[00:00:00] I think, reached out to both myself and Matt a couple of weeks ago.

Hamish: And, well just a little bit of praise for the podcast, which is always nice to hear. But [00:01:00] then through us, a couple of questions and I jumped on the phone pretty quick and said, well, why don't you come on and interview us? 'cause obviously you've got your questions. It's only you getting the answers. Why don't we answer some of the questions because maybe some other people, want to know the answers to now, not blowing wind up mine and Matt's ass or anything like that.

But, um, maybe there's things that we know that other people like to know. So we have invited Damo on to interview us. And we've got Matt up. I think probably the earliest that he's ever been up on a Saturday morning.

Matthew: Yep. Hi guys. Um, really thrilled to be up at 6am today. Matt, Matt, No, I'm is, Matt is on the ball today.

double espresso, ready to, I'm halfway through it. So there's the latte landslide that might halfway through this time. just before we get fully stuck into it, though, Damon, I just want to give us a bit of a, a bit of information about you.

Tell us who you are, so the people who are listening understand who you are, because you're probably, what I would [00:02:00] say, our, the average listener of the person. The person that would listen to our podcast, you're the listener.

Damien: Yep. Yeah. Thanks Matt. Thanks Hamish. I guess, so me in context to the trade, I've been a carpenter for 30 years, left school early, didn't love it. slipped into a trade like straight away. 16, maybe even a little bit younger when I started. And then worked, trained, traveled, found myself from South Australia into Victoria, where I started a family.

and about 18 years ago started on that, that registration process, with the intention to get Involved in sustainability, sustainable building, and kind of had this harebrained scheme that I wanted to help owner builders, on sustainable projects, navigate the construction process, get in and do some, some sort of [00:03:00] management, help them get through that.

That turned out to be a really difficult niche. to put myself in. and I see other people kind of in that niche now or, or, or getting into that and it kind of gives me the squirts a little bit. It's really, it's really tricky. and so for that point, like period of like 18 years, To now, I reckon I could say I was consistently trying to get a DBU.

And so going through the application process with the VBA, going through interviews with the VBA, failing, exams with the VBA. it's pretty funny. You guys shit on the VBA a little bit. And I do have to laugh. They're such an absurd, absurd organization.

Matthew: do think the way that they make you get your license is a good way of getting it though.

Damien: Oh, I think so. I think so too.

Hamish: Yeah, to, to, to be clear, to be clear, my side, I feel like VBA needs to exist. Although I guess [00:04:00] from my experience, I don't want to say limited experience of seeing people go through that licensing, process. It does seem a bit inconsistent. I've heard people kind of sail through who I didn't think should have their license.

And then I know of people who. Definitely should have their license that have

Matthew: That was me at the time when I got my license.

Hamish: that you got it. You got it.

Matthew: That was literally me at the time when I got my license. I should not have had my license. I was just, I'd come straight out of the uni degree, like, done my four years apprenticeship, went for it straight away, was able to just, wrote, learn, book, learn, like, really studied my ass off because I was so used to it, and just knew how to find what they were going to teach me.

Hamish: Yeah,

Matthew: Or not teaching me what they're going to ask me.

Hamish: know, there's there's like there's an interesting kind of piece there to unpack maybe not now But I mean you can just go and Learn it all in a book and I kind of feel that a lot of where it's going now Is that and they do [00:05:00] want, you know a few years supervisory Experience.

But, you know, for someone, you know, potentially even like yourself, Damo, you, you, you kind of touched on that school wasn't for you and you didn't particularly like school. you know, we all don't learn the same. It doesn't, it's not a reflection of intelligence or anything like that, but we're all good at different things and practical hands on experience.

I know certainly for me, I excel better in that, in that environment. Uh, admittedly I did go to uni and I'm not bad at that in that. Sort of way of learning either. But I would say more broadly speaking, a lot of the people that are coming up through to try and get their license again, sort of generally speaking here, maybe didn't excel at school and maybe didn't like the classroom and their brains weren't wired that way to kind of sit down and read information in a book.

yeah, it's a hard one to solve, right?

