every part of this machinery is meticulously designed to thwart any accident that…

ETFE, translucent emitter of daylight into buildings, 228–29

Daylighters lately have a new lens to work with: a 1/10 inch thick translucent membrane known as EFTE. This material is also flexible, elastic, UVA-re­sist­ant, dur­able, lightweight, and environmentally benign. You may have no idea what this is until you are cued that it covered the…

Ethanol, type of vehicle fuel, 78

Eth­anol is another counterfeit. National Geographic says, “Pro­ducing ethanol from corn consumes about as much fossil fuel as ethanol itself replaces, growing the corn requires nitrogen fertilizer made with natural gas and uses farm machinery, and the process gives off large amounts of…

Eutectic salts, see phase-change salts

Evacuated tubes, type of solar water heater, 310

Today’s engineers have developed another solar water heater: the evacuated tube collector. This system’s elemental unit is a finned copper pipe mounted in a long thin glass tube usually about 3 inches round and 60 inches long from which the air is removed to create a thermos-like vacuum inside the tube. Com­pared to a flat plate collector, a rack of these suncatchers is…

Evaporative cooling, 392

A common humidifier is the evaporative cooler. This sends a mist of cool water into hot dry air that lowers its temperature. If you have ever draped a wet towel over your head while under a hot sun you have manufactured a portable evaporative cooler. You do the same, minus the towel, when your body sweats in hot weather. In desert regions evaporative coolers are often…

Exothermic weld, type of electrical connection, 192

[The best electrical connection] of all is an exothermically welded connection that fuses the wire to the terminal. This won’t loosen or corrode, will resist repeated surge and fault currents, and will conduct high-voltage current safely between…

Fabrics, type of structure, 178–83

A fabric structure is typically a sail-like cloth held aloft by three or more cables tautly attached to masts or other firm structure so the fabric looks as if it is floating in the air. Such membranous construction can…

Fabrics, type of duct, 375

Ducts are also made of fabrics, wherein the air flows through the weave along its length which allows the air to disperse evenly through the spaces served, and screened registers can be sewn into the fabric where large amounts of air are delivered. Fabric ducts are…

Fallingwater, house designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, Bear Run, PA, 22, 345–46

Here’s a well-kept secret about America’s most famous creekside residence: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater. Its foundation rising out of the creek absorbs water via capillary action, the way a towel draped over the side of a bathtub sucks water from inside, and…

Fans, as ventilators, 391

Like heat pumps, a fan also moves heat instead of produces it, often nearly as cheaply as the cost of a match. In a small building up to three floors tall, one of these bladed whirlers mounted near the center of the ceiling in the top floor can pull stuffy stale air from the spaces below. If the air around the lower floor is cool…

Fiber optic lighting, also fiber optic cable or FO cable, 234–35, 247–48

Imagine a tube whose inside is so mirrorlike that a light aimed into one end is barely diminished as it emerges from the other. This is the rudimentary “fiber optic”. There are two kinds…

Field Order, legal document for enacting changes in construction, 56

This is a written order issued by the architect to the contractor authorizing a change in the work that is the fault of the contractor; wherein the contractor…

Filters, in climate control systems, 408–15

Most filters are mat-like devices mounted in an HVAC duct where they strain impurities from the airflow. When one becomes clogged and can hold no more particles, it is cleaned in place, removed and cleaned, or…

Filters, in plumbing systems, 297–98

If the impurities are particles that damage piping, leave rings in toilet bowls, stain washed clothes, and the like, they are usually removed with a filter installed on the supply main before the water flows to any fixture. The best systems have two filters installed…

Firebrands, burning debris lofted into sky during wildfires, 104

Firebrands are burning debris lofted into the sky by strong convection currents that can carry these sparky items far ahead of the advancing flames. In intense wildfires these embers can fill the sky and ignite any…

Fire, making buildings safe from, 9, 38, 85, 102–107, 153, 157, 181, 191, 195, 202, 280, 311, 353, 368, 385, 393

Seventy-five percent of all fire deaths in buildings are caused by smoke and gas inhalation. Pushed outward by the expanding heat of flames, these toxins spread to areas well beyond their source, often faster than a person moving at a brisk walk. Consider the Happy Land nightclub fire near New York City in 1990 in which 87 people breathed their last…

Fire, methods of suppression, 318–26

Nearly every method of extinguishing a fire in and around buildings uses plumbing. This piping can do more than put out fires. It can contain…

Fire extinguishers, handheld, 319–20

These chemical-filled cylinders are mounted in accessible locations near fire hazards. When a fire erupts, an occupant removes the extinguisher from its mount and discharges its contents at the base of the fire. Each unit typically operates for 12 to 30 seconds and covers distances from…

Firehouse rack, type of fire suppression, 320–21

Firehose racks: wall-mounted cabinets with glass doors that contain a 50 to 100 foot canvas firehose and often a fire extinguisher and a fire axe. This system is like putting a fire hydrant on every floor, one operable by…

Fireplaces, 57, 118, 167–176, 206, 404, 405

When I designed the fireplaces in my house, I decided to emulate the efficient colonial models. The one facing the kitchen appears in figure 4-35. As the colonists often did, I hung a swinging crane on the left and built a dutch oven in the firebox wall on the right. This hearth has…

Fire sprinklers, also sprinklers, type of fire suppression, 150, 321–23

In these systems rows of small nozzles extend just under the ceiling or next to walls and each nozzle is plugged with a chunk of wax. When the wax melts at a specified temperature, the spraying water suppresses the flames below. The water flowing through the pipes may also activate…

Flame front, type of wildfire, 104

Flame fronts are walls of fire that usually pass a given area in 1 to 5 minutes. Since it normally takes 2 to 3 minutes of flame exposure to ignite most wood exteriors, a passing flame front may leave one house undamaged while the house next door burns to the ground. Even noncombustible materials are…

Flanking sound, type of annoying sound, 423–24

Another annoying acoustic event is flanking sound. An example is a noise that slips through a louver or loose trim in a door, moves down a hall to the next door with louvers or loose trim, and slips through these openings to annoy occupants in the next room. Flanking sound can creep around walls between open windows, hop over walls between…

Flared end fitting, for storm drains, 70

A culvert should always have a flared end fitting on both ends, as sketched below; then erosion won’t occur at the upstream end by the inflow under the culvert nor at the downstream end by the outflow eddying under it. If the stream is large, it may be…

Flat conductor cable, electrical, 91

Two other conductors are … and flat conductor cables (ribbonlike conductors that carry electricity under carpets to outlets located away from walls)…

Flat curve, horizontal curve on driveways, 67–69

Flat curve: a horizontal curve where the driveway turns right or left. Minimum radius is about 60 feet. Any less, and a motorist may need to decelerate quickly to keep from…

Flood rim, in plumbing fixtures, 274–75, 326

A flood rim, a small hole near the top of a sink’s basin that keeps it from overflowing and which connects to a small pipe descending outside the basin to the drain…

Floodlighting, type of lighting environment, 257–58

These include incandescent, quartz, and metal halide bulbs whose reflectors concentrate their rays into conical beams of strong light that vary from about 3 to 130 degrees. Floods have the wider beams and spots the smaller. Each has a beamspread designation such as…

Flood drains, in waste plumbing, 331–32

These remove water collecting on flat roofs or floors before they can damage nearby construction or furnishings. Where wasteflow may contain oils and sediments, a floor drain may be a cubic-foot-size metal casing with an acid-resistant finish inside and a coat of bitumen outside. One of these beauties appears above…

Fluorescent (F) light bulbs, 238–39;
compared to incandescent and LED bulbs, 240–43

These long thin bulbs are made as tubes, circles, U-s, and corkscrew-shaped CFLs. All provide excellent short-distance illumination. Different coatings inside the bulbs enable them to render certain colors well, as follows…

Foam, type of fire suppression, 325

Here a detergent concentrate is stored under pressure, then when activated the concentrate mixes with water and the sudsy solution is driven by a large blower through a nylon net which creates an avalanche of foam that advances across burning areas to prevent oxygen from feeding the flames. These systems are installed in…

Foam, type of insulation, also spray-in foam insulation, 356–57

This product’s installers –the gun guys– have to wear oxygen respirators and head-to-toe protective suits because as they apply the foam, expanding droplets fly into the air and stick to light fixtures, electrical outlets, floor registers, doors, windows, tools laying around –you name it. In one installation the owner…

Foliage, 32, 67, 69, 128–29, 271, 272, 434;
air freshener around buildings, 25, 409;
poor fire barrier, 105–06;
controller of heat and light entry into buildings, 228, 338;
how to illuminate at night, 245, 266–67;
absorber of smoke particles, 174;
how foliage affects temperatures around buildings, 340–41, 344;
obstruction along driveways, 67, 69;
use as waste water treatment, 337;
supporter of wildlife, 310–12

Grasses, meadows, shrubs, and trees not only absorb carbon dioxide, they soak up sulphur dioxide, nitric oxide, and other toxins and they generate oxygen which freshens the air even more. Nearly two hundred years ago, Washington Irving described the airy advantages of foliage exceedingly well when he said…

Footcandle, measure of light, 228–29

Wherever any kind of light comes from, the amount that strikes what you are looking at is mea­­­s­ured in foot­can­­dles. One footcandle is the amount of light given off by a candle flame when it is a foot from your eyes. Desirable lighting levels for a number of visual tasks appear in figure 6-2…

Footings, in buildings, 126–27, 132, 137

A common dirt dilemma exists where soil freezes in winter. Then the soil’s volume increases by 9 percent and exerts a pressure of 150,000 pounds per square inch in every direction –that’s three times stronger than tensile steel. Hence building codes…

“Form follows function”, Wright directive, 112

Early in Wright’s career he stated that “Form follows function”. But decades later he revised this directive by declaring that “Form and function should be one, joined in a spiritual union, as efflorescence is to a tree.” This was at the core of his philosophy of…

Formaldehyde, toxin in building materials, 26–27, 150, 371

In recent years building interiors have become flooded with a cocktail of toxins that are known to cause allergic reactions, asthma, behavioral breakdowns, birth defects, endocrine disruptions, infertility, and cancer. These substances include formaldehydes in…

Formwork, for concrete, 159–61

As important as concrete is the form it is poured in. A concrete form is a tank that holds a liquid –one that weighs about 150 pounds per cubic foot. Imagine an aquarium that’s eight feet tall, forty feet long, and eight inches thick: that’s what the formwork for only one side of a residential basement is like. Since this container must…

Fort Garland, Colorado, site of 19th Century superinsulation, 361–62

Out in south central Colorado, where temperatures soar above a hundred degrees in summer and plunge below minus thirty degrees in winter, is a small town with a frontier command post of the same name: Fort Garland. Built in 1858 to garrison 100 soldiers commanded by Kit Carson, this fort has several long buildings whose thick adobe outer walls retard heat flow in this area of climatic extremes. How thick are these walls? Twenty-four inches. In the corner of each room is a…

Foundations, in buildings, 126–32

A building’s structure doesn’t begin in the sky but in the ground. This is because a building’s lowest construction bears the heaviest loads and needs the strongest support. This occurs where the flat underside of a building’s footing rests on an equal area of earth immediately below. A footing should be…

Foxblocks, type of insulated concrete, 161–62

While concrete can be shaped into exciting structure, it is a poor insulator. A new product that does something about this is foxblocks. The outer and inner walls of each block are made of rigid foam insulation about 2 inches thick, each weighs less than ten pounds, and is about 48 inches long. The blocks are dry-stacked up to four feet high and interlock like Lego bricks; then…

Freezeproof hose bibb, also frostproof sill cock, 295, 318

Useful in cold regions is a frostproof sill cock, an 8 to 12 inch pipe with the handle on one end and s spigot valve on the other that is mounted in an exterior wall with the handle outdoors and the valve inside behind the insulation where it won’t freeze…

Fuel gas and fuel oil plumbing, 315–17

In these systems a flammable liquid or gas is stored in a pressurized tank which may be small as a bucket or large as a railroad tanker car. From the tank the fuel flows through one or more copper or brass pipes (never iron or steel because they can create sparks when struck) to machines in homes, commercial buildings, and industrial facilities. If your house has a gas stove or gas water heater, you have one of these systems. In the tank is onsite…

Function, role in creating ornament, 109–13

If ornament must exist on or in a building, it should be spare, and it should evolve from a functional aspect of the building’s construction. One architect was exemplary in doing this: Frank Lloyd Wright. When he ornamented a building, he…

Furnitecture, efficient furniture design, 23, 97–98

What the above shows is that the spaces in most homes and businesses are horrendously inefficient! The biggest cause? Fat furniture! If you throw out all the usual cabinets, beds, and desks in most homes and replace them with shoulder-high walls, bureau­beds, and long counters, this furnitecture could make 2,000 square feet of floorspace feel as roomy as 3,000 normal square feet. Think of all the money and…

Garbage, re recycling, 117–25

It takes little more than money to bring out the beauty of a finely grained hardwood in a building; but it takes a refined insight to bring out the beauty in an old board found in someone’s back yard. Furthermore, if you clean that board in a way that makes its weathered grains shine so lustrously that someone says, “You can’t buy wood like that in a lumberyard” –then you have tapped into a more kingly essence…

