On Friday, April 22, the Hygge House reached another major milestone: the completion of rough electrical work! Thanks to the technical expertise of Graham Electric of Haydenville, MA (with an assist from the DesignBuild student team), the house is one step closer to being equipped with all the comforts and conveniences of home. Yes, you can do a lot in terms of heating, cooling and lighting with passive strategies…but not everything! A system of wiring for distributing electricity to power appliances, HVAC equipment and lighting fixtures is essential for a modern house, and that is the focus of the rough electrical install phase.
Preparing for this phase requires a few per-requisites: first, all exterior framing and wall and roof sheathing must be complete; ideally, the house should be fully “dried in” with all windows and doors installed (we’ve decided to hold off on door installation to maintain easy access to the space so we can use it to store tools and materials, and to avoid potential damage to the glass doors.) Second, all interior walls which will contain wiring must be framed for this phase to proceed. The rough electrical work covers pulling wiring, mounting junction boxes for outlets and controls, and installation of the electrical panel (aka breaker box), grounding, and overhead service wire. It doesn’t include the installation of switches, outlets, or fixtures yet-that will happen after insulation and drywall! (So for now, our power supply is still dependent on extension cords.)
In this phase, it’s important to keep everything neat and labeled and to avoid kinking wires or damaging insulation on wires. Metal plates are installed over studs where wires run through them to prevent damage from stray fasteners during the finish phase.
The rest of the weekend featured more Gutex installation and detailing. We used Visconn, a liquid-applied air barrier product, to seal the Gutex at the corners of the building. Visconn was also applied around the windows to provide an application surface for tape and for further air sealing. One more piece of exciting news from this weekend’s build: We got to enjoy a rare day of warm, sunny weather!