Matthew: There's a whole episode. I've just

Hamish: there's, yeah, there's,

yeah. There, there totally is. So we're [00:06:00] totally digressing here, Damo. So

Matthew: Because we probably had very different experiences ourselves.

Hamish: yeah, well, I failed the first time. So Damo, have you got your DBU now or is that something that you're still,

Damien: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Hamish: cool.

Damien: That's how I got it. and you know, and it's, and in a sense, like it can be a license to get yourself into a lot of trouble and I reckon I have, you know, I've, I've probably had that experience too. So, so that level of regulation is not a bad thing and, and just, if it's going to keep some people out and turn them off, then yeah, that's not a bad thing for some people.

Matthew: I think it actually is a license. It is a

license to get you into trouble.

Hamish: I literally have just written that down because I think that is such a beautiful way to describe getting your builder's license. Like, I think that is fantastic. Because, you know, without the right, yeah, you can get it. It's like driving a car. You can get it, but you can be a horrible fucking driver and then go and run up the ass of someone.

but yeah, I think that's a really fantastic way of putting it. Damo,[00:07:00]

Matthew: The issue I see with the licensing structure at the moment, and I hope this changes and we're probably about to have some form of change in Victoria around between March and May from what I've read, but we walk out with a DBU, which is Domestic Builder Unlimited License. We're not unlimited because we're bound by our insurance.

And I think what people don't understand is you go get your builder's license and it's based off the cash you have on the bank, the assets you have, the backing that you have. And that will then limit your workflow. So if you've now come out of your, if you now get your license, you might be limited to what?

500k of work at once? Is that probably about roughly, maybe

Damien: that was my experience for a fair while, probably a good 12 years of my, you know, of being registered as a, a limited carpenter and a manager was really trying to navigate that limit.

Matthew: it's, it's hard now, especially with all prices have doubled. Our insurances haven't doubled. Or the amount of work we can do hasn't doubled. Like it hasn't [00:08:00] moved. In conjunction with price increases, but we are getting a little bit off track. So,

because that's what Hamish and I do.

just to give you a reference, Hamish and I caught up for coffee yesterday or lunch to talk about our planning for the Mindful Builder for the year and the 10 year plan and where we're going to go.

And what we're going to do, and we'll talk about that in the future. But I reckon we spent 15 minutes the whole day talking about the Mindful Builder.

Hamish: Oh man, we solved, we solved every, we solved every other problem. And I reckon in one breath, we changed tact about four different times.

Matthew: There was about 15 conversations going at once, but we knew exactly what was happening.

Hamish: Oh, we could pick

up

Damien: heard you say Hamish in the past, sorry, I think I heard you say in the past that your ADHD is your superpower. So clearly that's, it's supercharging the podcast. That's fantastic. Yeah.

Hamish: Uh, yeah, superpower and kryptonite. But yes, yes. So carry on, mate. You, you keep, keep, keep on. So license builder, you know, wanted to get into sustainability. [00:09:00] The licensing process was, it was a bit challenging. So, so where are you? Where are you today?

Damien: Yeah. So at this point in time, I reckon I'm in. right in the middle of maybe a shift. I think I've probably been four or five years of pretty much unrestricted and unlimited. and have gotten myself into trouble, wound up in a negotiation pre VCAT with a client that kind of burnt, left me feeling pretty burned out, and put me into damage control, I think. and now I reckon I'm in a position Where I am seeking advice and mentorship to keep forward in the building industry. And a big part of that is having that vision. like I said, when I started, I was very strong [00:10:00] on the passive solar design stuff and build stuff. And I wrote that really felt natural for me.