Garage doors, also overhead sliding doors, use as movable insulation, 396–400

Regarding making the panels of movable insulation cover all the solar glass, one way to do this has been hanging around in your house for years. It’s that homely furnishing residing in a few cobwebby corners of your garage’s ceiling: the overhead sliding door. This portal’s hinged horizontal panels form a solid vertical wall when closed and they…

Gas water heater, in plumbing, 300–05

As you can see in figure 7-18, a gas water heater has an incoming gas line and pilot dial at its base. A gas unit requires…

Gas/electric hybrid vehicles, 77–78

Many “fuel-efficient vehicles” are anything but when you consider that elemental yardstick of environmental efficiency: embodied energy. For example, the electricity used to run gas/electric hybrids is an average 36 percent of utility-generated electricity (the rest is lost in…

Gasoline generators, see generators, gasoline-powered

Gaudi, Antoni, architect of Park Guell, Barcelona, Spain, 125

When I was in architecture school, my history professor showed color slides of Antoni Gaudi’s gorgeous serpentine benches rimming the large public terrace of the Park Guöell in Barcelona, Spain. These works of architecture were built of trash –yet they are studied in the halls of academia as examples of the finest architecture in the world. Look on these mighty works at…

Gehry, Frank, architect, 114–16

Many highly publicized buildings today are littered with garishly excessive ornament that not only looks ugly and out of place but has inflicted serious damage to the environment. Take Frank Gehry’s titanium freeforms, one of which appears in figure 3-32. The front of this building…

Generators, gasoline-powered, also gasoline generators or gensets, 202–03

Residences and small commercial buildings may have smaller gasoline generators that satisfy the occupancy’s critical electric loads when the utility power is out. Each is best located in a shed built against the outside of the building. Never put one of these units inside a…

Generators, water-powered, see hydropower systems

Generators, wind-powered, see wind generators

Glare, excess light, 227–28, 246, 257, 262, 265, 269–70, 339

This is too much light. It can range from a bright sheen on a page you are reading to a streetlight outside that shines through a window to annoy…

Glulam, type of wood structure, 151–52

Another “timber” construction is glulams. These are made of glued and laminated (hence glulams) ¾ or 1½ inch planks ar­ranged end-to-end and layer-on-layer and occasionally side-to-side to form solid beams up to eight feet deep, a foot thick, and a hundred feet long. One’s top if flat usually…

Gore, Albert, environmentalist, 187

You can go to Al Gore’s movie, and read his books, and come to the realization that, yes, all we hear about creating an environmentally sustainable economy is really important. But living happily for a year in the wilderness in a house built of scraps that has no electricity drives the lesson far deeper into one’s soul, and pins the badge of experience on…

“Grassoline”, auto fuel from cellulose, 78

Why not use cellulose wastes: weeds, crop residues, logging and paper wastes, textile remnants, sawgrass, kudzu and other nuisance plants? Scientific Ameri­­­can says we have enough of these kinds of recoverable cellulose to make enough “grassoline” to replace half the oil we use! Then we can have our corn and eat it too. Another possibility is…

Graywater, plumbing water waste, 328

Graywater. Water draining from sinks, showers, tubs, clothes washers, cooling towers, and the like. It is undrinkable and may have a slight odor and pose a health hazard, hence it must empty into closed drains and requires venting. But it can bypass septic tanks and sewers, be filtered, and be…

Graywater, recycling systems, 330–31

Figure 7-29 shows a large graywater recycling system that operates by gravity. On top is a roof that sheds rainwater, and below are…

Grazing, light shining at low angle across a surface, 259

With glazing the lights’ angle of incidence is so low (usually one to five de­grees) that it turns a rough surface into an area of pebbly shadows or slightly re­cessed mortar joints into patterns of…

Grease, type of plumbing waste, 329

Oils from machines, fats from restaurants, and the like. This matter adheres to surfaces, is largely water-insoluble, and is often flammable. In restaurants and food processing plants…

Grease separator, in waste plumbing, 329

Waste greases and oils typically drain into tanks that contain meshed panels to which the grease adheres as it cools, then the remaining liquid (considered as brownwater) flows downstream and the panels laden with fats and solids are periodically removed and replaced. The tank is often a…

Green architecture, environmentally sustainable architecture, 16–31;
advantages promoted by LEED, 18–19;
re efficient spaces, 87;
shortcomings of LEED, 21–29

For those of you who may not want to sit still for a sermon on the fate of the earth, at least consider this: A “green” building that earns a high score on LEED’s checklist is likely to be more comfortable, healthier to live in, less expensive to maintain, more durable, and have a…

Green building products, 16–31;
embodied energy in, 17, 19;
re fuel-efficient vehicles, 77–78;
re green or vegetative roofs, 365–68;
re irrigation, 23–24, 310–12;
re no-touch controls in plumbing fixtures, 276–78;
re ornament in architecture, 109;
re recycled materials, 117;
re septic systems, 336;
re solar energy strategies, 223;
toxins in, 26–28, 371–72;
re underfloor supply plenums, 376;
re visqueen house, 184–87;
re wasteful technologies, 28;
re wood wastes, 150

A “green” building that earns a high score on LEED’s checklist is likely to be more comfortable, healthier to live in, less expensive to maintain, more durable, and have a significantly higher…

Greenhouse with beeswax-operated vent, 401

And here’s a final solar gem: a fiberglass greenhouse whose roof is capped with a vent that opens automatically when the sun shines on an attached tube of beeswax. The sun heats the wax, which…

Green roofs, also living or vegetative roofs, 365–68

In this age of energy-efficiency another method of building the top of a building is taking root: green roofs. On such “upland” terrain one can grow foods from strawberries to cornstalks, enjoy the view, even have…

Ground, also topography, 129, 342–44;
re electrical ground rods, 199–200;
re foundations, 126–32;
surface temperatures, 344;
temperatures 20 feet below, 344–45

Flat land may seem like a good place to build, but water sometimes doesn’t drain well in these places. The steeper the slope, usually the nicer the view downhill, but the more you’re likely to pay for a foundation and a driveway. Gentle slopes, like the one at…

Ground wires, also ground wiring, 198–200

With the advent of computer electronics, those little ground wires that run from outlet to outlet in a room and gather stray electrons have become very important. In commercial buildings with lots of electronic equipment, these wires are often…

(Solomon) Guggenheim Museum, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, New York City, 81, 108, 116

One of the finest ADA-compliant buildings is New York’s Gug­genheim Museum. Of this seven-story helix Frank Lloyd Wright said: “It would be easy to go up in the elevator in a wheelchair and come down again without undesired interruption.” Here is eloquent proof that…

Hall of the Cloisters, Euphrata, PA, example of sustainable architecture, 31

[Example of sustainable architecture]: The Hall of the Cloisters at Euphrata, Pennsylvania, a six-story building for a monastic community whose structure is built of mortised local oak posts and beams covered with … construction circa 1732.

Hall of Records, Los Angeles, CA, use of computerized louvers in, 235

Another fine example of programmed daylighting, dating back to 1962, is the 125-foot-tall aluminum louvers on the south facade of the Hall of Records in Los Angeles. As the hot southern California sun moves across the sky, computerized photocells (in 1962!) rotate these huge fins on their vertical axes to block the sun’s…

Halon alternatives, for fire suppression, 324

On Jan. 1, 1996, domestic production and importing of Halon 1301 was banned. Since then several environmentally acceptable replacements have been developed. There are two general kinds: (1) gases stored under pressure, which when activated discharge through one or more nozzles as a heavier-than-air mist that smothers and cools the fire; and…

“Hands-off” approach to designing and building architecture, 10

This book’s greatest gift is the way it enables you to put all its knowledge and ideas to use. In this respect these pages employ the “hands-off” approach. This in­volves de­scribing each part of a building’s design and construction for those who have neither the time nor ability to do the work, yet need to ensure that those professionals who do this work will do it right. Here you needn’t be…

Happy Land nightclub fire in 1990 near NYC in which 87 people died, 102

Consider the Happy Land nightclub fire near New York City in 1990 in which 87 people breathed their last. During a conversation I once had with the insurance claims adjustor for this fire, he said some people who died on the lower floor at the bar were found slumped in their seats with cigarets and drinks in their hands –because they had inhaled an invisible gas with no odor and…

Heat exchanger, recycler of waste heat, 394–95

In almost every building some of the energy consumed to keep occupants comfortable escapes up a flue as hot gases, through a vent as warm air, or down a drain as warm waste water. Recapturing this lost heat and reusing it offers tantalizing opportunities for reducing energy bills in such buildings. The heat is typically recovered by a heat exchanger, a radiator-like device containing a…

Heat mirror®, cellophane-like insulation, 399–400

If you stack many sheets of bubblepak until they are ten inches thick and sandwich between them cellophane-like sheets of electrostatic inhib­it­or such as Heat Mirror®, (see www.southwall.com), you will have a translucent insulation with a hefty R-value. I once conducted a…

Heat pump, climate control system, 388–91

Imagine a machine that makes cold air out of hot and hot air out of cold. That’s what a heat pump does. This cycling can be reversed to make the heater work as a cooler. All it takes is a reversing valve, which appears as a little circle with an X in it in the upper center of figure 8-21. You probably have one of these machines in your house right now: your refrigerator. If you installed a reversing valve in it, you could use your ice cube tray as a warming oven…

Heat tracing cable, see electric heating cable

High-density discharge (HID) light bulbs, 244–46

These bulbs are efficient and long-lasting … They are installed in high ceilings in warehouses, superstores, and the like. Outdoors they are located above streets, parking, and recreation areas. Since they burn hot and their pressurized bulbs typically explode with hot glass particles if they break or contact any liquid, they…

High-pressure sodium (HPS) light bulbs, 246

These bulbs render colors reasonably well and their light depreciates little with age. They are installed in streetlights, parking garages, security areas, and other places requiring steady high-output lighting where color rendering is unimportant…

Home elevator, type of elevator, 84–85

In a home elevator, the cab may be small as a showerstall or big enough to hold a wheelchaired passenger and an attendant. Each requires a mech­anical equipment area usually located next to the shaft above or below. The cab may rise through an open area such as a stairwell, or the…

Home run, type of electrical circuit, 188–89

An example of one circuit, which electricians often call a “home run”, appears in the lower right of figure 5-3…

Horseshoe staircase, efficient staircase, 80

In floor-to-floor stairs avoid straight-flight steps –too dangerous. Instead turn the second half around, which creates shorter falling distances for stumblers. The halfway landing can be divided into four big pie-shaped steps which shortens the stairs’ length: a construction known as the horseshoe staircase, as sketched in…

Hose threads on bathroom faucets, 279–80, 318

At least one sink on every floor should also have spigot threads on its spout so a hose can be screwed onto it. These are available in almost any hardware store. Two appear in the photo above. They enable you to do everything from…

Hot water heating, in plumbing, 300–10

In small buildings this is commonly a cylindrical tank whose water is heated by electricity or natural gas. For domestic water the optimal temperature is 120º F, but for com­mercial water the temperature is often 170º which is needed to kill Legionella bacilli. Each tank has a draw capacity (maximum gallons per hour of water the unit can heat), a recovery rate (maximum gallons per hour the unit can replenish used hot water), and an…

Hot water heating, climate control system, 380–81

In this system a boiler heats water that is pumped through pipes to rooms or zones with baseboard heating units. This is your typical household furnace-fed water baseboard heating system. The baseboard units look much like the electric unit in figure 8-16, except that…

Humidification, 392–93

Most likely the first humidifier used in American buildings was a pan of water on a Franklin stove. This technology is little changed today, though now it can be governed with digital controls. Some of today’s models are nearly as small as a pan of water. In large units, outlets should be…

Humidity, amount of water moisture in air, 348–50, 363, 370, 373–74, 392–94, 413

Here are the parameters of indoor human comfort that define their operation: Humidity: 45 to 55 percent year-round, as measured by a humidistat, which is often…

HVAC (heating, ventilation, and cooling) systems, 19, 45, 362–65, 385–87, 409–15, 421, 422, 432

This is your big-building HVAC system. One appears on the next page. It operates as follows. (1) Fresh outdoor air and stale return air enter one end of an air handling unit (or AH unit), a long box that may be as big as a mobile home; (2) the air is preheated in cold weather, precooled in warm weather, humidified if too dry, dehumidified if too moist, and filtered to remove impurities; (3) at the…

Hydraulic elevator, type of elevator, 83–84

Here the cab is hydraulically raised and lowered by a telescoping plunger mounted be­neath the cab or along a side. They are quieter and less costly than traction elevators and have smaller shafts, no penthouses, fewer controls, and lighter structural supports. But their height is…

Hydrogen fuel, use in vehicles, 78

Hydrogen fuel delivers only about 27 percent of the embodied energy it typically takes to make it. Every hydrogen-fueled vehicle success story seems to come from Iceland, where the huge amount of energy required to split water molecules into hydrogen atoms is geothermal energy –free energy gushing from the ground. As one authority says about this fuel…

Hydropower systems, also microhydro systems, small water-powered generators of electricity, 206, 216–21

