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3398 Washington Road
Atlanta, GA 30344
USA

773.398.5288

Advanced residential construction and home improvement consulting and owner's advocacy in Atlanta, using the latest building performance diagnostic and modeling techniques and tools. Airtightness, insulation, HVAC, ventilation, moisture, and air quality and EMF consulting for homeowners and building professionals alike.

Videos/Podcasts/Articles

Home performance articles and stories from the field with internationally respected building forensics guru Corbett Lunsford at the Building Performance Workshop. Hear new episodes of the Building Performance Podcast, see new videos from the Home Performance YouTube channel, and learn all about how diagnostic testing (more than an 'Energy Audit') can make home improvement and new home construction a proven process!

Filtering by Category: Tiny Houses

Airtight Homes are Quiet Homes: Hear for Yourself with this Helicopter

Corbett Lunsford

Hear why airtightness, not insulation, is what makes a home noiseproof. A helicopter takes off outside the #TinyLab and you can't hear it!

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categories Around the World, Homeowner education, Real Estate, Videos, Tiny Houses
tags airtightness, air seal, airtight, construction, building, house, tiny house, helicopter, noise, reduction, attenuation, sound, control, insulation, quiet, decibels

Tour the #TinyLab: Tesla of Tiny Houses

Corbett Lunsford

Take a tour of the #TinyLab, built and lived in by Grace and Corbett Lunsford, and an example of high performance building for homes of all sizes and shapes. See how the Proof Is Possible Tour teaches homeowners to control ventilation, pressure imbalances, air quality, moisture, comfort, and durability.

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categories Homeowner education, Performance Pros, Real Estate, Tiny Houses, Videos
tags tiny house, thow, on wheels, tesla, high performance home, tour, roadshow, proof is possible, #tinylab, home tour

Proving the Ventilation System of the #TinyLab

Corbett Lunsford

Thanks to Broan, Dwyer, Defender, Mason-Grant Consulting, and Lawrence Berkeley Nat'l Lab, the #TinyLab is the highest performance tiny house on wheels ever built. The air quality and moisture control is finely tuned, and in this video watch the testing of each subsystem of the mechanical ventilation system as a whole.

2 Comments
categories From the Field, Homeowner education, Performance Pros, Real Estate, Testing Tools, Tiny Houses, Videos
tags mechanical, ventilation, system, broan, nutone, hrv, erv, enthalpy, recovery ventilator, heat recovery, fresh air, stale air, tiny house, exhaust, ape130, erv70, hrv70, makeup air damper, stove, propane, air quality, #tinylab, #tinyhouse

Proving the Airtightness and Insulation of the #TinyLab

Corbett Lunsford

Join building diagnostics guru Corbett Lunsford as he tests the airtightness and insulation of the #TinyLab, the highest performance tiny house on wheels in the world. Using a Retrotec 5000 blower door, DM-32 smart gauge, and ThermApp infrared camera, he proves that the #TinyLab is truly a work of science and art at the same time.

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categories From the Field, Homeowner education, Performance Pros, Testing Tools, Tiny Houses, Videos
tags tiny house, blower door, test, infrared, thermography, thermapp, retrotec, dm-32, 5000, #tinylab, air leakage test, insulation, passive house, passivhaus, ach, cfm, cfm50

Electrifying the #TinyLab: PV Solar, LEDs, and Other Shockers

Corbett Lunsford

Watch stage three of the electrical system process as Corbett Lunsford brings Fall Fast Tracker Eddie Lammers of Honey Home Services to the #TinyLab for a very long day of wiring. See how the Panasonic PV panels interact with the Outback Power system from Soligent, how the RAB Lighting LEDs and the Mitsubishi and Broan HVAC equipment finally come online!

The #TinyLab is equipped with 960 Watts of PV solar panels, 4.8 kWh of nanocarbon AGM batteries, a 3.6 kW 48v Outback FlexPower ONE from Soligent, 100 Watts of RAB Lighting LEDs, a 1/2 ton Mitsubishi Ductless Minisplit Heat Pump, a 30 cfm Broan ERV/HRV, and a Hewlett-Packard HP Z840 computer. We also have a vacuum cleaner, for those who are concerned about cats. Hallelujah.

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categories Tiny Houses, Videos
tags tiny house, off grid, #tinylab, #tinyhouse, #proofispossible, proof is possible, video, electrical, system, wiring, RAB lighting, led, pv, photovoltaic, panasonic, broan, mitsubishi, hp, outback, soligent, eddie lammers, honey home services, florida, home performance, high performance, tiny house on wheels, tiny house construction

Formaldehyde-Free Plywood for Airtight Homes

Corbett Lunsford

All plywood has formaldehyde in it, except Purebond. Why anyone would choose normal plywood for interior surfaces is perfectly clear: they have no idea that it will poison them.  Let's set the record straight on the only plywood that should be used inside a new, airtight home. YOU CAN BUY PUREBOND AT HOME DEPOT, PEOPLE.

