ELUMAJA
Architecture
elumaja 90 is a healthy energy efficient one-storey building with four rooms, a separate kitchen and bathrooms.
The living room (25.3 m2) opening to the south is placed in the middle of the house and surrounded by the other rooms. The floor-to-ceiling windows of the living room and the two bedrooms (12.0m²+12.7m²) face south. The 12.7 m² bedroom occupies the northwest corner of the house and the separated kitchen is allocated in the northeast (12.0 m²). Each room has an openable window of 0.9 m of width that can also be fixed into venting position. For exterior finishing vertical shading or plaster can be used. Options for the roof include a flat, gable or single-pitched roof.
Technical info:
Length: 13.1m
Width: 7.9 m
Minimal height: 3.9 m
Neto area: 84.3m²
Bruto area: 102.8 m²
Volume: 211 m³
Technology
The planned heat load is 30 kWh/(m2a). The calculated energy use is below 80 kWh/(m2a). Energy class A. Efficiency in energy use is accomplished with an insulated (thermal transmittance can reach up to 0.069 W/m2K) and air tight (envelope tightness is 50 to 0.2 1/h) envelope. Heat and hot water needs are covered by a ground source heat pump which is connected also to a heat recovery ventilation system, whereas both of them can be linked to solar panels as well.
The house is heated with water radiators. A fireplace-oven using exterior air can be installed for extra heating. The heat recovery ventilation system is controlled by humidity and CO2 sensors that calculate the real need of fresh air considering the number of people in the room and minimise over-drying during the heating period.
Thanks to ventilation it is possible to cool the rooms with a bypass in summer.
Interior finishing
Exterior finishing
The choices for outer finishing are wood and plaster. In case of double air cavity we usually prefer vertical tar oil processed wood planks that ensure a natural, long lasting outcome which ages with dignity.
If plaster finishing is required, it can be used on top of wool plates covering the air cavities.
For the interior finishing, low health risk materials have been used. The base for interior finishing is cross laminated timber that we suggest to cover with a wood oil that would not hide the texture of the wood, but would decrease appearance of micro fractions from drying. Dry room floors are oiled with floor oil or covered with a parquet. Wet floors and walls are tiled.
Constructions
The house is constructed in a factory in three finished modules that are later transported to the plot and mounted on-sight. This secures best possible construction quality and price. The envelope is a double carcass wooden framework supported by cross laminated timber panels (CLT) in the inner layer.
Dold cross laminated timber panels have the perfect size (2.5*5 m) and they can be used both for structure where they help to support the whole building and for interior finishing as well. Plus, they make the envelope air tight while allowing the water vapour to pass through it.
Wood is a renewable ecological material that ages with dignity and is safe and easy to exploit when the life cycle of the house comes to an end. The benefits of the double carcass are that there are no thermal bridges in the entire perimeter and the thickness of insulation can be chosen depending on climate circumstances and energy demands.
We normally use 600 mm of celluwool for insulation. Using celluwool eliminates the need for vapor barrier, which decreases the risk of humidity and health damage in the future. The slab and partitions also have a double carcass which, together with the mineral wool boards ensure maximum sound isolation. The house is placed on a post foundation. Using a post foundation avoids excessive greenery works later.
The openable windows and doors are triple-glazed thermal break frame windows from Viking Windows. To further decrease energy loss from the linear thermal bridges, all non-opening windows are resolved with placing the glass directly into the carcass.