Generating electricity with water involves damming a stream to create a reservoir whose surface is well above the water at the dam’s base, then a pipe called a penstock carries the impounded water from the top of the dam’s upstream side to the bottom of the dam’s downstream side where the…

Hypars, see warped planes

Illumination, see lighting

Impact Insulation Class (IIC), ability of floor construction to absorb impact sounds, 431

ASTM has given a number of floor constructions Impact Insulation Class (IIC) ratings, in which the higher the IIC rating the more the construction absorbs impact sound. Constructions with IICs of at least 55 are installed between units in…

Impact noise, type of annoying sound, 431–32

This occurs when an object sharply strikes a surface and creates a quick loud sound that passes through the construction behind. Examples are a door slamming against its frame, a woman’s spike heels striking a hard floor, and a heavy object falling on a floor. The chief remedy for eliminating these annoyances is to…

Imperial Polk County Courthouse, Bartow, FL, example of faulty building construction, 362–65

Those five earlier-mentioned letters –w a t e r– that can wreck havoc in small buildings can do the same in large ones. Wit­ness this scenario gone awry at the Imperial Polk County Courthouse in Bartow, Florida, completed in 1987 for $37 million…

Incandescent (I) light bulbs, 237–38;
compared to fluorescent and LED bulbs, 240–43

Known to engineers as I lights, this is the bulb that began it all. It may be clear (the brightest), frosted (these emit slightly diffuse light), or white (these emit highly diffuse light). One line of “IQ” bulbs has energy-saving microchips in their bases that enable the lights to turn off after 30 minutes (good for closets, storerooms, and bathrooms), turn off after…

Indoor comfort parameters for climate control systems, 370–72

Since climate control systems essentially do only what they are told, first we need to know what to tell them. Here are the parameters of indoor human comfort that define their operation…

Indoor lighting, 254–64

Each part of a room that contains a light (including windows and skylights) is a “larger light fixture” whose construction may be shaped and surfaced to…

Infill frame, type of structural bracing, 140–41

This [structural bracing] involves filling an area of wall or floor with a solid material that keeps the area rigid. An example of a wall infill frame is a brick wall between a floor and a ceiling beam and two columns on each side; here the masonry keeps the frame from leaning right or left. An example of a floor infill frame is a concrete floor poured onto sheets of formed metal known as…

Infill site, unbuildable site made buildable by adding earth to it, 131

An infill site is a lot that normally can’t be built on. Example: In 1978 when I was field engineer for a 160-house development in New York, one lot sloped so steeply from the street that a driveway couldn’t legally be laid to the building site thirty feet below. So the developer (1) built a poured concrete basement wall on the legal building site, (2) dumped truckloads of excess earth…

Institute of Land and Water Research, Penn State University, re purifying plumbing waste water, 337

Regarding plumbing waste that empties into a public sewer, research conducted by the Institute of Land and Water Research at Penn State University in the 1960s found that if the effluent of a typical city of 100,000 is treated in a manmade lake, it would require 1,290 acres of area to purify the water. But if the same effluent empties into a forest, it would require only 129 acres…

Insulation, in buildings, 45, 98, 161–62, 234, 342, 347–62, 368, 376, 408, 436;
acoustic insulation, 83, 376, 426, 428, 430;
around boilers, 379;
around ducts, 376;
cladding around electric wires, 190–92;
around fiber optic cables, 247;
around plumbing pipes, 289, 295;
around solar panels, 306–08;
translucent insulation, 396–404;
around water heaters, 302

Once you’ve analyzed the weather and the landscape around a building, your next line of defense toward making its indoor spaces economically comfortable every hour of the year is insulating its lowest floor, outer walls, and roof: what is known as the building envelope. This cutaneous construction may contain three kinds of insulation…

Insulation Cage, superior superinsulation construction, 350–54, 357–61

Is there any way to notably reduce the heat flowing through a building envelope without trapping moisture in it? There is! It is the Insulation Cage, a wall construction that contains thick insulation, allows enough air to flow through the construction and carry away any deposited moisture, and is relatively easy and economical to build. Its construction appears in figure 8-8…

Irrigation, 23–24, 310–12

In other words, all a LEED point-seeker needs to do with this environmentally destructive construction is use a few high-efficiency nozzles, a couple moisture sensors, and a little recycled water to earn five full points toward earning certification. But building irrigation systems does more than dig up the environment onsite…

Irving, Washington, American author, 409

Nearly two hundred years ago, Washington Irving described the airy advantages of foliage exceedingly well when he said…

Johnson's Wax Building, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, Racine, WI, 230

Some of the finest examples of daylighting in the last century were created by Frank Lloyd Wright and Le Corbusier, as you can see in figure 6-3. In the skylights of Wright’s Johnson Wax Building…

King, Reverend Martin Luther, 30

If incorporating such minor economies into our buildings lull us into believing we need do nothing more, they will become more the problem than the solution. As Martin Luther King once said of another movement in the making: “A beginning sincerely made is one thing, but a token beginning that is an end to itself is quite another.”…

Kitchens, efficient design, 101

An efficiently arranged kitchen sink, stove, and fridge should form a triangle whose perimeter is no more than 22 feet. On each side of each vertex should be at least two feet of counterspace, and ideally much more. A clever arrangement is the…

Lamp posts, see lighting poles

Landmark lighting, at night, 264–65

This outdoor illumination brightens facades, monuments, and other prominences at night; it is especially effective on light-colored surfaces with slight indents or projections that cast lines of shadow which model their forms. Precise angles be­tween the…

Landscape lighting, at night, 266–69

There are two landscape lighting strat­egies: organic and rational. Organic de­sign utilizes natural shapes and free ar­rangements: its aim is to conform man to Na­ture’s grandeur. Ra­tion­al design uses geometric shapes and formal layouts: its aim is to fit Nature to man’s ideals. The two do not mix well. Either way…

La Tourette Monastery, France, designed by Le Corbusier, 230

Some of the finest examples of daylighting in the last century were created by Le Corbusier, as you can see in figure 6-3. Look at the shape of a window he de­signed at the top of a staircase of a monast­ery in France…

Laundry areas, efficient design, 101–02

Instead of cramming a clothes washer and dryer into a corner of a clammy basement infested with spiders and mildew, locate the machines in an area as nice as the living room. This should have a large sink, contain plenty of counters for folding clothes, and be close to…

Leaching fields, in septic systems, 334–36

Then the clarified effluent discharges through an overflow pipe into a leaching field: a network of underground 4-inch diameter footing drains with small holes along their sides known as perforated drain tiles through which the effluent seeps into the surrounding soil. The drains are laid be­low frost level in trenches filled with…

Le Corbusier, French architect, 116, 160, 230

Le Corbusier, the great French architect of the mid-Twentieth century, used rough boards for his concrete formwork which after they were removed made the concrete look rugged: a technique he called beàton brut (brute concrete). Another architect who knew a thing or two about…

LED light bulbs, also light-emitting diode light bulbs, 239–43, 250;
compared to incandescent and fluorescent bulbs, 240–43

No longer are these lights limited to off-on indicators on photocopiers and computers. They have escaped the bounds of fringe technology and now appear in buildings as security lights, emergency exit lights, and museum exhibit lighting. These lights cost a lot, but their operation…

LEED, 18–29, 74, 147, 187, 277, 279;
accomplishments, 18–20;
re brownfield sites, 22, 130–31;
building checklist, 18;
shortcomings, 20–29;
re fuel-efficient vehicles, 77–79;
re green roofs, 365–68;
re irrigation, 23–24, 311–12;
re OSB sheathing, 150, 371;
re recycling, 117, 124;
re underfloor supply plenums, 376

Since 1998, this agency has encouraged the creation of envir­onmentally sustainable architecture by using a detailed checklist … Lately this program’s directives have even been portrayed by our nation’s governments and businesses as a patriotic scripture … How­ever, even a perfect score on LEED’s checklist will not create a sustainable arch­itecture because a number of this agency’s di­rectives are littered with flaws. More specifically, some are…

Legionnaire's Disease, 274, 300

Plumbing requires an amazing variety of pipes and related components, which can be very dangerous when every part isn’t done perfectly well. To confirm this we need look no further than the weekend of July 21, 1976, where in a hotel in Philadelphia a germ crept into the water supply and killed 34 people –and gave birth to the term, Legionnaire’s Disease…

Light bulbs, also artificial lighting, 29, 33, 236–50;
comparison of incandescent, CFL, and LED bulbs, 240–43

An artificial light is a glass bulb that contains a filament or has a phosphor coating on the glass’s inner surface. When electricity passes through the filament or excites the phosphor, the bulb brightens. Phosphor-activated bulbs require a…

Light-emitting diode light bulbs, see LED light bulbs

Light fixtures, also luminaires, 19, 250–54, 257

An essential part of any light bulb is the fixture or luminaire it is mounted in –what Mark Twain described as “plenty of daylight in a box.” Each has one or more sockets, a mount of some kind, and a cord to the power supply. Each may also have…

Lighting, also illumination, 33, 35, 47, 181, 186, 226–73;
computer-operated lighting, 252–54, 269–71, 373;
exit lights, 103, 202, 260–61;
landscape lighting, 266–69, 367, 373;
occupancy sensors in lighting systems, 19, 24, 193, 204, 252–54, 257, 267
tips for illuminating indoor areas, 262–64;
in unoccupied buildings at night, 24, 271–73

Unless you live in a mausoleum, architecture is merely light reflecting off surfaces. No light, no architecture! Inside a building this space-shaper may arrive from several sources…

Lighting circuits, in electrical systems, 193, 204

In commercial buildings with lights operated by wall switches or occupancy sensors, the lights require separate circuits…

Lighting environments, constructions around light fixtures that make their illumination more useful, 254–62

A lighting environment is the construction immediately around a light fixture that directs its light most advantageously to the area it illuminates. Each can make a space look larger and be smaller at the same time, which re­duces the cost to construct it and keep it comfortable. Common lighting environments appear below…

Lighting poles, also lamp posts, design and construction, 270–71

Mount outdoor lights on poles 10 to 16 feet above walks and 14 to 25 feet above parking areas. The lights on top should be several feet from any foliage and the poles’ bases should be five feet from driveway edges and parking areas. The best fixtures have…

Light metal framing, type of steel structure, 157

In many commercial buildings wood framing is not allowed because it is considered a fire hazard. Enter light metal framing. Its studs, joists, and rafters have the same nominal dimensions as wood, but they are sheets of galvanized steel bent into hollow rec­tangular sections. These shapes are lighter and…

Lightning rods, 62–63, 201–02

One final threat remains to electric wires and all the construction that surrounds them: stray electrons from the sky. A lightning bolt may carry six trillion volts and 20,000 amps and be thick as a quarter. The best we can do with these violent blasts of electricity is to make it easier, not harder, for them to blindly find their way into the ground. This is done by…

Light ribbon, type of illumination, 249

Imagine a light that is only one-fiftieth an inch thick and up to 22 inches wide that can be bent like cardboard and tucked into a corner. Such a light exists. It is bright enough to read by, is dimmable to 3 percent of full brightness, consumes little power…

Light well, open construction that allows daylight indoors, 233–34

Two more ways to coax daylight deeply into buildings are the sawtooth roof and the light well, as sketched in figure 6-8. These work well where temperatures are equa­ble year-round as in Hawaii and on the California coast. But in hot or cold regions a lot of heat will flow through these openings; then it would make more sense to…

Line light source, type of lighting, 252

A line light source contains a tube-like bulb that creates a long linear light. Familiar here is the fluorescent tube…

Living areas, efficient design, 101

In residences, instead of fitting together a boxy living room, dining room, and den in the old Victorian way, think of the activities occurring in these spaces. Then you may prefer a formal area for pleasant conversation (this needs several upholstered seats, each near a low table); a passive area for…

Loadbearing wall, type of wall structure, 137–38

Some walls support no structure above (these are nonloadbearing walls), while others do support structure above (these are loadbearing walls). One way to tell the difference is to … If you have trouble with this, call in a contractor or architect. Also helpful may be figure 4-12. A loadbearing wall is part of a…

Lo-flo showerheads, in plumbing, 29, 97, 272, 277, 312

When you take a shower, first you wet yourself down, then you wash your body, then you rinse yourself off. While washing your body, why not turn off the water, so you don’t wash the soap off while trying to put it on? This simple act could save much of the gallonage you guzzle when showering –and much of your patience in putting up with long drizzly showers. My health club has a solution here…

Longspan steel joists, also open-web steel joists, type of structure, 133, 155

These lightweight trusses are assemblies of usually horizontal top and bottom chords connected with diagonal struts, all made of small steel angles and rods. You’ve probably seen rows of these members in the ceiling of your local supermarket or health club. They can be up to…

Low-pressure sodium (LPS or SOX) light bulbs, 246

This is the most efficient of all bulbs, but its drab yellow light makes all other colors look dull. It is used for roadways, tunnels, security areas, and other places where economy is more important than color clarity. This light also penetrates fog well and…