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categories Homeowner education, Real Estate, Tiny Houses, Videos
tags purebond, formaldehyde, free, plywood, without, toxic, columbia, forest, products, fsc, airtight, tiny house, proof is possible, #tinylab, tiny lab, poison, tiny home, tiny homebuilding, tiny house engineering, air quality

HOW TO BUILD A SHOJI DOOR FROM PUREBOND PLYWOOD

Corbett Lunsford

Our #TinyLab is a touring tiny house on wheels, which means it takes a lot of abuse as we travel the U.S. on the Proof Is Possible Tour. We’re teaching home performance, showing people how to get diagnostic proof when doing home improvements or building/buying a home.

One of the major problems in the home market is that people just don’t know what they don’t know. They don’t know that air leakage is the biggest problem in their homes, they don’t know that they’re making carbon monoxide every time they use a gas stove, and they don’t know that the formaldehyde in plywood is slowly poisoning their families. That’s what the tour is about.

Because we built the #TinyLab very airtight, almost every visible surface in our home is made of Purebond Formaldehyde-Free Plywood. We didn’t even waste time thinking about air purifiers or other band-aids; if we don’t want toxins in the house, it’s easier if we don’t bring them inside in the first place. We decided to use the Purebond for our Shoji Door to the bathroom, too- faster than using wood framing pieces, and going with a hardware-free sliding door would mean more durability overall. Here’s how the door was built:

1. Cut two sheets of Purebond ½” pre-finished plywood to size, with an extra ½” in each direction. Clamp them face-to-face. Measure and trace the cut-outs on the unfinished top side, putting the extra ½” along just two edges (i.e., bottom and right side) so that the other two edges are your reference 'finished' edges. You'll cut the extra ½” off after the door is assembled, to ensure a flat, straight edge on every side.

2. Cut the two sheets with a jigsaw to create the spaces for the rice paper, and any vents for pressure relief between rooms.

3. Dust the sheets off and stain the interior cuts you just made to match the veneer.

4. Prep your glue table with clamps- lots of them. Cut your rice paper to fit the full span of cut-outs with 1" to spare on each side.  Working fast but thoroughly, spread glue on the unfinished faces of both sheets simultaneously, and sandwich the rice paper between them.

5. Clamp the hell out of the assembled door, making sure the rice paper is taut, the cut-outs line up, and the two finished edges are even.

6. After letting the glue dry, unclamp the double-thickness door and cut the extra ½” away from the two edges, leaving all four edges perfectly even and smooth. Stain the outside edges to match the veneer.

7. Install the Shoji door in the jamb where it will slide (we used a pre-made sliding door frame, and removed the hardware and metal components for wheels) and seat it in a 1/16" waxed groove in the threshold. Attach adhesive felt strips to the pocket jamb to keep the veneer from being scratched.

8. Install the door and the jamb pieces that will lock in the top and closing side- DONE!

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categories Architecture, Tiny Houses
tags shoji door, hardware free, no hardware, sliding, pocket door, sliding door, slider, japanese, plywood, easy, diy, how to, build, design, screen, rice paper, #tinylab, proof is possible, purebond, columbia, forest, products

#TinyLab Noise Reduction Test with APC Cork Flooring

Corbett Lunsford

Grace and Corbett Lunsford show not just the installation of APC Cork floating floor planks, but also the sound reduction testing to prove that it's performing the way it's supposed to! See the #TinyLab on the Proof Is Possible Tour in 2016: http://ProofisPossible.com

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categories Homeowner education, Performance Pros, Testing Tools, Tiny Houses, Videos
tags noise test, sound reduction, reflections, reverberation, diagnostic, cork, dampen, apc cork, floor, tiny house, tiny homebuilding, tiny house engineering, home performance, building performance, air quality, no voc, proof is possible, #tinylab

How to Keep a Rainscreen Airtight

Corbett Lunsford

Corbett Lunsford had a problem finishing the ventilation holes in the rain screen of the #TinyLab, and apparently invented a new tape technique using 475 High Performance Building Supply's Tescon Vana. Voila: Corbett's Car Wash technique.

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categories From the Field, Performance Pros, Tiny Houses, Videos
tags ventilation, air gap, rain screen, 3/8", cor-a-vent, coravent, broan, ventilation duct, penetrations, cutting, proper, best practice, building science, hole, home performance, building performance, proof is possible, #tinylab, tiny lab, tiny house on wheels

Installing & Testing a Mitsubishi Ductless Mini-Split

Corbett Lunsford

Building Performance Workshop's Corbett Lunsford, with expert help from Uplifting Air's Brad Lemley, installs and commissions a 1/2 ton Mitsubishi ductless mini-split heat pump on the #TinyLab tiny house on wheels for the Proof Is Possible Tour. Come see us in 20 cities across the US at: http://ProofisPossible.com

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categories From the Field, Homeowner education, Performance Pros, Testing Tools, Tiny Houses, Videos
tags Tiny house design, tiny house performance, home performance testing, hvac testing, A/C, commissioning, micron gauge, micron test, brad lemley, uplifting air, #tinylab, #tinyhouse, tiny house on wheels, engineering, heat load, half ton, 6, 6000 btu, minisplit, isee sensor, infrared, heat pump