I read that your home guide and it just felt like a little bit of a Bible for me of just how to really simply, you know, use orientation. and all of those principles to, to build a good home. and we did a lot of mud brick stuff, like, play with a lot of different techniques in, in mud brick, to sort of achieve that some of the thermal stuff. I mean, looking at, what you guys are building. We were certainly really undisciplined with our wrapping and stuff, but, um, it, it, you know, with the way that air moves in and out of a building, it's, it is a different, it's a different thing. But, um, yeah. So from there, you know, at the moment I'm in a position where I have a couple of really good clients, that.

Uh, showing support for me and support for my team, or it was fantastic team of guys that, that, you know, I built, I guess, [00:11:00] almost in a sense, just to be with because. we're building for so long. I couldn't handle the thought of putting together a team of people that I didn't want to be around or even one person that I didn't want to be around. So it's kind of been a bit of a light bulb for me, having clients that support me and support us to do great work. and then when I started listening to you guys and that's like, I don't know, that's probably a week ago. You're really, really pushing that. The client, I guess it's claiming that, yeah, you need support in what you do and you won't take on a client that won't support it, won't support your vision, won't support your people, won't support your needs for your family.

Um,

Matthew: So thank you. thank you.

for, for listening.

The kind words here too.

Hamish: I'm sitting here listening to all of that. And if I'm being honest, like I'm, I'm kind of getting like goosebumps I'm just thinking about it because. It feels like, like I've just written this little, time, like, like from, from the moment we started chatting [00:12:00] to now, and I've kind of just written down here.

Apprenticeship and I kind of feel like you've just finished your builders apprenticeship because we've all been through this. Like I feel like we've all had that shit client. We've all lost money. We've all had our backs against the wall. We've all fucked up. We've made mistakes. We've hired the wrong people and we get to the point where we're like, okay, I've learned all of that because none of that can be taught.

The VBA certainly doesn't sit down and go, Hey, you got to be mindful of all of these things. As Matt said before, and as you so beautifully said, once you got your license, it's a license to get yourself into trouble. And it sounds as if you've got yourself into trouble because believe me, I've got myself into trouble.

and now you've come to the realization that, Oh, I need a great team. I need great clients and I need a really clear vision for my business. And that's how you move forward from here. But I actually don't think you can get there at the beginning. In my experience, [00:13:00] you can't be like, right, I've got my builder's license.

I've got the best team. And now I've got the best clients. I just don't think it happens unless, you know,

Matthew: I think it can now. I think there's enough information though

right now,

Hamish: I think, yeah,

Matthew: the generation coming through, to, I, I, I agree with you on 75 percent of it.

Hamish: think that I just think there's so much that you just need to learn by doing and failing that you just can't be taught

everything.

Matthew: yeah. I agree with that.

Hamish: Yeah. Look, I mean, I, I feel like listening to, listening to you, Damon, like now, like you, we've known each other for a second. Right. And I feel like there's a, there's immediately connection. Like the moment I picked up the phone and called you. of a few days ago and as soon as you started talking and

Matthew: Valentine's Day was yesterday. It's not today

Hamish: I think it was, yeah, I felt from my side that, okay, this is a guy that, cause I had the idea we should get Damo on to, to interview us [00:14:00] and I go, I just want to call him cause I just want to make sure he's not a dickhead.

And I think immediately when he started talking like, Oh, this guy's not a dickhead. I think we can have a chat. And I think that sort of like, sort of salt of the earth kind of personality also leads us to be quite people pleasing people as well, which I think can get us into trouble. make

Matthew: that's a typical

Hamish: are happy. Yeah, agree. Agree. Yeah, mate, I, I feel like you're, you're, you are right now, you're, you're on this sort of beautiful sort of sliding door moment where you can go this way or that way, and it sounds like you've chosen to go, like, to follow your heart and follow your passion, which I personally feel is so important.