Lstiburek, Joseph, Ph.D., prominent building scientist;
re bogus LEED point grabbers, 21–22;
re green roofs, 368;
re obtaining LEED rating without saving energy, 28;
re underfloor supply plenums, 376;
re use of vapor barriers, 350, 353–54, 440

Hear what one of America’s most esteemed building scientists, Joseph Lstiburek, Ph.D, affiliated with ASHRAE, itself an esteemed organization, said of LEED’s checklist containing a number of these bogus point-grabbers: Aren’t these code requirements? Shouldn’t these be “the standard of care” …? …

Lumber grading stamps, 147–48

Professional lumbermen examine every pallet of lumber that leaves a sawmill and give it a grade depending on the wood’s number of knots, splits, warps, wanes, pitch streaks, and other structural defects or blemishes; then the grade is stamped on the lumber. Lumbermen can read these stamps the way an orchestra leader reads sheet music. Three lumber stamps appear in figure 4-17…

Luminaires, see light fixtures

Luminous escape route trim, type of photoluminescent tape, 260–61

One kind of emergency lighting consumes no energy, has no bulbs, is nontoxic, and requires no computerized controls. This is luminous escape route trim: a photolum­inescent tape that glows in the dark. The tape is sold as adhesive-backed sheets that can be cut into arrows, strips, signs, and other shapes then applied to floors, wall bases, tread nosings, stair rails, and…

Machine-borne sound, sound originating from machines in buildings, 432–34

This sound originates in HVAC units, elevators, loosely mounted pipes, and other mechanical equipment. Their sloppy installation can turn an otherwise well-designed occupancy into a chaos of vibrations, rattles, rumblings, hammerings, buzzes, and whistles. A few remedies are…

Masking, method of concealing unwanted sound, 421

Next, you can introduce a second sound [to an initial annoying sound] that is more enjoyable to listen to, a method known as masking. Two examples are a fan and soft music, each of which occurs at about 35 dB. Now [if the initial annoying sound is 70 dB] only about 35 dB remain to be lowered by…

Masonry, type of structure, 164–73

This is an interlocking assembly of rock-like units, natural or manmade, typically held together with mortar. This structure can be almost any shape, from the marble drums stacked in the columns of the Parthenon, to the interlacing ribs in the rose windows in the Cathedral of Chartres, to a garden wall in your back yard. A common masonry product today is…

Masonry heater, efficient fireplace, 405–06

Two other woodburners merit an honorable mention here. One is the ma­son­ry heater (some are known as Finnish stoves or Russian stoves). This is a massive brick or rock construction that contains an enclosed firebox (the front may be pyrex glass so you can see the flames dancing inside) from where the produced heat twines through a maze of channels whose…

Maximum comfort in minimum volume, design strategy, 23, 87–99, 206, 416

Each indoor space should provide maximum comfort in minimum volume. This involves removing any useless corners, unused crannies, excess doorways, gunbarrel hallways, seas of circulation around islands of furniture, and other chubby cubic footage from a floorspace. This strategy is central to all that is Green in architecture, because efficient spaces consume less energy and…

Medical gas, type of nonwater plumbing, 317

These systems convey gases as oxygen, compressed air, vacuum air, helium, nitrous oxide, ethylene, and cyclopropane (the last three are anæsthesias) in hospitals, dental offices, medical clinics, and many industrial and scientific facilities. The gases are stored in…

Mercury, in light bulbs, 242

To many, an obvious debit of CFLs is that they contain mercury. But even this may be the opposite of what most of the public may believe; because the EPA recently stated that where electricity is generated by coal-fired utilities, since coal contains mercury and I lights burn much less efficiently than CFLs, I lights actually cause more mercury to be released into the environment per kilowatt consumed than CFLs. Plus, the…

Mercury vapor (MV) light bulbs, 245

These emit a blue-green light, which makes them ideal for night-lighting foliage and weathered copper exteriors; but they’ll make those porterhouse steaks at the supermarket look like spoiled meat. Since they emit ultraviolet light, they require…

Metal decking, also composite decking, type of structural bracing, 140–41

An example of a floor infill frame [a type of structural bracing] is a concrete floor poured onto sheets of formed metal known as metal decking or composite decking; this bracing is unsurpassed for resisting racking stresses that occur in high-rise buildings. You’ve probably walked on this bracing whenever you’ve been in a tall building (it’s usually…

Metal halide (MH) light bulbs, 245

These are smaller and produce better-quality light than MV bulbs. They offer the best combined efficiency, color rendering ability, and long life of all lights and so are used for long-burning general commercial illumination. They should have …

Microhydro systems, see hydropower systems

Mies van der Rohe, Ludwig, architect, 136

How different Wright was from another great architect of his time, Mies van der Rohe. Mies’s 1927 Barcelona Pavilion and early European residences were also profoundly innovative, but his iconic use of steel and glass could be easily copied by others; so much so, that most of today’s urban skylines were forged on a Miesian anvil. Eero Saarinen described this well when…

Mirror lighting, type of nocturnal lighting, 268

Another exciting nocturnal strategy is mirror lighting. This reflects an interesting scene in a pool or other placid body of water as appears above. This illumination is composed as follows: 1. Set the water’s surface as a dark reflective foreground in which no light shines on, in, or from under the water; 2. Locate the reflected scene a little back of and …

Mirrors, illusory enlargeners of space, 90

A space-doubling cousin of big wall openings is large mirrors. These work best when the glass is large, when it is located so you don’t readily see yourself in it, where two walls of glass meet at a corner, and when a roughly textured object is placed close to the glass in the corner. A good example of all this is a…

Mixing box, air regulator in HVAC duct, 375–77

As sketched in figure 8-14, a mixing box blends proper proportions of hot and cold air where heating and cooling ducts meet to supply one room or zone with air…

Moisture, in building envelopes, 348–50, 362–65

Now when heat flows through an exterior wall, part of the migrating heat is carried by the air which, remember, also contains water. As the air flows through the wall and its temperature lowers, the air cools and its humidity rises until it reaches 100 percent; then the water begins to drop out of the air and deposit on the wall’s construction. If this water cannot es­cape, it will…

Moonlighting, type of nocturnal lighting, 267

A related night-lighting strategy is moonlighting: a soft downlighting that emulates the silvery glow of a full moon­­. A good light source for creating this effect is a low-wattage metal halide bulb mounted in a parabolic reflector faced with…

Motor circuit, in electrical systems, 194

In commercial and industrial buildings, large electric motors run elevators, pumps, and all kinds of other machinery. An electric motor can have 200 horsepower and weigh 2,200 pounds, and each has several critical dimensions as sketched in figure 5-9. The chief criteria for selecting an electric motor is…

Mount, part of light fixture, 250–51

An essential part of a light fixture is its mount. This may be recessed, flush, or projecting. A re­cessed fixture is mounted so its facing is flush or nearly so with the surface of the surrounding construction; this protects the light from…

Moving walks, 82

Related to escalators are moving walks. Here the steps are replaced by long skidproof belts that may slope up to 11 degrees. They can carry large numbers of pedestrians over long distances in airports, sports arenas, and shopping malls. Moving belts also convey…

Multiple module redundant design (MMRD), climate control system design strategy, 374

One innovation computers have spawned is a more efficient design of HVAC systems known as multiple module redundant design. This involves replacing a large whole-building HVAC unit with several smaller units of the same capacity plus one more small unit. Then during most of the time when heating and cooling loads are notably less than maximum, instead of…

Natural gas, type of auto fuel, 78

What is so amazing about all the inefficient alternative energies mentioned above is that we’ve had an energy-efficient replacement for gasoline and the infrastructure to dispense it for decades: natural gas. Back in 1969, the subcontractor who installed the natural gas system for a house in California I helped build ran his truck on propane. The gas line entered a special carburetor –all it took, he said. The fuel burned so clean that he hadn’t tuned his engine in 30,000 miles…

Natural light, see daylighting

Neon lighting, 248–49

This is a gas-filled glass tube that emits a cool but dazzling light whose voltage is regulated by a small transformer. The tubes may be any shape, many colors are available, and reflectors can be mounted along the tubes to direct the light. The lights are designed as follows: an architect draws the desired layout and selects the colors; then a…

Neutra, Richard, architect, 235

Another fine example of programmed daylighting, dating back to 1962, is the 125-foot-tall aluminum louvers on the south facade of the Hall of Records in Los Angeles … The system’s designer, the distinguished architect Richard Neutra, said, “All technical things are auxiliary to human well-being and an aid to vitality.” Well said for any age.

Night roof spray cooling, 392–93

A method of humidifying air in high deserts where nightly temperatures may be 40 degrees cooler than midday is night roof spray cooling. As sketched in figure 8-23, a network of small sprinklers trickle water onto a smooth slightly sloping roof at night, the chilled water is reservoired, and the next day it…

NM (nonmetallic) cable, see Romex cable

Nonloadbearing wall, wall that doesn’t support structure, 137–38

Some walls support no structure above (these are nonloadbearing walls), while others do support structure above (these are loadbearing walls). In renovation work you would want to know which is which before removing one, or you might get a few tons of rubble down your neck. One way to tell the difference is to…

Nonwater liquid, type of nonwater plumbing, 315

These plumbing systems carry such liquids as milk in dairies and chemicals in industrial facilities. In each system, meticulous specifications and a detailed list of…

Nonwater plumbing, types, 315–18

Plumbing also conveys fluids other than water, as follows. All these systems are designed by professional engineers…

No-touch controls, hand-free operation of plumbing fixtures, 276–78

A hot topic in plumbing these days is no-touch controls. These automatically turn on a fixture’s water as you approach and turn it off as you leave. Theoretically at least, they are easier to use, are sanitary, and conserve water. But here I would like to ask someone I can trust –You: how often does a no-touch fau­cet fail to…

Occupancies (interior spaces), efficient design of‚ 87–102

Every indoor space has an optimal floor area based on its number of occupants and what they do. Examples are two people sleeping in a bedroom, and twelve people sitting around a table in a conference room. Each such space should provide…

Occupancy sensors, 19, 24, 193, 195, 204, 252–54, 257, 267

Another useful “dimmer” is the occupancy sensor. Each of these little sentinels has an eye that notifies host controls down at computer headquarters to turn on the lights when someone enters an area and turn them off when the last person leaves, saving energy when the space is vacant. Each sensor is usually…

Off-grid vs. on-grid, types of electric power, 206–07

Will the [natural energy] system be off-grid or on-grid. In off-grid systems, the building doesn’t have access to local electric power; then the system requires batteries to store its generated electricity for when more is needed than the system can supply. In on-grid systems, the local utility provides electricity when more is needed than…

Onsite generation of electricity, 205–25

On the other hand, generating electricity with sun, wind, and water saves energy and produces virtually no pollution. But manufacturing natural energy systems consumes energy and degrades the environment somewhere; so consideration of each should compare…

Openings in interior walls, that allow light to enter adjacent rooms, 89–90

By making a large opening in a wall between two rooms, the space on each side may seemingly double its size, which can give you four rooms for the price of one hole. Two examples of this spatial legerdemain appear in figure 3-19…

Open-web steel joists, also longspan steel joists, type of structure, 133, 155

These lightweight trusses are assemblies of usually horizontal top and bottom chords connected with diagonal struts, all made of small steel angles and rods. This structure is economical for light uniform loads on long spans, and…

Orientation, of solar panels to maximize exposure to solar energy, 211–12

Try to orient stationary panels within 15 degrees east or west of due south. Regarding the panels’ vertical angle, or tilt, for maximum annual production the optimal tilt is the site’s latitude plus 5 degrees, and for maximum winter production (when lights and appliances are used more) the…

Ornament, on buildings, 109–16

Ornament has little to do with a building’s function. Surely ornament can make an ordinary space look more attractive; but when it is stuck on a building like post-it notes reminding you of how nice it would be to live in early Greece or Rome, it is an inglorious masquerade that only blots whatever beauty the building may truly have. Such…

OSB (oriented strand board), plywood substitute, 26–27, 150, 371

But wait a minute. OSB glue contains toxic phenol formaldehyde. Although plywood contains this too, it has only a few paper-thin layers compared to the stew of phenol in OSB. OSB is also factory-sealed with waterproof paint, and when a sheet is cut…

Oscillation, annoying sound passing through thin constructions, 426

Another annoying reverberation is oscillation. This occurs when a soundwave strikes a thin or membranous material and makes it vibrate which can magnify the sound on the other side. These adverse acoustics can occur in back-to-back medicine cabinets in adjacent apartment bathrooms, back-to-back book­cases in adjacent offices, and in ducts where swiftly flowing air makes the sheet metal walls rumble. Design remedies are…

Outdoor lighting, 264–73

When the sun sets, outdoor lighting rises to the fore. Here the radiating photons aren’t enclosed by a big reflective container; so the illuminated scene looks brighter while all around is black, which creates harsher contrasts. Since these can hurt one’s eyes, outdoor light sources should be…

Outdoor sound, 434–35

In such spaces the sound is usually weaker at near distances; so if the sound is a lecturer or musicians performing before an audience, the sound may need to be amplified more. Lack of enclosing surfaces also…

Overhangs, re controlling sun’s radiance on windows, 338

By building an overhang over a south-facing window, you can (1) keep the high summer sun from entering the window and lower your air-conditioning bills, and (2) allow the low winter sun to pass through the window and lower your heating bills. Such a sun control appears on the left…

Overhead electrical service entrance, see weatherhead

Overhead sliding doors, see garage doors

Owner and Architect Agreement form, also A.I.A. Document B141 or Standard Form of Agreement between Owner and Architect, 35

An architect also has a document titled “Standard Form of Agree­ment between Owner and Architect” (known as A.I.A. Document B141), which details every as­pect of an architect’s business relation with a client. Usually the…

Palace of the Governors, Santa Fe, NM, example of sustainable architecture, 30–31

[Example of sustainable architecture]: The Palace of the Governors in Santa Fe, New Mexico, a magnificent 250-foot-long commercial building whose walls are made of native adobe earth, whose impressive entrance facade is a colonnaded portico … built between 1610 and 1612.

