A Pod Container Push Button House by Adam Kalkin

A Pod Container Push Button House by Adam Kalkin

http://architectureandhygiene.com/

Find Shipping Container Homes, 20 ft container, 40 ft container, ISBU in your area!

Container with drop down sides creating a instant house, not sure if I would want to sleep with no walls though?

Cargotecture by Hybrid Architecture Container Home

Cargotecture by Hybrid Architecture Container Home

http://www.hybridarc.com

Find Shipping Container Homes, 20 ft container, 40 ft container, ISBU in your area!

Nice design with sliding wall to seal container when not in use

Facts

External Dimensions

• Length: 20'  (6.09 Meters)
• Width: 8'  (2.44 Meters)
• Height: 8' - 6"  (2.6 Meters)

Food

Food Storage and Production
2 important areas to cover, Growing some food and storing some food.

My aim is to make a unit that is self supporting for 2 persons for between 6months and a year, that means storing and growing food is essentiall.

I have already established an aquaponics system, and have to say its a very good method of food production with little to no maintenance and self contained. 

A large tank built in the door way would be pumped into trays attached to the doors that would grow the plants, the fish would be edible too usually something like Talipia or perch which are plate size in about 10 months.

After having chooks (chickens) on my balcony I dont think I will bother with them, they take a lot of effort and resources for little output, haven't kept rabbits yet but think for protein they would be an easier alternative as they dont make a noise or mess or smell and breed well like rabbits!

The other Important thing is store lots of food, I want to design storage within the kitchen units and maximize the space. But remember! "Store what you Eat! and Eat what you store" as Jack at the survival podcast is always saying!

I have gone off canned goods and now prefer Dehydrated as a storage method, its easy cheap and fun to do, I now just grab corn, Carrots, and peas from my dried stored containers and add to packet soups all the time, so much easier and long lasting, oh and lighter and not as bulky.

Or you can buy preprepared MREs and other types, check out Bee Prepared Products for some great MRP's

Exterior

Cladding
would like to make optional cladding panels that can be taken out of the container and mounted once at site!

Couple of cool cladding ideas

Deck
apart from a drop down deck from the drawbridge and another from end doors would be nice to bridge the gap too

Roof
Would also like to make a kit that clips gutters on roof to collect rainwater and grow a green roof

Semi Buried
If I was placing it in a permanent position I would Ideally like to build a rock basket wall that slopes to the roof level on back and sides to insulate and obscure from view, especially with a green roof

Interior

Paneling

Flooring
Bamboo Flooring

I like the nice natural look of Bamboo which is also a very sustainable wood


Kitchen
Units

Ikea has some very universal well made basic set ups in many different colors and styles for a sensible price

Appliances

I will probably fit out the kitchen with Caravan/RV/Boat appliances as they are designed for low energy consumption and more compact size

Bathroom

All in one sealed bathroom unit

Furniture

Doubles as a couch then pulls down to a bed, very effective and space saving

another example but a display unit that turns into bed

nice looking small clean interior

sofa fold down bed

Hot and Cold

Heating And Cooling

The most important part of heating and cooling goes back to how well you insulate the container, my guess is the better the job the less energy need to heat and cool.

For larger place I would consider making it a Passive Haus, and include a heat exchanger

Basically the warm air going out heats the cold air coming in and vise versa, a well insulated passive hause will hardly need any additional heat.

One idea I had looked into is Geothermal for cooling.

A trench dug deeper than 6 feet and as long as you can make it with just a coil of pipe laid in, this would use the stableized cold ground temperature to cool air in pipe, the longer it travels threw pipe the better its going to cool, anyway a simple connection to the front of container, once drawbridge is down and a small fan you can suck the warm air from ceiling height threw the pipe and return it as cool air, very simple but I think it will work in a small area very well.

A simple heating method providing you have some sun is to use a solar heater, I have made one from soda cans that works very well.

A very simple A/C unit made from a frozen water bottle would provide a short term fix to cooling.

Another great heat source is the Rocket stove, although I dont like the idea of a fire burning indoors

but I have Sean examples where these type of heaters can create a lot of stored head by using stone benches and passing the neat threw them and retain the heat releasing slowly into home. would be great in very cold regions.

Very simple fuel fire is using Ethanol, it burns clean with no fumes or smoke and gives out a good heat, I have one in my apartment.

Water

Although I think its impractical to use inside a container the principal would be good to filter gray water for plants and washing.

Like to incorporate some water storage tanks for drinking and cooking some where inside the furniture or maybe the floor itself would also insulate it?

Water bladder type storage would be idea in the wall or ceiling of the bathroom, I like idea of ceiling but realize some reinforcing will be needed, but could gather rain water from roof of container and solar ledge to the bladder used for natural force shower and washing then filtered for re use in aquaponic system?

Some water facts!

Water weighs 1kg per Litre

1000ltr tank = 1 ton in weight.

1mm of rain per SQ Meter = 1Ltr of water

Not forgetting some water filters on all kitchen uses, the Caravan/ RV and boat market will be a good place to research this need.

Energy

Solar and Wind
I want to set up about 12 panels that will pull out of the container roof on a panel and also include solar water heater, also would be nice to include some kind of wind powered turbine that can be easily erected.
The most important part of the design is to choose lower power consumption items and LED lighting  to keep power usage down rather than a massive set of solar panels.

My first sketch and plans for a pull out solar roof, No its not a mistake! South Facing for us in the southern hemisphere for full sun and North for all you in the Northern Hemisphere.

The roof would act as rain catchment area too, and sun blind for summer high sun to keep sun out and stop excessive heat.

Rainbow Power Company show a medium house will need a 2.2KW system at a cost just under $9000

http://www.rpc.com.au/solar_grid_connect_systems.html

Really like these spiral turbines from WindSpire

How about some pedal power! would be kind of cool to have some power generated from a workout