Damien: Yeah. Thanks, Hamish. I just want to share also, like, I reckon coming across your podcast has, It's opened my eyes to this world. And I was, I was really close. Cause I looked at a couple of other podcasts and then a mate sent me yours and he said, um, mindful builder, this looks like you, you should listen to these guys and he hadn't even heard it.

and so I reckon. I, so anyway, so you shared this story, I think it was [00:15:00] you Hamish about cash flow, about running five jobs, being in the middle of your stage payments, having a deposit for your house. And the fucking story brought me to tears, man.

Hamish: It was heavy time. Yeah, it was.

Damien: It, like, I, it's just, I've never had somebody spell it out like that. And I, and I'm a person that, That spends a lot of time in the emotional space with men, and I've shared a lot of my stuff, and I've heard a lot of stuff, but that particular story about a builder's cash flow, it's like, fuck, that guy gets it,

Matthew: Yeah,

Hamish: I know from my side, I can't navigate my brain by myself without help. [00:16:00] Uh, and I'm pretty stable, right? Don't get me wrong, but, like, I've needed help.

Like, I'm, I go in to get my body tuned up every three or four weeks, like a car goes in to get serviced. and now for me, it's just so natural talking about those kind of type of things, but I can, you know, honestly, hand on heart that particular time in my life was probably one of my hardest. Well, there's been two really poignant moments in my life.

One where we lost twins. At 20 weeks. And that particular time was really challenging. And I don't think I'd, and it's probably the only time that loose at my wife. We've been together for almost 20 years now. It was the only time that we had ever had a really big fight. And, uh, it was that moment that I'm just like, Holy shit, I'm going to do something here.

You know, this is not right. yeah, anyway, sorry, man. I'm, I don't, I don't want to, I don't want to hijack this conversation. So.

Matthew: yeah. So

the purpose of today's podcast is pretty much, we're going to hand this over to you now Damo, and you're just going to ask whatever you want. to me, I can't speak [00:17:00] on, on Hamish's behalf here. For me, there's nothing that you can, uh, like there's open book, you ask whatever you want.

Damien: Yeah. All right. That's cool, man. So look, yeah, I guess I did reach out to you guys because, I'm at a point now where I reckon probably 18 months into discussions with a client and architect about a, Passive house design, and I think I was sort of match made as a builder for the clients by the architect. And now I'm at that point where the jobs on my desk to quote. Okay. So my questions were around, I guess it's what are the key differences in passive house? And I would say for quoting, but it's, it's building as well, isn't it? So you're, you're only quoting is just building it in your head and on paper.

And with with numbers. So yeah, what are the key differences of building passive house [00:18:00] as opposed to building

Matthew: average other? can I start, So, just so you understand, and it's okay, that a passive house is more expensive than a traditional house. Okay? It's more than 5%. It's probably more than 10%. The issue that you'll find at the moment is, It's probably going to cost you around 20 to 20%, but it's, that's not just passive house.

It's costing 20%. There's a good 10 percent within the costing that is just building better. Comparing that to the traditional low standard Australian home. Okay. So there's going to be a huge inflated cost to compare to what you currently build with. but not all of that is directly linked to passive house, but it's going to get lumped in the passive house category.

All right. That's the first thing I'll say. Hey, do you want to jump back to the architect?

Hamish: Yeah, I do actually. so that, that's not a bad point. I think that building better is, is important because I feel like firstly, our, our current building standards are crap. So let's, let's eliminate that lower end of the market. and then let's just start our [00:19:00] conversations at, at custom homes, right?

So custom homes are more expensive than that lower end of the market. So the first bit of advice for me, as far as the documentation goes, is does the architect have a really good handle on designing for a passive house?

Damien: Yes,

Matthew: can you message us through who the architect is? Is that possible? Just so we. No,

Damien: sure. I'm just gonna find my messages chat.

Matthew: So that's a Hamish really good point. Really good

point.

Hamish: because, because I feel like and I get, this is amazing, right? There's so many architects out there now and builders and designers who. Want to build better,

Matthew: Oh, yeah, you're you're fine You're fine, dude Okay, I'm actually just going to go straight out and say, so it's actually

Hamish: oh, oh, you got, oh my goodness.