Park Güell, designed by Antoni Gaudi, Barcelona, Spain, 125

When I was in architecture school, my history professor showed color slides of Antoni Gaudi’s gorgeous serpentine benches rimming the large public terrace of the Park Güell in Barcelona, Spain. This work of architecture was built of trash –shattered china, defective tiles, collected seashells, broken bottles –yet it is studied in the halls of academia as examples of the finest architecture in the world. Look on these mighty works at…

Parking, for driveways, 71–72

Every driveway needs adjacent places to park. Each may be perpendicular, angled between 45 and 60 degrees, or parallel to the lane. A parking space should generally be…

Parthenon, Athens, Greece, 164

Masonry can be almost any shape, from the marble drums stacked in the columns of the Parthenon, to the interlacing ribs in the rose windows in the Cathedral of Chartres, to a…

Patch lighting, type of night lighting, 265

A delightful variation of landmark lighting is patch lighting. This brightens a focal area while blackening its surround, an example being an entrance at night. Here two or more floods are mounted near the base of an entrance like footlights before a stage so…

Pathway lights, for night lighting, 267

A landscape that people will walk in at night should have pathway lights placed along pedestrian routes. The lights should be mounted low and aim downward, away from the eyes and toward the feet, with part of the…

Pelton wheel, see turbine

Penstock, pipe that carries water from reservoir to turbine in hydropower systems, 218–20

[In water power generation systems] this is an inclined pipe, typically 2 to 6 inches in diameter, that runs from the top of the reservoir to the base of the dam. To keep objects from entering the pipe and lodging in the nozzle or damaging the turbine, the inlet…

Perforated drain tile, around foundations and in leaching fields, 132, 334–36

Install a large pipe with penny-size holes along it (known as perforated drain tile) alongside the footing to collect water accumulating around the foundation…

Perimeter heat flow, heat loss through solid construction between areas of insulation in building envelopes, 352

The Insulation Cage has another big thermal advantage: the 5 inches between the two stud walls eliminates another heat loss known as perimeter heat flow. In standard stud framing, heat conducts through the studs between the insulation and the plates along the wall’s tops and bottoms; and since heat conducts through wood about four times faster than through fiberglass batts…

PEX (crosslinked polyethylene) tubing, small plumbing piping, 286

A new kind of plastic piping that is gaining popularity these days is PEX (crosslinked polyethylene) tubing, a flexible corrosion-resistant piping that is useful for small plumbing systems (i.e. in cottages and campground bath houses), radiant floor heating, snow melting, and…

Phase-change salts, also eutectic salts, storer of heat indoors, 404

As effective as this thermal construction is, it can be significantly improved by replacing the masonry with a superior thermomassing material known as phase-change salts or eutectic salts. One, named PCM 20T (see www.pcmenergy.com), is said to thermomass 50 to 80 times more heat than masonry if its…

Photovoltaic (PV) cells, also PV cells or PV arrays, generator of electricity from the sun, 182, 206, 209–12

When electricity is generated by the sun, the elemental component is the PV cell. Each is typically a bluish-gray wafer of chemically treated silicone about 6 × 6 inches in size and less than a half inch thick. A few dozen are typically wired together to create a flat surface of almost any size and…

Physical water conditioner, remover of unwanted minerals in water, 300

… the physical water conditioner, a small electronic device that is clamped onto the water supply main and passes a low-energy electromagnetic field through the flowing water that keeps the suspended calcium and magnesium ions from crusting inside the pipes. Where the water later…

Piles, deep columnar supports in soft soil under a building, 130, 137

For larger buildings, deep holes may be bored in the area of the foundation and long thin cylinders of soil are removed and analyzed by an engineer. If the soil beneath the planned building isn’t strong enough to support it, long column-like piles may be sunk deep into the earth below. There are three kinds…

Pipes, common kinds used in plumbing systems, 283–88

In plumbing systems, these are the tubular assemblies that deliver water to and from the fixtures. Common pipe materials are…

Pisa, leaning Tower of, Italy, 127

Another dirt dilemma exists where strong soil lies over weaker soil. A footing bearing on the stronger soil can punch a hole through it and settle into the softer soil below. This is what caused the Tower of Pisa to lean. After it started to tilt, a strata of…

Plans, see architectural plans

Plastic pipes, in plumbing systems, 285–86

This piping costs less than copper and steel, it is easily cut with a hacksaw and easily connected with quick-drying solvent, but it is correspondingly weaker. There are sev­­­eral kinds…

Plumbing fixtures, 274–83

The central character in this system’s parade of purity is the plumbing fixture. Here is where all the purifying reaches a climax –and where it ends. Each such receptacle typically has…

Plywood, 137, 150, 159–61, 306, 351–54, 360, 371

A common structural wood is plywood. When sheets of this are fastened to a row of studs, the assembly may be up to 14 times stronger than the studs standing alone. However, since plywood is made from essentially defect-free logs that are becoming scarcer these days…

Point light source, type of lighting, 252

A luminaire may be a point, line, or area light source. A point source contains a single bulb that radiates light from one spot. The most common is…

Poles, type of wood structure, 152–53

A more prosaic wood structure is poles. In this construction, telephone pole-size posts are mounted in the ground usually 12 to 20 feet apart and enclosed with facades and roofs. This is a rugged way to build barns and other boxy architecture up to 30 feet tall that has few columns inside, lightweight roofs, and no basements. Lately though, this structure’s facades have been dandied up with fancy windows and…

Ponding, structural load created by water collecting on flat roofs, 141–42

An inch of rain weighs more than five pounds per square foot of area. On a large flat roof this can be a lot of weight that depress the roof’s central area, which can cause more rain to collect, which depresses the area even more, ad infinitum –until tons of collected water collapse the roof. Ponding is especially dangerous…

Portland cement, see cement

Portman, John, designer of pod elevators in tall buildings, 83

Elevators can be as plain as a showerstall-size cab in a two-story house, or as showy as the glass-caged pods in one of John Portman’s hotels that allow passengers to gaze at a huge central atrium as they woosh through the height of the hotel…

Post-and-beam construction, see timber frame construction

Power density (PD) ratio, quantifier of biomass in environment, 25–26

A peerless measure here is a concept that appears in every ecology textbook, the power density (PD) ratio: the amount of biomass (foliage, natural materials, energies, etc.) an acre of land produces compared to how much it consumes. Clustered residences have high negative PD ratios (their acres consume far more natural materials and energy than they produce) while wildernesses have…

Preservatives, wood, 146–47

One questionable wood preservative is chemicals. Opinion on these products fumes with controversy, but here are the facts. Most chemical preservatives are poisonous. They poison the environment in their making, they poison the wood they impregnate, and they poison you when you touch them. A common preservative over the past few decades has been…

Pressure tanks, in plumbing systems, 294

When a pump delivers water to a building, it usually fills a sealed tank about three-quarters full which compresses the air above to a specified maximum pressure (perhaps 55 psi), then the pump turns off. As the water below is used, the tank’s pressure lowers until it falls below a specified minimum pressure (perhaps 45 psi), then the…

Primary cable, also primary, electrical conductor, 188–89

The electricity generated by your local utility arrives at your house or place of work via a thick primary cable, or primary, that carries a certain voltage and amperage. Typical for homes these days is…

Pumps, in plumbing systems, 291–294

A pump is a motor-driven impeller fitted with an inlet pipe and a backflow valve on one side and a discharge pipe on the other. It usually pumps a liquid or gas at a specified pressure. A plumbing system usually needs one of these machines to deliver water at an adequate pressure to…

Pure water, type of nonwater plumbing, 315

It may surprise you to know there are different kinds of pure water. One may be 100 percent free of minerals, while another may be completely free of organic matter. These systems usually have…

PV arrays, see photovoltaic cells

Quartz (Q) light bulb, type of lighting, 244

Also tungsten or halogen bulbs, these have the highest CRI of any bulb which makes them the top choice for ex­hib­iting objects in museums, displaying merchandise in storewindows, matching fabrics, comparing paint colors, and proofreading fine print. Since these bulbs…

Radiant ceiling heating, 382–83

In this system a gas such as propane or butane is ignited in a ceiling-mounted firebox through which flows fan-driven air into a large-diameter metal tube that has a U-bend at its end so the tube doubles on itself to average heat losses along its length. The double pipe may be…

Radiant floor heating, 381–82

In these systems a central boiler heats water that flows through piping loops embedded in concrete floors from where the heat radiates into the spaces above, as pictured above. For the heating loops flexible plastic tubing is gaining popularity because it is…

Raised access floor, see underfloor supply plenum

Ram pump, type of water pump, 292–94

One kind of pump requires no electricity whatever to move water upward: the ram pump. This machine is located near a steeply flowing creek, and it uses the momentum of a large amount of water flowing downstream to push a small amount of water upstream. Who says water can’t flow uphill? Here’s how one works…

Ramp, type of inclined circulation, 81

Since steps obstruct wheelchaired pedestrians, they are often replaced with ramps. Each should slope no steeper than one foot in ten, be broken every thirty horizontal feet by a 5 × 5 foot landing, and have a…

Ray tracing, method of analyzing sound propagation in assembly areas, 422

In assembly areas soundwaves generally radiate from a performer onstage over the audience, reflect from en­closing surfaces, and re­turn over the audience. Architects analyze these sonar patterns … This plotting is known as ray tracing, and the patterns are ray diagrams. Architects use this graphic data to…

Reactive power, see electromagnetic interference

Rebar, also reinforcing rod or reinforcement, use in concrete, 158–59

Where part of a concrete structure will be stretched, as along the underside of a beam, steel reinforcing (strong in tension) is placed to hold the concrete together … This is usually wire mesh (rectangular patterns of steel wire generally six inches apart) or rebar (steel rods covered with tiny lugs that interlock with the enveloping concrete). All reinforcing must be…

Recycling, reusing discarded building materials, 117–125, 184–87

If anything could be called the soul of sustainable architecture, it is rescuing and reusing old materials in new construction. After all, it is not the mighty dinosaur or mastodon that has survived through the ages, but the scavenging buzzard and shark. An elemental way to consider recycling is to…

Reflectors, surfaces in a light fixture that send a bulb’s light in desirable directions, 250–52

Another important part of a light fixture is the shape of its reflector. An elliptical reflector focuses the fixture’s light inward. Surgeons use these because they aim lots of light onto the site of an operation. A parabolic reflector emits…

Registers, vaned grilles at ends of ducts in climate control systems, 377–78

A register is a vaned grille that fits over the end of a duct where it enters a room or zone. They are often installed in pairs: a supply and a return for each area served. The two should be the same size and ideally located in…

Renewable energies (sun, wind, water), that generate electricity, 205–25

On the other hand, generating electricity with sun, wind, and water saves energy and produces virtually no pollution. But manufacturing natural energy systems consumes energy and degrades the environment somewhere; so consideration of each should…

Resonance, type of sound, 426

An extreme reverberation is resonance. This is a harmonic buildup of reflected sound whose wavelength is an exact multiple of the dimension of a space through which the wave travels. You may have heard this when a person is speaking before a microphone and at a certain pitch (i.e. wavelength) the person’s voice screeches awfully. To deal with this possibility…

Reverberation, type of sound, 424–27

If the room’s walls and ceiling and walls are smooth, they may harshly echo the speaker’s words: a phenomenon known as reverberation … Sometimes an assembly area may need its enclosing surfaces to be highly reflective on one occasion and highly absorptive on another, as in an auditorium when a concert is scheduled one night and a lecture the next. Here the surfaces should be…

Ribbon windows, long narrow windows that distribute light evenly indoors, 98, 121, 124, 212, 233

The long ribbon windows in my house are also simply framed, as figure 6-7 attests. This barebones construction allows a 161-foot ribbon of glass to wrap around three sides of the house and makes you feel like you’re in the forest outside when you’re indoors. Figure 3-26 on page 98 shows what part of this window looks like from inside…

Rigid frame, type of structural bracing, 140

Rigid frame … this structural bracing involves strength­ening the corners of a wall framed by beams at the ceiling and floor and columns at the ends. An example is a pair of steel angles bolted to each side of a timber post-and-beam connection, as appears in the figure on the right…

