Mana Timber Frame

Things are really starting to move on our house now. The timber frame is up and the roof is going on in the next couple of weeks. The timber frame has taken 6 working days to erect, having been manufactured at Merlin Timber Frames in Leominster. They have a done a great job and have proved to be very helpful and responsive during the design and build phases. Lovely people.

The frame is made up of ring beam which is 140mm wide and 350mm deep, running around the whole perimeter and criss crossing around the internal walls to fully support the frame and have enough strength to withstand the expected loads of weight and wind.

On top of these beams sit prefabricated open wall panels that are void of any boards or insulation, and this is highly unusual for most houses. We have done it this way enable us to caste hempcrete into the void either side of the wall panels using formers. This means that there is just one element to the wall structure and this is hempcrete. It cannot support heavy loads so the frame does this, but it is an excellent insulator, allows air to pass through it  and regulates humidity by absorbing and emitting humidity to balance the atmosphere in the house. More on that in a later post.

Apart from the open wall panels the technology of the frame is fairly standard. It allows for a faster build process and enables us to order the long lead time items such as windows and doors early because of the inherent accuracy of the frame.