Matthew: Yeah, we just had Talena on this week, so you're fine. So, if, if, if, if, I'm going to now go the opposite way. If there's a project to start your first passive house with, and I can put five people on my, like, architects or building [00:20:00] designers on my hand.

Damien: Yeah,

Matthew: gonna get

Hamish: are, you are incredibly lucky to have Talena and her team as the first person that, uh, well, the first designer who's going to put a passive house in front of you. And my advice to you with Talena and her team, open an honest conversation of where you're at. Because they are all for helping builders get to that next

level. And, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna throw mine and Matt's hat out here. Like any questions you've got about that design, any time, just flick us a message. Cause Where it's super supportive of what they do. And, um, yeah, you're, you're going to, you're going to shoot it in. So, so the reason I ask that is because,

Matthew: So you can probably be more open with your costings with them too than some other architects, by the way.

Like, they won't sit there and go, Your carpentry lab is too expensive. They won't question you like that.

Damien: Yeah,

Matthew: They will actually sit there and be like, yeah, we understand those costs where if the cost [00:21:00] isn't like you need to come in tighter, the cost is going to be like, well, what can we pull from?

What could we do better?

Damien: yeah.

Hamish: So let, help me, help me understand the design then. So are we slab on ground or are we, lightweight subfloor

Damien: Screw piles. Yeah, which I've never used.

Hamish: cool. So hang on screw piles with a, with a lightweight subfloor. So timber subfloor.

Matthew: Can you give us a brief on the house? That's probably a better way to start.

Damien: Yeah. Okay. Okay. So, small north facing, We've got, skillion roof with a clastery,

Matthew: Logic house, windows, alu clad.

Damien: logic house windows,

and, 140mm external

Matthew: insulation or?

Damien: So there's a couple of zones, I suppose, which is pretty normal. external like sort of laundry areas are excluded from that zone.

There's two composting toilets which are excluded from that zone. which I think, I'm not sure if they've got it through Hepburn Council yet with those toilets. But that was a big part of the [00:22:00] courting process with the clients is that that's something that she was really. And it's something that I've worked with quite a bit.

Matthew: Yeah. Okay. claddings. What type of claddings?

Damien: we have just got metal cladding.

Matthew: And yeah. Okay. timber

sub.

So timber subfloor, bush, bush, bushfire

Hamish: area. area. So,

Damien: No, I think it'd be.

Matthew: BA 16.

Damien: It'd be 16. It's pretty open. It's sort of like a grass fire risk, but there's no bush around it.

Hamish: So

probably, probably 12, 12. So, bushfire area, but, but like a low to 12. 5 barrel or something like that. So you, there's some, the reason I ask is I'm, I'm imagining that, um, sub floor cause obviously you're going to be at least two, three, four, two, 300 off the ground. So how do you detail that junction where that metal cladding hits the ground and how do you then protect the under, underside of the

Damien: it's right up off the ground because of these composting toilets, right? So the only, the only way to deal with those, you've got all these, these cartridges underneath, which, you [00:23:00] know, so that actually pitches the house quite up quite a long way out.

Matthew: Yep.

Damien: So that transition is not too bad. So airflow and everything's fine.

And then we're just looking at, insulation in the, in the floor.

Matthew: Yeah. Okay.

Hamish: And

Matthew: So, so we, we call, we'll call it simple shit, houseworks. It's like a simple, like a simple way of building, essentially.

Damien: Oh

totally.

Matthew: Yeah, yeah,

Hamish: Yeah.

Damien: There's nothing crazy, there's nothing crazy at face value on it.

Matthew: yeah.

Hamish: so that one, that one 40 frame. So given your climate, do you need to insulate externally? Are you got any wood fiber or anything on the outside of that frame? Or is one 40 frame, uh, meeting passive house standards or are you insulating the cavity? the services cavity inside.