Rigid insulation, also rigid foam insulation, 347, 354–55, 403–04

… what is known as the building envelope. This cutaneous construction may contain three kinds of insulation: Sheets … lightweight rigid sheets such as styrofoam and urethane that are fastened to walls and roofs and laid under concrete slabs…

Roadsigns, for driveways, 70–71

If a driveway requires roadsigns, they should be the same as on public roads. Centerlines, crosswalks, direction arrows, and handicapped parking symbols are usually applied to paved surfaces with stencils and spraypaint. This can also be done with a big roll of adhesive tape known as…

Romex cable, also NM (nonmetallic) cable, electrical conductor, 190–91

The three wires are then clad in a second larger insulation, of which there are three general kinds: NM (nonmetallic) cable: the wires are clad in a plastic jacket which is color-coded depending on the conductor’s capacity. This is also known as Romex cable due to its 1922 invention in Rome, New York, as an experimental…

Ronchamp Chapel, designed by Le Corbusier, France, 116, 230

Some of the finest examples of daylighting in the last century were created by Frank Lloyd Wright and Le Corbusier, as you can see in figure 6-3. As for Le Cor­busier, the south facade of his Chapel at Ronchamp in France is one of the finest window compositions ever. As Corbu said…

Roofing felt, also 90-pound roofing felt, 145–46

Here is a final directive that ought to be written into every building code: Wherever surfaces of wood, metal, or masonry contact each other, insert a layer of 90-pound roofing felt –not tarpaper– be­tween the two materials. This is because wood, metal, and masonry absorb moisture in different ways; and moisture collecting on the surface of one can…

“Round river”, recycling concept, 336

Septic systems usually receive effluent from buildings whose water supply is a drilled well. Hence the system and well create an ecological “Round River” that returns the used water nearly to where it was drawn, transforming the intervening earth into a huge three-dimensional filter often a cubic acre in size that keeps the well water perpetually pure. So a well/septic system doesn’t…

R-value, measurer of a building material’s insulating ability, 19, 356, 396, 398, 400, 401

R-value is a measure of heat flow through a material: the higher the R-value the better it insulates…

Saarinen, Eero, architect, 82–83, 116, 136

Le Corbusier’s chapel at Ronchamp, Saarinen’s TWA Terminal, and Wright’s Guggenheim Museum –all designed before 1960– were as curvy as Gehry’s computer-aided designs and they didn’t need computers…

Sag curve, type of vertical curve in driveway, 67–69

This is a vertical curve where a road descends into a dip or de­pression. Each should be gentle enough so a motorist won’t experience a whiplash sensation or believe the road ahead is farther away than it really is as s/he enters the dip. When possible…

Sail fabrics, see fabrics, type of structure

Sawtooth roof, open roof construction that allows daylight indoors, 234

Two more ways to coax daylight deeply into buildings are the sawtooth roof and the light well, as sketched in figure 6-8. These work well where temperatures are equa­ble year-round as in Hawaii and on the California coast. But in hot or cold regions a lot of heat will flow through these openings; then it would make more sense to…

Scalloping, type of lighting, 259–60

A related wall washing on long facades is scalloping. This is created by aiming several uniformly spaced uplights or downlights at low angles across the height of the wall. You can see what…

Sconce, type of lighting environment, 258

A sconce is a wall-mounted light with a translucent or opaque shade that redirects the light against the surface behind the bulb to create a gentle light in the spaces nearby. The cleverest sconce I ever saw was in a 19th-century pony express depot renovated into a…

Security lighting, outdoors, 269–71

This illumination is presently undergoing revolutionary changes due to computerization. Now this lighting can be fitted with adjustable shutters and combined with motion sensors, intrusion alarms, battery packs, remote TV surveillance, “lived-in look” indoor lighting scenarios, and other features…

Security notifiers, vehicle detectors mounted along driveways, 74

Security notifiers are alerting devices in­stalled along a driveway. One may be embedded in the pavement and its wiring extended inside the building, or the device may be a battery-powered or remote-controlled motion detector mounted by the driveway. Two other security devices for those who can afford them are…

Septic tanks, also septic systems, in plumbing, 334–36

A septic tank is a reservoir shaped like a large concrete box that is located be­low grade where it collects effluent from a usually small building. As the effluent empties into the tank, any heavier-than-water solids settle on the bottom and lighter-than-water solids form a sludge on top, then the clarified effluent discharges through…

Service entrance, building entrance for driveway, 66, 71–72;
building entrance for electric wiring, 188–91, 199, 205;
building entrance for plumbing main, 287–89

Even more meticulous is the design of a commercial service entrance. This is a world of loading docks, security entrances, approach aprons, truckable sills, and trailer turning radii, every detail of which must be professionally sized. Here thousands of dollars can be lost at the stroke of a drafting stylus if any part is too large, or thousands can be lost at the bump of a truck if any part is too small. If you are ever responsible for are otherwise involved in the design of a…

Shakespeare, William, re ugliness as “harlot’s cheek”, 115

Shakespeare described such ugliness as a “Harlot’s cheek, beau­tied with plast’ring art.” Here Gehry’s art is nothing but a…

Shanghai apartment collapse due to unstable foundation, 128

Another dirt disaster awaits when a building’s foundation is dug deeply too close to an existing building. Witness what happened to a narrow thirteen-story apartment in Shanghai in 2009 after an underground parking garage was excavated along one side. The removed earth was piled on the apartment’s other side, heavy rain created uneven soil pressures beneath the building’s sides, its pilings snapped –and the building toppled like a…

Shea, Reeford, building contractor in California, 53, 60, 184–86, 305–06

Don’t over-estimate experience. The best contractor I ever worked for, Reeford Shea, for several years around 1970, once said, “It takes only five or six years to be a good carpenter, and I’ve seen people who’ve done it for thirty years who still don’t know what they are doing.”

Shell structures, see warped planes

Shelves, around tops of walls, 90–92;
under ceilings in small rooms, 92–93

In almost every room a band of bare wall wraps around the walls between the tops of the doors and windows and the underside of the ceiling. In an average bedroom a few long shelves in this space could hold fifty linear feet of boxes and books! This construction is performed with the hidden bracket trick, kin to the magician’s floating lady trick. If you would like to see this sleight-of-hand performed by a local magician, hand the directions on the next two pages to a…

Shoulder-high wall, type of efficient furniture, 93–94

A clever way to make two rooms more useful at the same time is the shoulder-high wall. As you can see in figure 3-22, when this visual barrier rises between a dining room and a kitchen, it can keep seated eaters from seeing into a messy kitchen while allowing a standing cook to see the eaters: a welcome scenario for cooking mothers who need to keep an eye on the kids at the table. If the intervening wall is a…

Shoulder, narrow parking area along driveway, 68–69

Shoulders [along a driveway] should descend at about a 1:12 pitch sideways from the road and be 8 to 12 feet wide so vehicles can pull over in emergencies. A firm and attractive shoulder construction is turf grass planted in 4 inch topsoil spread on…

Showers, efficient design, 280, 305–06

Make this bathing booth a roomy 38 × 54 inches, set a triangular seat in a corner opposite the controls, make at least one wall translucent so light can enter while preserving privacy, and install a floor sill low enough to allow someone to enter in a…

Sidewalks, efficient design, 280, 305–06

A sidewalk is an outdoor hallway typically made of concrete, asphalt, brick, or pavers. A nice walk has broad curves lined with foliage, benches, kiosks and wide entrance aprons to buildings. Each should slope no more than…

Signal circuits, in electrical systems, 195–98

These are low-voltage circuits (12 volts is common) that operate phones, faxes, and the like. Decades ago a household’s signal circuitry served only the doorbell and a phone. But nowadays this low-voltage wiring may include a variety of computerized sensors, operations, and controls … Even owners of homes and small businesses today can have signal circuitry that automates…

Signal reference grid, electrical ground wiring system, 198–99

With the advent of computer electronics, those little ground wires that run from outlet to outlet in a room and gather stray electrons have become very important. In commercial buildings with lots of electronic equipment, these wires may be replaced by giant signal reference grids that connect every circuit and piece of equipment to sub-floor grids of … One such system ap­pears above…

Simpson Strong-Ties, see stamped metal fasteners

Sinks, efficient design, 275, 279–80, 326

Each should have a drain with a basket strainer and paddle handles (not knobs) that are easy to use when your hands are messy or arth­ritic, as is the gorgeous “ADA-compliant” model on the right that was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. At least one sink on every floor should also have spigot threads on its spout so a…

Site plan, part of Architectural Plans, 41–42

This is a map of the property on which the building is located. It shows the property’s boundaries and siting of the building plus its driveways, turnarounds, parking areas, any related construction, landmarks, landscaping, bodies of water, topography, nearest public road(s), and the like. Figure 2-4 is part of the site plan for the house that appears in figures 2-2 and 2-3…

Slip-forms, portable concrete formwork for small buildings, 161

A simple form used for small buildings is slip-forms. These are plywood or aluminum sections often 8 feet tall and 1 or 2 feet wide whose vertical edges fit together and the connected pieces are braced along the outside. A slip-form subcontractor can carry all the pieces for…

Soffit, also canopy, lighting environment, 255

These are overhangs whose undersides contain bulbs that brighten the area below. They provide excellent downlighting for counters, desks, vanities, workplaces, walls, niches, and…

Soil, under building foundations, 126–32;
around grounding rods, 199–200;
re septic system design, 334–36

The soil beneath a building is rarely uniform. Each cubic foot may contain different earths, rocks, silt fissures, lava brecciations, and ancient shorelines that have evolved during the past billion or so years. Hence every linear foot of footing under every building –even one-story cottages on hard level soil– should contain…

Solar cells, see photovoltaic cells

Solar chimney, type of natural ventilator, 407–08

Another nifty natural ventilator is the solar chimney, a fluelike shaft with a tall pane of glass on the south side and an opening high on the north. When the sun shines on the glass it heats the air in the shaft which rises and draws stale stuffy air up from below. Imagine that: cooling with solar energy!

Solar electric power, see photovoltaic cells

Solar energy, also solar radiance or sunshine, natural energy source, 205–06, 224;
feasibility analysis, 205–09;
using sun to create electricity, 209–12;
using sun to heat water, 306–10;
using sun to heat interiors, 395–401;
using sun to ventilate interiors, 407–08

The sun’s rays can be utilized to generate electricity, make hot water, and heat indoor spaces. The efficacies of these methods are compared below…

Solar water heating, in plumbing, 306–10

Another way to heat water for a building’s plumbing fixtures is with the sun. This involves mounting a network of small pipes on a flat surface about the size of a sheet of plywood, covering the pipes with glazing, backing them with insulation and a structural substrate, and aiming the panel south. Cold water enters the…

Solid-borne sound, transmission through building constructions, 428–34

Solid-borne sound migrates through a floor, wall, ceiling, or other solid construction and emerges in adjacent spaces. During a building’s design these potentially annoying sounds may be reduced by…

Sonotube, concrete form, 153

… Mount it in a water-resistant cardboard tube known as sonotube, fill the void between pole and tube with concrete, peel the sonotube from the concrete after it has set, then…

Sound transmission, also acoustics, 83, 162, 202, 416–35

Otherwise comfortable and beautiful architecture can be made unbearable by unwanted sound. If you don’t like what you see, you can close your eyes –but with sound you’re trapped, prisoned by an invisible invader. Sometimes you can’t even tell where the villain lurks. Other times the…

Sound Transmission Class (STC), ability of a construction assembly to reduce transmitted sound, 430–31

The American Society for Testing Materials (ASTM) has given a number of construction assemblies Sound Transmission Class (STC) ratings, wherein the higher the STC rating the more the construction reduces sound transmission through it. Constructions with STC ratings of…

Space frame, type of structure, 155–56

This structure has an aerodynamic nature that captures the essence of the space age. Each is an assembly of struts and joints that extends in two directions to create structure that is very strong for its weight. It typically spans 30 to 120 feet, is available in many colors and finishes, requires no lateral bracing, and allows ducts and pipes to fit within the frame. Since they cannot…

Specifications, document that accompanies Architectural Plans, 49–51

The Specifications describes the materials, equipment, appliances, and finishes plus the quality of every part of the work that is required to build the architecture. … It is the fine print of the contract between the Owner and Builder, as enforced by the Architect. Normally this document is a…

Splitter damper, air regulator in HVAC duct, 375–77

… as sketched in figure 8-14, a splitter damper is a thermostat-controlled vane that varies the airflow where a duct divides into two smaller ducts with varying heating or cooling requirements; this can happen in two adjacent rooms on each side of a corner when the sun shines into one room while the other is cast in shade…

Spotlighting, type of lighting environment, 257–58

These include incandescent, quartz, and metal halide bulbs whose reflectors concentrate their rays into conical beams of strong light that vary from about 3 to 130 degrees. Floods have the wider beams and spots the smaller. Each has a beamspread designation such as…

Spray-in foam insulation, see foam, type of insulation

Sprinklers, see fire sprinklers

Staggered stud framing, re acoustic and thermal insulation, 430

Between acoustically critical areas, build double-stud walls and fill with batt insulation. Stagger the studs rather than align them, as sketched in figure 9-8…

