Part 8

This house is similar in many respects to the first unit of 6522 (p. 26), but is enlarged to provide for the bathroom. A shallow root cellar with room above is added at the rear of the house to provide extra storage if needed in localities where a cellar is not practicable. As in the case of plan 6522, two more bedrooms may be added to the left side of the house by taking space from the rear bedroom for a hallway.

The house is planned to be heated by a jacketed heater in the workroom with a cold-air return duct under the floor and cold-air registers in the living room and bedrooms. This arrangement will keep all handling of coal and ashes out of the living parts of the house.

Prepared by O. R. S. Trabor for the department of agricultural engineering, University of Missouri.

PLAN 6528, FOR THE NORTH

Floor areas: Superstructure, 800 square feet. Cellar, 800 square feet.

House 6528 is intended for use in cold, snowy regions, where farmers need cellars for storing fuel and vegetables. The hip roof helps to brace the house against the wind and is economical of material. A well-insulated ceiling is recommended to help keep the house comfortable. The substantial chimney in the center of the house, with separate flues for furnace, kitchen range, and fireplace, insures good draft and no wasted heat. The vestibule at the front and the hall arrangement at the side door also aid in keeping the house warm. Both doors are convenient to the driveway and the path to the barn.

The washroom and laundry of this house are in the cellar. This is a satisfactory and economical arrangement where there is good drainage for both the cellar and the plumbing fixtures, and is particularly advantageous on rolling ground. But one should beware of putting a deep cellar in a poorly drained location. (See Farmers' Bulletin 1572, Making Cellars Dry.)

Prepared by S. A. Witzel for the department of agricultural engineering, University of Wisconsin.

PLAN 6529

Floor areas: Superstructure, 740 square feet. Porches, 250 square feet.

This house was designed to meet the needs of a family of 4 to 6 people. The porch faces the highway, and paths from the front and side porches lead to the farm drive.

The kitchen is complete and compact. The extra space found in many farm kitchens has been omitted and a workroom added to provide for laundry and other rough work. This also provides a place for men to leave their outer wraps and wash before entering the living room. Storage space can be obtained in the attic by the use of a disappearing stair in the workroom ceiling.

No wood or coal range is provided for in this plan, because the use of an oil, gas, or electric stove saves space in the kitchen and correspondingly reduces the cost of the house. This saving and the convenience of a small, compact cooking unit deserve careful consideration in localities where these fuels are cheaply available. Heating is accomplished by means of a circulator heater in the living room.

The designer of this plan states:

The bedrooms are small. They are little used during waking hours, thus they can be reduced with less injury to family comfort than any other room. The large living room more than compensates for this.

When funds are limited it is always debatable, in a great portion of the United States, whether spending money for a porch is wise, because the same money could be used instead to increase the area of the house proper. In this particular case the porch could be left off without harm.

Prepared by H. E. Wichers and O. S. Ekdahl for the department of architecture, Kansas State Agricultural College.

PLAN 6530

Floor areas: Superstructure, 1,155 square feet. Porches, 245 square feet.

The well-known economy of square house construction is illustrated by this plan. A choice of heating methods without a cellar is indicated. If a circulator heater is used in the hall, as shown, the chimney between the bedrooms will not be needed, and if extra bedrooms are wanted they may be added as in plan 6517 (p. 18). A fireplace in the back bedroom would, of course, interfere with taking a hall off this room.

Kitchen doors are located to permit easy communication between the screened porch and the hall without interference with the work area while the screened porch is useful as both work and dining area. This latter feature, together with the ample size of the bedrooms, living room kitchen, makes the dwelling especially suitable for the small family in the South. The addition of a cellar under one-half of the house and of a central heating plant would adapt this plan to other sections of the country, though the rooms are rather larger than is common in the North.

Prepared by W. C. Breithaupt and H. W. Dearing for the department of agricultural engineering, Alabama Polytechnic Institute.

PLAN 6531

Floor areas: Superstructure, 1,185 square feet. Porches, 155 square feet.

House 6531 should be compared with no. 6533. The two plans were developed independently, but are very similar and illustrate a logical grouping of rooms for a farmhouse. In some respects the arrangement of 6531 works out more satisfactorily because it is not restricted by the structural details of framing a pitched roof.

This house is a model of compactness and efficiency. Note the simple but effective way in which the kitchen and heater room are located back to back. The floor of the heater room is a concrete slab, two steps below the main floor level. A pass cupboard between the kitchen and dining room is handy for serving meals. It also provides storage space beneath its counter. The entire bedroom side may be omitted from the original house, in which case the workroom would serve for dining and the dining room for a bedroom.

All dimensions of this house are multiples of 3-1/2 feet. Wall, door, and window sections might be prefabricated so that erection would consist merely of bolting the sections together, or the house can be built in the ordinary way. The sketch at the top of page 41 illustrates the use of sheet metal as an exterior covering, the one in the center shows concrete blocks, and the bottom view shows the walls covered with a combination of lap siding and shingles or wide boards.

The flat roof should be covered with good roofing and well-insulated for comfort in both summer and winter as described in the working drawings. The cost of the insulated flat roof should not be greater than that of an ordinary pitched roof without insulation. The accumulation of snow will help to keep the building warm.