Damien: Uh, this is a part of, I haven't, oh, I'm looking at the wrong plan.

Matthew: It's the right job though. Yeah.

Damien: It's the right job. I'm just looking at the wrong

Matthew: Yeah, because these questions that we're asking here just to give context is something that both Haym [00:24:00] and I have learned over time that when we go into a project that's a passive house, especially for certification, the questions we're going to ask like around like, are we externally insulating?

Are we doing the cavities? What, what's our heating demand? We're really just pretty much chasing, I would say a lot of the time heating demand and, and blow it all testing, but blow it all testing will happen on site. so we're always looking at things like What the U value of the windows are going to be?

Are they going to be double, triple glazed? Are they going to be a UPVC? Are they going to be an ALU clad? Maybe a timber, probably very unlikely going to be a timber. and then what's our wall build up, our floor build up, our roof build up? That's pretty much where we're going to start for most of the questions.

All right, I'm assuming that you're going to have an internal air tightness barrier. Yeah, okay, cool. Super.

Hamish: I just ask, I'll just ask another question too. And, and again, um, we're digressing a little bit, but these are relevant, when we think about our air tightness and we think about a thermal envelope, one of the things that we're trying to do internally in our business now is really encourage the designer [00:25:00] and engineer to be focused on that thermal envelope and anything that's outside of the thermal envelope.

So garages, in your case, the laundry and the toilets. Really make sure that there's a clear divide between how that is attached to the building because it makes it a lot easier for air tightness and where the tightness. So if those like external, external structures that are off that thermal envelope can be built after you've built that main structure, and then you can wrap it really well and then fix these structures onto it.

It makes it a lot easier.

incredibly smart that Yeah, like think about it putting it like an app like a little pergola on the side of the house like you want to

connect it like that. Now can I ask you, have you got Orenic as the engineer on this job too?

Damien: Yeah.

Matthew: Oh, Oh

Hamish: mate, you've got the dream, more question I have for you. What, uh, what, what degree is the roof that you're running with as well? Do you know that?

Damien: I think it's [00:26:00] 10 degrees. I'm just going to see if I can get it. That's

Hamish: Probably borderline

whether or not you want to put ply on that one.

Matthew: I, I would.

Damien: As a, as a cladding. That's interesting because that's sort of, I came across a design a little while ago that didn't get built. And it was, I think it was really that half assed passive design. And there was some, you know, dual layers of, wrap in the ceiling that I just couldn't, like, he designed to put trusses up at 900 or 1200 and wrap the trusses and then batten and then wrap over the battens and I just thought, how the fuck is that buildable?

But

Matthew: Can I, can I actually say something here? I'm probably sometimes shouldn't say this. Like I'm gonna say it follow simple fucking principles. Don't try reinvent the wheel what I see is so many people at the moment trying to get the proclimer app and Install it in a different fucking way install it the way that it's meant to be designed to be installed Don't try reinvent it.

Don't try come up with these beautiful new details [00:27:00] just because they look cool for an Instagram reel or because That's what's gonna get you approval of your builder friends stick to simple fucking shit That's as honest as I can be about that, because simple shit works. All the

information

is

Hamish: I was,

Matthew: out there for those sort of

Hamish: and that's, that's kind of what I was alluding to before about really thinking about and, and admittedly, Rory, one of my supervisors on site is really pushing this at the moment. because he's sitting there on site trying to work out how to detail air tightness and, and really good weather tightness details.

And he's like, why can't we just build the rectangle, build the airtight box, build the thermal envelope, and then just attach everything on the outside? Because The efficiencies on site and the ease in which we're going to have a bomber weatherproof and airtight structure just makes all the sense in the world.