Stairchair, also stairlift, 85–86

If installing a home elevator would be too expensive, a more economical possibility is a stair chair. Also known as a stairlift, this is a chair mounted on an inclined track installed along one side of a staircase on the treads or against the wall. When the seat is not used it folds against the wall to allow normal use of the stairs. In addition to operating on…

Stairs, also steps, type of circulation, 80–81;
inclined beams with steps, 133

The stair’s incline is the ratio of each riser’s height versus each tread’s width; or, as the noted art theorist Rudolf Arnheim put it, “the ratio of victorious advancing versus laborious lifting.” The more victorious the advancing the longer should be the treads; the more laborious the lifting the lower should be the risers. In floor-to-floor stairs avoid…

Stamped metal fasteners, in wood framing, 142–43

These bent pieces of zinc-coated sheet steel dotted with holes are made in dozens of different shapes, and with sheetrock screws and the guns that drive them they are about as easy to install as poking holes in a potato before microwaving it. Figure 4-15 shows a few. A tornado would come in second place in a wrestling match with this construction. These little prizes are familiarly known as…

Standpipe, type of fire suppression, 320–21

Here a large vertical pipe known as a standpipe rises through the building, then on each floor extends one or more pipes to firehose racks: wall-mounted cabinets with glass doors that contain a 50 to 100 foot canvas firehose and often a fire extinguisher and a fire axe. This system is like putting a fire hydrant on every floor, one operable by…

STC, see Sound Transmission Class

Steam heating, 387–388

This is much like hot water baseboard heating except the water is heated to above its boiling point and delivers more energy in a smaller volume to each room or zone. The biggest in this country has five generating plants and 105 miles of steam mains that serve 1,800 buildings including the Empire State Building and the United Nations. At the other extreme, in the Susan Dana house in Illinois that Frank Lloyd Wright designed in 1904, he…

Steel, type of piping, 284–85

This is the strongest pipe, but it is harder to cut than copper and its connections must be threaded, both of which in­crease labor costs. As with copper, each diameter has several wall thicknesses and the outer diameter is always the same for each thickness so fittings of the same diameter can connect pipes with different wall thicknesses. Steel piping may be…

Steel, type of structure, 153–57

This material is strong and springy, its uniform molecularity makes every member virtually the same as every other, and when experiencing extreme stresses steel won’t suddenly crack as will wood and concrete. But steel has an Achilles’ heel: it greatly weakens when exposed to fire. At 1,500º Fah­renheit steel is soft as warm chocolate. In the steel column pictured on the right, fire heated the column until it could no longer…

Steps, see stairs

Streams, also creeks, 69–70, 73, 105, 206, 337, 292–94;
bad place to build near, 345–46;
electric power source, 206, 216–21;

Speaking of water, one landscape feature that buildings should stay away from is streams. A whispery brook may seem the epitome of tranquility –but it can rise up and steal a house during a rare superstorm. If you consider building along a stream, see if the ground extending back from each bank is fairly level a few dozen feet or so to a second bank that slopes steeply uphill. That second bank was created by a…

Structural materials, common kinds, 143–83

Each structural material in a building has an innate strength. Exceed this, and the material will fail and whatever rests on it will fall. Each material also has a personality which if you offend you may also regret. Common structural materials used today are…

Structural members, common kinds, 132–43

A structural member may be a beam, column, brace, connection, or combination thereof, as detailed below…

Stud wall, 90–92, 137, 148, 347–60, 429–32

A stud wall is several rectangular wood posts held together by a sheet of plywood, itself a very long and thin column, which together support much more weight than the studs could carry alone…

Sulphur light, type of illumination, 249–50

This is a hollow quartz sphere mounted on a long thin stem which together is about the size of a Tootsie-Pop. The light is extremely bright for its size: a 1,000-watt bulb generates 125,000 lumens, which is somewhat like storing a lightning bolt in a ping-pong ball. But before you…

Sump pump, remover of unwanted water, 333–34

When clear water waste collects in the lower part of a basement or crawl space of a small building and needs to be pumped outdoors to a higher elevation, this is typically done with a sump pump. This is an electric motor attached to a small pump that sucks water collecting in an often bucket-sized sump pit and delivers it to the higher elevation. This drainage can be…

Sun angles, re controlling sun entry through building openings, 338–40;
re orienting solar panels or solar glass, 211–12, 308, 395–99

As the earth tilts on its axis during its annual rotations around the sun, at any latitude this bright orb crosses the sky at a significantly higher altitude in summer than in winter. There are clever ways to manipulate these solar trajectories to your advantage…

Sunpipe®, type of skylight, 234

Another de“light””ful daylight de­liv­erer is the Sunpipe®, a domed tube with mirrorlike walls that can send light as deeply as three floors below. Each unit is in­stalled much like a stovepipe, di­a­­meters are 10 to 21 inches, and 45 degree elbows allow one or two bends. This is not so much a long thin skylight as a…

Suntracker, fiber optic skylight, 235

Speaking of fiber optics, another clever daylighter is the Parans FO Suntracker. This contains 64 fiber optic cables whose upper ends connect to roof-mounted fresnel lenses that track the sun through the day and whose lower ends deliver light through a ceiling fixture below. Seeing the company’s video of its operation is better than paying twelve bucks to see a movie. Step under the marquee at…

Sun-tracking solar panels, 211

Consider sun-tracking panels. These have movable mounts with photoelectric eyes that keep the panels facing the sun as it moves across the sky. Though these systems cost more, due to the added energy they collect the extra initial cost is often returned in a few years…

Superinsulation, 350–62

… It is the Insulation Cage, a wall construction that contains thick insulation, allows enough air to flow through the construction and carry away any deposited moisture, and is relatively easy and economical to build. Its construction appears in figure 8-8. This 12-inch thick thermal armor has…

Supply plumbing, 283–315

This is the pipes and related components that deliver water to the fixtures. Common pipe materials are detailed below…

Surface fire, type of wildfire, 104–05

Each [wildfire] may be a surface fire (the flames spread along the ground), or a crown fire (the flames race through the treetops)…

Switches, 86, 188–89, 204, 215;
float switches in plumbing fixtures, 314, 333;
for lights, 193, 252–54, 267, 271

Every light fixture has a switch. Behind this tiny lever may lurk an amazing array of controls. Chief of this tribe is the…

Switchgear, minimizer of electromagnetic disruptions in wiring, 197, 198

As further protection against EMI, many commercial buildings today are equipped with refrigerator-sized power conditioners known as switchgear. In large buildings these units may number in the dozens and look like the refrigerator sales section at Sears. These “amptraps” also contain…

Tankless water heater, in plumbing, 304–05

When a small number of infrequently used plumbing fixtures are located a few dozen feet from a water heater, the hot water residing in the long pipes while the fixtures are off cools; then when a faucet is turned on, it may take seemingly forever for the cold water to flow out of the pipe before hot water arrives at the spout, which also means the first few gallons of delivered water are heated twice. Enter the tankless water heater, alias the…

Task lighting, type of illumination, 227

This is the light that shines directly on something you are doing. This illumination brightens desks, counters, workbenches, a book you are reading, and the like…

Tattletale gauge, leak detector in plumbing systems, 290

A tattletale gauge tells if any part of the supply piping has a leak (especially handy if the dripping is under a floor or behind a wall where it can’t be seen or heard). This gauge contains a red triangle that spins when all the faucets are turned off and a pipe leaks somewhere; it is usually mounted on…

Tax credit, explained, 302

By the way, a $1,500 tax credit doesn’t mean you get $1,500 back; it means you pay taxes on $1,500 less income; so if you’re in a 20 percent tax bracket you get only $300 back…

TBM systems, see total building management systems

Thermal massing, method of reservoiring heat indoors, 402–05

Every material –solid, liquid, or gas– has an ability to hold heat. Indeed, when you are in a room everything around you –the air, every object from a pencil to a sofa, and every enclosing wall and ceiling and floor– holds a certain quantity of heat. The higher the temperature, the more heat each material holds. When you raise the setting on the room’s thermostat, more heat enters the room and warms the air, then the Btus in the air migrate into…

Thermoplastic marking tape, for labeling pavements and roadsigns, 70–71

Centerlines, crosswalks, direction arrows, and the like can also be made with a big roll of adhesive tape known as thermoplastic pavement marking tape. This sticky-backed material is thick, up to twelve inches wide, easily applied, cut with scissors, economical, durable, made in three colors, and your county highway department usually carries it. It can also be used to…

Thermosiphoning, natural fluid circulation in solar water heaters, 306–07, 310

It is best to empty the solar-heated water into a standard hot water heater whose burner keeps the liquid hot during cloudy weather and at night. If this reservoir is above the collectors, the heated water will flow naturally into it via thermosiphoning (natural upward movement of a heated fluid when it expands and becomes lighter) into the tank. This technology is decades old; in…

Thermostat, 370, 373–75, 391, 402, 406

A thermostat is a dial switch that an occupant adjusts to obtain a desired air temperature, humidity, or other indoor comfort condition; then the switch turns on the machinery that satisfies the desired condition and turns off the machinery when the condition is satisfied. With the advent of computerized controls, this little sentinel has seemingly…

Thickening, adding insulation in existing walls and roofs, 357–61

If we are to solve this nation’s energy crisis, we must find ways to make existing buildings energy-efficient. But how? What other solution is there than to thicken the existing exterior walls? With not just six inches of insulation, but twelve inches. This can be done in three ways…

Thin-walled cores, large vertical shapes (i.e. closets and stairwells) that act as structural bracing, 140–41

This is a small room whose walls have strong corners-in-common that essentially create a fat hollow column that can hold up twenty or thirty tons of architecture. Common thin-walled cores are closets, bathrooms, stairwells, and elevator shafts. They are relatively safe shelters during…

Throw, specified distance that air travels from a duct register, 378

A supply duct register is often designated by its throw: the distance it can propel air into a space, which generally should be about three-quarters across the room. Register throw ranges are listed in…

Timber frame construction, also post-and-beam construction, type of wood structure, 150–51

An attractive wood structure is timber frame construction. Also known as post-and-beam, it is charac­ter­ized by exposed timbers and tall cathedral ceil­ings with long ridge beams at gable peaks and lots of diagonal braces to keep the timbers in place…

Toilets, 103, 186, 260–61, 264, 276–77, 280–81;
compostable privies, 281–83

Know the difference between flush tank toilets (ones with a boxy tank behind the seat) and flush valve toilets (ones with only a lever behind the seat which when pressed creates a roar in the bowl). Flush tank toilets consume much less water per flush but require a 2 to 3 minute wait between flushes. Flush valve toilets are…

Topography, also elevation contours, horizontal lines across land surfaces on a map or site plan that indicate elevations above sea level, 23, 41–43, 129, 343–44, 434;
see also convex and concave terrain

Part of a USGS map appears above. Where topographic contours are far apart, as at A, the land is flat or nearly so, and where contours are close together, as at B, the land is steep. Flat land may seem like a good place to build, but water sometimes doesn’t…

Topo maps, see United States Geodetic Survey (USGS) maps

Tornado, 138–40, 141, 143, 354

A tornado is a writhing serpentine funnel that usually travels east to northeast at speeds of 25 to 70 miles an hour and often takes an erratic skipping path, its tapered end hopping randomly over one area then descending furiously on another. The funnel’s walls of water droplets mixed with dust and debris whirling counterclockwise at speeds up to 400 miles an hour can scour building exteriors of finishes and…

Total building management systems, also TBM systems, computer-managed electrical systems, 195–97

In a large commercial building, hundreds of signal circuits may govern the operation of light fixtures, thermostats, fire detectors, TV surveillance monitors, and other equipment located throughout the building, all collectively known as a TBM (total building management) system. These circuits can be programmed to streamline almost any business activity. Here’s a sampling of…

Towers, see wind generators

Toxins, in building products, 26–28, 146, 150, 371–72

In recent years building interiors have become flooded with a cocktail of toxins that are known to cause allergic reactions, asthma, behavioral breakdowns, birth defects, endocrine disruptions, infertility, and cancer. These substances include…

Traction elevator, type of elevator, 84

Here the cab hangs from steel ropes that pass over a traction sheave driven by a geared motor, then the ropes descend to a counterweight on the sheave’s other side. When the cab goes up, the weight goes down. This vertical circulation costs less to operate in buildings more than 60 feet tall and is durable; but it…

Translucent insulation, 396–97, 399–401

As for making the solar panels translucent, a simple material has probably laying around your house or place of work for years: bubblepak. A sheet of these tiny enclosed airspaces is a good insulator. If you stack many sheets of this material until they are ten inches thick and sandwich between them…

Translucent light through walls, 118–19, 233, 280

And while you’re at it, replace the solid door below with a fancy French door with a translucent pane. A few other methods of letting light through walls are glass blocks, translucent glass showerstalls, little liquor bottle windows (mentioned on page 119: I also mounted few of these near the tops of the interior masonry walls in my house), interior stud walls filled with batt insulation with the foil face removed and sheathed with translucent plexiglass, and even light-emitting…

Trompe l'oeil, a painting, usually on a wall or ceiling, that is so photographically realistic that it deceives the viewer into believing the painted scene is real, 90

