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Atlanta, GA
773.398.5288
corbett@buildingperformanceworkshop.com
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.
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!
Visit an attic (vicariously) with building performance expert Corbett Lunsford to find a tiny problem that may force us to replace the floor and ceiling of this building- and it might happen to you someday too! Stop guessing- Proof Is Possible. Get up in that attic and have a look!
The answer to this bass-ackwards question is: NEGATIVE DOLLARS AND ZERO CENTS. It costs LESS to build a high performance home, whether that means ENERGY STAR Home, a Passive House, a Zero-Energy Ready home, or any of a number of other green home certifications. Here's why:
In his first Fall Fast Track week of 2015, home performance guru Corbett Lunsford answers the question "how much more will it cost to build my next home high performance?" The answer to the question is as straightforward as the question is ridiculous!
Building forensics work shown in detail! Watch as I give a tour of a few of the diagnostics projects we worked on in the past month, especially a battle between two flow hoods that are both past due for calibration, duct tightness testing failures and what to do, and when performance testing professionals should get paid for their work.
Grace and Corbett are building a performance-proven tiny house on wheels called the Tiny Lab! It's going to be built from November to February, and it starts a 16-city US Tour in March of 2016. The Crowd Sourcing Campaign is happening NOW on RocketHub- CLICK HERE TO PARTICIPATE IN THE TOUR! Here's the full series of four webinars from August 2015 detailing the engineering of a super cool tiny house on wheels!
In #1: SHAPE AND LAYOUT, Corbett and Grace show the 3D sketchup model of the Tiny Lab, and bring engineer John Bergman in for some heavy lifting to do with pinpointing the center of gravity on this 24 ft trailer tiny house.
In #2: AIRSEALING, INSULATION, & WEATHER BARRIERS, tour the process of energy modeling the tiny house to determine the optimal R-values and level of airtightness, and hear about vapor barriers, moisture control, and drainage.
In #3: HEATING, COOLING, AND VENTILATION, you get a taste for how wrong a lot of the discussion goes about homes in general, and tiny homes especially. The HVAC design, including Manual J heat load calculations and hourly solar gain curves are analyzed and used for things as straightforward as deciding which direction to park the tiny house.
In #4: BELLS & WHISTLES, see behind the design of the solar PV kit, formaldehyde-free plywood built-ins, composting toilet, off-grid plumbing challenges, and luxury items that just add that quality of life that tiny house occupants are seeking.
We really hope you'll tune in for the videos of construction- you can subscribe to our YouTube channel right now with one click!
Today Corbett talks at the Habitat X thinktank with BPI CEO Larry Zarker about his passions: helping contractors, building homes that stop sending you to the emergency room, and how to infiltrate the health insurance industry to help make all that happen. Sponsored by the 6-week Fall Fast Track distance mastermind course for home performance black belts.
To download this episode or hear others, visit BuildingPerformancePodcast.com
Tiny home performance is made even more perfect in our third presentation in this tiny house engineering series! Watch as I walk you through the design and engineering of the heating, cooling, dehumidification, bath and kitchen exhaust, fresh air ventilation, and water heating systems in the Tiny Lab.
If you stay tuned to the end, you get to hear me realize I'm a total idiot! Fun stuff!
Let's do building diagnostics! Watch me demonstrate the commissioning of a kitchen exhaust fan in a big new apartment building. Just because the label says it sucks air doesn't make it so. Proof Is Possible- ask for it. Using a Testo 417 large vane anemometer.
Welcome to the new series where you solve it yourself! Watch me demonstrate a common problem happening in a brand new home- will you be able to diagnose the problem and prescribe the solution? In heating and cooling, airflows and pressures are the most critical and least understood factors for performance.
Grace and Corbett Lunsford walk through the process of engineering their Tiny Lab, a tiny house taking them on the Proof Is Possible US Tour! Tonight's episode is on designing the barriers to heat bleed, air leakage, and water leakage.
WORKING TINY LAB SPECS: Floor 2x6 with R-21 EcoBatt insulation. Walls 2x4 with R-15 EcoBatt insulation. Ceiling 2x6 with R-21 EcoBatt insulation. Air leakage down to 2 ACH50 or less.
I struggle with frustration, and you might be able to hear it in this presentation. I'm frustrated that as a relative newbie in the homebuilding industry, I'm constantly seeing work done thoughtlessly, or at least with not as much thought as work deserves. Sorry if I come across as an a-hole, I promise I'm not- I just care a whole heck of a lot, and I spend all day in buildings where my caring comes back to haunt me.
Today Corbett is psyched to again talk with Lew Harriman, the master of dehumidification and author of lots of books on moisture control, about guess what! Lew takes us on a tour of macro-drying philosophy, down to the nitty gritty of ERVs and hairdryers and wet spots on your carpet. Sponsored by Corbett's Fall Fast Track 6-week mastermind course in free market home performance.
To download this episode or hear others, check the show out on iTunes or at BuildingPerformancePodcast.com
Hi Corbett,
How long should the air conditioner run in a given day? The upstairs zone was running for 16 hours yesterday, and 10.5 and 11.25 each of the days before. Is that reasonable amount of time for the A/C to run given the recent summer temperatures? We are still trying to get the developer in to fix the ductwork, and figured this might be an symptom of the problem.
Thanks,
Graham
Hey Graham!
Great question- your air conditioner is actually designed to run continuously when it's hotter than 89 degrees F outside.
The A/C's job is to both COOL and DRY the air, and if it's too big, it doesn't run long enough to wring the humidity out of the air. This leaves you with a muggy house, where you keep lowering the temperature to try to get comfortable.
So don't be concerned when your air conditioner runs for long periods on hot summer days- that means everything's working the way it's supposed to!
Looking Forward,
Corbett
In our first reveal of the Tiny Lab, Grace and I show off the structural and stress engineering basics of a tiny house, assisted by actual engineer John Bergman.
We believe showing home performance dynamics through the lens of a tiny house tour will make it click for a lot of American homeowners. That's why we've created the Proof Is Possible Tour, and we'll visit 16 US cities in 2016!