And this is where I think your team, your team of iron, Nick, and also, um, EnviroTexture team [00:28:00] are going to

listen to these It's already there, but they're going to listen to it. Like, you're probably not going to be able to avoid detailing rafters, like rafter and eave projections. Because I'm assuming you've got an eave at at the northern end and you've got an eave at the southern end, or which way it, orientates,

Matthew: or is it, have you got, have you got overhang eaves?

Damien: uh, full overhang

Matthew: Okay.

Damien: front.

Hamish: yeah okay in my mind if you're if you're using that projection as part of your summer shading solution to to help um stop you know that really hot summer having those long e those those long rafter projections over that thermal envelope is sometimes avoidable unavoidable.

I know Matt, you've done some work with, putting bolt ons afterwards, but if you've got, if you've got longer than 600, I think it's, it's, I don't think it's possible from an engineering point of view.

Matthew: No, I think it is, especially when, so I'm going to, argue against his aim. So I'm going to say that where you are, you don't have [00:29:00] height restrictions, most likely like the

buildings. Okay. So let's actually start on this roof. So 10 degrees. I would ply it. So OSB three ply. So it's vapor permeable.

mento wrap will be fine. In all honesty, I'm going to say that if you put ply down on a house, you should probably use an adhero system. it just works better. Yes. It's a little bit more expensive. Um, The install time that I'm finding, and I'll give you feedback directly from yesterday with my team, who with my own house, we've completely peel and stick Adhero membrane walls and roof.

The Adhero goes on a little bit quicker on the roof when there's ply, because what happens with the Mento that, when there's a little bit of wind, it's really hard to put it on. With the Adhero, and if it's windy, and I'm assuming this job is going to be in the middle of the year, most likely, you can just roll the Adhero out, peel and stick it and keep moving.

The wind doesn't affect you. Alright, and on a 10 degree roof, I just think that if you've got ply and any moisture you get between that membrane and that ply, you could have issues. So that's my first part. [00:30:00] The second part here with the overhang eaves, look, I, I think if you, cause you've got that going back to the, the high issue that you don't have it, you don't have that with any town planning regs.

All I would do is you can, you can cut out, is it one third of your rafter? Is that what you can kind of do? Is that their code from Australian standards that you can cut out one third of the, of the timber member and check it

out. Yeah. So I would build it completely like a, like pretty much what, Matt Reisinger in the build show referred to as monopoly framing.

Build it as just one complete unit, like monolithic structure, no overhangs. And then I would then get bigger rafters, for example, If you need to project out, say, a meter, go find something that's like maybe a 240 rafter and cut them out and install it on top. Work out a method that you can build those eaves externally to the structure.

and that might be using them as a purlin too, so that also creates your roof battens, if that makes sense. I don't know if Perlin's is the right way to, to terminology,

Hamish: Probably, probably, like it makes perfect sense in [00:31:00] my head because I've, I've done it

before.

Um, is that making, is that making sense, Damo? You're kind of putting these. A projections on once that frame is up and wrapped and then you're plunking the

Damien: Yeah, so she's done a beautiful cross section here showing a window, the frame, insulation in the trough, and I can just, I can see where she's done her external vapor barrier. And it, well, it makes perfect sense because that she's drawn that line there almost within exactly what you're saying.

So you've just got a, uh, truss end detail with absolutely no overhang on it. And then everything is built outside of that. She's sort of drawn battens outside of that line, which Form up the EVE overhang.

Matthew: how wide is the EVE?

Damien: it looks like about 1200 to

Matthew: Okay. So it's quite, and that EVE is not supported by posts. Okay. The other thing I would do is have a track, have a, have a conversation with a [00:32:00] trust manufacturer. They might be able to come up with a method that allows you to do something on top. what's the, again, going back to the code of the standard, a cantilever is usually.

You got to go back two thirds of whatever the projection out is that

usually

Damien: Yep.

Matthew: you might be able just get a 90 45 LVL or something like that. Sit it on top and use some really good screws that screw it down to the top of the truss, which then counter lever it right out on edge. Does that make sense?

Damien: Yeah. Well, it really is like, yeah, it's like a counterafter.