If you’re into trompe l’oeils, paint a ceiling sky blue and add a few clouds and perhaps a wavy chevron of geese flying south. Then the roomtop may look eight thousand feet high instead of eight…

Truss, type of beam structure, 133–36

Although peaked wood trusses as shown above are mostly used to construct boxy buildings, their geometry can be exploited in far more imaginative ways. An amazing example was created by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1948 in the Unitarian Meeting House in Madison, Wisconsin. The structure above the nave is a series of light wood trusses whose construction is illustrated below…

Tungsten light bulbs, also halogen or quartz bulbs, 244

Also tungsten or halogen bulbs, these have the highest CRI of any bulb which makes them the top choice for ex­hib­iting objects in museums, displaying merchandise in storewindows, matching fabrics, comparing paint colors, and proofreading fine print. Since these bulbs burn hot, tend to…

Turbine, also Pelton wheel, water-driven wheel that turns electric generator, 217–20;
type of rooftop ventilator, 406–07

This is a wheel with spooned blades mounted around it. One appears in the drawing above. When the nozzle shoots water against the blades it rotates the wheel and a generator connected to the wheel’s axle. YouTube shows several of these whirlers in action. Their blades turn so fast they are a blur. The water’s velocity…

Turnarounds, for driveways, 71–72

Many driveways also have turnarounds so drivers won’t need to back into the street when pulling out of a garage. A turnaround should be dimensioned as sketched in figure 3-5 on the next page. The area outside the garage door should be…

Twain, Mark, American author, 250, 272

An essential part of any light bulb is the fixture or luminaire it is mounted in –what Mark Twain described as “plenty of daylight in a box.” Each has…

UF (underground feeder) cable, type of electrical conductor, 191

UF (underground feeder) cable: the wires are clad in a purple-gray jacket that can be installed underwater or underground. Two subtypes are SE (service entrance) cable and…

UV filter, in climate control systems, 414–15

Here a beam of UV light passing through an HVAC duct destroys bacteria, molds, or fungi passing through the rays. Efficiency depends on intensity of light, volume of airflow, and length of…

Underfloor supply plenum, also raised access floor, elevated finished floor that allows space below to contain mechanical conveyances and function as ducting, 198–99, 376–77, 423

Another “duct” in some commercial buildings is the underfloor supply plenum. This is a crawlspace-like area under a raised finished floor through which run pipes and other mechanical conveyances, then air flows through the remaining void to the rooms above. These subspaces allow quick adding and removing of mechanical conveyances simply by removing one or more floor panels above. But hear what our esteemed…

Underground service entrance, below-grade portal where utility power lines enter a building, 188–89

If the primary cable arrives underground, it enters the building below frost level through a thick conduit whose ends are sealed to keep out water and rodents. Typical overhead and underground service entrances appear in figure 5-3. Whether arriving from above or below, the…

Unitarian Meeting House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, Madison, WI, 133–36

An amazing example [of wood truss design] was created by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1948 in the Unitarian Meeting House in Madison, Wisconsin. The structure above the nave is a series of light wood trusses whose construction is described on the next page and whose exterior appears in figure 4-9. The reason why many of Wright’s buildings look so exciting is that (1) he was…

United States Geodetic Survey (USGS) maps, 343–44

A marvelous tool exists for analyzing this: United States Geodetic Survey maps, also known as topographic or topo maps. The government publishes these for nearly everywhere in the country. Part of a USGS map appears above…

UPS (uninterruptible power supply), switchgear for small computerized electrical systems, 198

Install near computers, photocopiers, lamp ballasts, and any device with a microchip in it a miniature switchgear known as a UPS (for uninterruptible power supply). These harmonic filters maintain smooth electron flow and many contain a backup battery. Most office supply stores…

Vacuum air, type of nonwater plumbing, 317–18

Here a pump removes air from a sealed tank from which one or more pipes extend to valved stubs to which are connected hoses that suck loose matter from in front of the nozzles. This system is used to clean large homes, apartments, hotels, and laboratories. In hospitals it cleans instruments, removes fluids from surgical incisions, and sucks spent heavier-than-air anesthesia gases from operating room floors. Since the detritus is often messy, each system…

Valance, type of lighting environment, 258

In this illumination a wall-mounted light source is concealed by a faceboard that sends a soft light onto the ceiling above and the wall below. The faceboard may be tilted, curved, trans­lucent, or opaque. Va­lences work well above…

Valves, in plumbing, 274, 278, 289, 291, 294–96, 308, 312, 317, 330;
reversing valve in heat pumps, 388–89

These are the traffic lights of plumbing: they tell the fluids when they can stop and go. They are chiefly used to isolate part of a system when it needs servicing or repair. Each should have adequate service area around it, and the floor below should be waterproof and drainable. There are five kinds of valves…

Vapor barrier, in building envelopes, 348–50, 358, 363, 372, 409;
in ducts, 376

But during the energy crisis of the late Seventies, somebody got the bright idea that the way to stop a lot of heat escaping from a building was to wrap it in an airtight membrane known as a vapor barrier. This stopped the heat flowing with the air –but it also stopped any flowing air from carrying away the deposited moisture. If this water cannot es­cape, it will…

Vegetative roofs, see green roofs

Ventilation, 370, 372, 374, 381, 384, 390, 406–08

The best ventilator is an open window. Its cost is low, its “hands-on” technology is simple, it comes in many sizes, it is widely available –and you can’t look out a furnace or an air conditioner. Especially adept is the…

Video conferences, design of, 261–62

In this lighting environment a person appears before a camcorder mounted on a computer in which appears a small image of the subject so s/he can remain focused and framed during telecasting. This environment is best brightened by two ceiling-mounted downlights aimed about…

Viollet-le-Duc, Eugéne, 19th-Century French architect, 38–39, 113, 116

This document [the architectural program] is extremely important, as evidenced by what Eugéne Viollet-le-Duc, the famed French architectural theorist of the mid-19th Century, said: To every architect worthy of the name, a programme that is well drawn up and clear, and which is not liable to any false interpretation, is half the battle…

Volatile organic compounds (VOCs), pollutant in buildings, 23, 26, 371

In recent years building interiors have become flooded with a cocktail of toxins that are known to cause allergic reactions, asthma, behavioral breakdowns, birth defects, endocrine disruptions, infertility, even cancer. These substances include volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in interior paints, adhesives, and finishes…

Volts, also voltage, unit of electric power, 188, 190–96, 204–05, 223, 226, 244

In each circuit, its voltage and amperage multiplied equals the electricity’s power in watts (amps × volts = watts). If your toaster runs on 110 volts and 8 amps, its power is…

Wallpaper murals, illusory enlargeners of space, 90

Another illusory enlarger is wallpaper murals. A full-wall photo of a tropical seashore or a mountain lake can make a small indoor room look like the great outdoors. Wallpaper murals are typically made in panels that together measure 8 feet 4 inches high by…

Warped planes, also shell structures or hypars, type of concrete structure, 162–63

This section on concrete structure would be remiss if it didn’t mention warped planes. Also known as shell structures and hypars, these reinforced concrete shapes have large thin curved surfaces that are very strong for their weight. Their great strength and lightness is revealed by a simple experiment…

Washing, light shining at low angle across a surface, 259–60

With this illumination one or more lights aim at a small angle across a flat rough surface such as stone, brick, tile, or drapery to reveal its texture. With washing the lights’ angle of incidence is usually 10 to 20 de­grees, which smooths rough surfaces and produces a soft glow. This lighting generally en­hances the nature of…

Waste plumbing, 326–37

Most plumbing fixtures re­quire a drain to carry the effluent down and a vent to carry any noxious gases up. The drains combine downstream like tributaries of a river into one main that leaves the building at its base, and the vents combine similarly upward until one or more stacks rise above the roof. In both systems, pipe diameters…

Waste, as fire suppression, 318, 320–23;
re moisture in building envelopes, 348–50, 362–65;
in concrete, 157–58;
re generating electricity, see hydropower systems;
filters in plumbing, 297–98;
hot water heaters, 301–10;
how to illuminate moving, 269;
in supply plumbing, 283–315;
in waste plumbing, 326–37;
re moisture in air, see humidity;
re moisture in wood, 144–45

A building is a container that holds a lot of water. And every drop that dribbles from every faucet must be pure. This requires an amazing variety of pipes and related components, all of which are very complicated and very delicate and which can be…

Water hammer arresters, 296

A serious piping plague in some buildings is water hammer. It occurs in long straight runs when a faucet is closed, which can cause the long cylinder of water in the pipe to suddenly slam into the faucet’s valve like a battering ram –then a pressure wave rebounds back through the piping, straining every fitting along the way and sounding like someone is hitting the pipe with a hammer. This problem emphasizes why all pipes should be…

Water power, see hydropower systems

Water table, level of moisture below ground, 128

The liquid’s highest level is the local water table, above which the soil is dry. During dry spells this level falls and during wet spells it rises. If it rises higher than a basement floor and no drainage exists around its perimeter, the basement can become a wading pool. In such conditions, empty in-ground swimming pools have been known to…

Watercube, aquatic facility for 2008 Olympics, Beijing, China, 136, 229

You may have no idea what this material is until you are cued that it covered the facades and roof of the Wat­ercube, the facility that hosted the aquatic events in the 2010 Olympic Games in Beijing, China. 7.7 acres of this translucent membrane covers the building’s roof and from the…

Waterless urinals, 23, 277–78

But the worst no-touch culprit is waterless urinals. When urine enters one of these receptacles, it sinks beneath a layer of lighter-than-water liquid and drains through a siphonic trap in back to eliminate the need for flushing. But only half the public uses this fixture, the other half uses it only half the time, and even then a quart of water is all it takes to flush the fluid away. A waterless urinal has other debits…

Watts Towers, designed by Simon Rodia, Los Angeles, CA, 125

In architecture school, my history professor showed color slides of Simon Rodia’s monumental Watts Towers, two of them nearly a hundred feet tall. This work of architecture was built of trash –shattered china, defective tiles, collected seashells, broken bottles– yet it is studied in the halls of academia as examples of the finest architecture in the world. Look on these mighty works at…

Watts, also wattage, unit of electric power, 19, 190–96, 209, 223;
unit of brightness in light bulbs, 236–46, 249, 257, 263, 267, 271

In each circuit, its voltage and amperage multiplied equals the electricity’s power in watts (amps × volts = watts). If your toaster runs on 110 volts and 8 amps, its power is 880 watts. Since 1 kilowatt equals 1,000 watts, 880 watts can be written as 0.88 kilowatts (kW or kVA). The most common…

Weatherhead, also overhead service entrance, overhead electrical connection where utility power lines enter a building, 188–89

If the primary cable arrives overhead, it enters a weatherhead, a mast-like projection mounted at least sixteen feet above the ground against the side of the building from where the cable descends into the building. If the primary…

Well, drilled, water source for plumbing systems, 291–92

Drilling a well for a submersible pump is a mysterious exercise, because the well must strike enough water to satisfy the served building’s water demands in gallons per minute (gpm), and you never know what you’ll find until you get there. When the well driller sets up his rig and begins to drill, you cross your fingers and pray. I tried this on my property –but it didn’t work. When the…

Wheelchair design specifications, 108–09

Designing buildings for the disabled is described in the ADA Guidelines, which may be accessed by googling ADA Access­ibility Guidelines. Here is a sampling of these directives: Wheelchair dimensions. Minimum clear opening width for wheelchairs is 32 inches. A circular or T plan area (see figure 3-28) that allows wheelchairs to …

White roofs, roofs painted white to reflect sun’s heat, 369

One bona fide technique that will improve the thermal performance of many a roof is to do what Joseph Lstiburek mentioned above: paint it white. The July 30, 2009, New York Times had a front-page article on this. It said such roofs not only are…

(Henry) Whitfield House, Guilford, CT, example of sustainable architecture, 30–31

[Example of sustainable architecture]: The Henry Whitfield House in Guilford, Connecticut, whose fortresslike facades and three massive forty-foot-high chimneys are constructed of local fieldstone mortared with cement made of local clay and ground oyster shells, whose elegant staircase … cornerstone laid in 1639.…

Wilderness ratio, 26

This is the wilderness ratio [ratio of a square mile of urban or suburban environment to the number of square miles of wilderness which the former needs to perpetually sustain itself].

Wilderness shower, Big Sur, CA, 305–06

There is one more on-demand water heater which surely you have never seen in a catalog but which is too enchanting not to mention here. Back in 1970 when I was a carpenter on the house in Big Sur that I described in the chapter on electricity, Reeford Shea, the contractor, built an ingenious wilderness shower as sketched…

Wildfires, 104–107

In suburban and rural areas, fires may spread from one building to the next due to wildfires. Since it normally takes 2 to 3 minutes of flame exposure to ignite most wood exteriors, a passing flame front may leave one house undamaged while the house next door burns to the ground. Even noncombustible materials are no…

Wind, as climatic factor, 340–42

Nearer than the sun but still some distance from a planned building is another climatic factor: wind. These air currents flow over land much the way water flows over the bed of a stream. Where the terrain is smooth, the air flows evenly; where the terrain is rough, the air flows fast over the…