Right. And that's, and so what you're saying is, So you've got your tri, your, your monolithic looking trusses with no overhangs. Ply those, and then a counter after with a, with the overhang, which takes up all the battens and stuff for the,

Matthew: Yeah. Can I, can I also go back and say, if it's a truss roof and a 10 degrees, my suggestion is pitch it with a on site cart rafter, just because with the NCC at the moment, the, you want to try create a warm roof. All [00:33:00] right. So there are issues at the moment, um, With the way the NCC has written about, essentially vent is, is under condensation management that I'm not getting into too much detail, but essentially with trusses, if you put trusses now, you're going to have to insulate at the top core of the truss.

All right. It's going to make life a lot harder. My suggestion, if you can get just like solid rafters, It will be one easier for you on site to probably install. but two, it will also probably make this detail a little bit easier to construct on site.

Hamish: just,

Damien: are you talk, so are you talking about a conventional roof,

Matthew: Yeah.

Hamish: yeah.

Damien: I think the spans might be over for a conventional roof.

Matthew: Okay.

Hamish: Yeah. Okay.

I still think you can, you can get a warm roof detail, Matt, if you've still got trusses, you can still insulate up

Matthew: Yeah. It's just a little bit harder. It's just, it is a skillion. So it's not that bad. It's just a little bit harder.

Hamish: yeah. Does that, do you know what a warm roof is? Just, just to confirm.

Damien: No,

No,

Hamish: No, okay. So, in a nutshell, [00:34:00] if a warm roof is where you're putting your insulation layer hard up to the underside of the building wrap that sits on top of your rafters or trusses. So rather than insulate on the top of your ceiling, like I'd say 80, 90 percent of homes are, you're insulating to the, so you're actually not letting that roof space Warm up.

You're actually keeping the heat out.

Damien: Yeah. So, you're wrapping the external of the building and not treating the ceiling like a void which is kind of running its own climate.

Matthew: Yeah, so we're still keeping your ventilated cavity or you ventilate your drainage and ventilated cavities. But essentially you're just reducing the risk of condensation and moisture buildup at the roof structure. All right. So you want to push everything up as high as possible. Think about it like when you do essentially your rafters, you build, you cut your rafters, they might be 240 pine rafter and you're feeling the insulation, that whole thing.

And then you're wrapping and there's no space between that top insulation and your external membrane. And the external membrane is almost hugging the top of the insulation. Like it's one complete.

[00:35:00] system.

Damien: Yep.

Hamish: Um, another question for you. is EnviroTexture doing all the thermal modeling? So are they running all the PHPP or they've got an external consultant

Damien: I am not sure. I.

Matthew: it in, in house

from my memory.

Hamish: wouldn't

Matthew: They did have PHPP people, but then I know Talena has worked with Alex in the past.

Hamish: Oh, of course.

Matthew: so that's that. Going back to the screw piles, biggest suggestion I'll give you, this is something we have on site right now. So this is the inner city, Melbourne house.

So what I'd always suggest is go get a screw pole company and just test the piles on site before construction. Um, we couldn't do that because the house took up the space. We couldn't get the big machine in. So we had assumed around four meters roughly, which was probably pretty typical for the house in that area.

We haven't hit bearing capacity to around eight to nine meters, which means we've got to now double the. this screw pole length. So all that just means is you're giving a more accurate cost to the client. up [00:36:00] front and just getting more data back in the ground. It just means that when you're, you're starting to build on site, you know your depths, what you're going to get down to.

It's going to cost maybe 1, 500 to get this screwpile company on site, do a bunch of testing and go, cool. This is what it's going to be. We now can quote accordingly.

Damien: Yeah.

Matthew: And that's not even a passive housing. That's just a knowledge is

king thing.

Hamish: just, just with the 140 frame, and Talena and the team, we'll all be over this, but stretch them out to 600 centres. Just to reduce your thermal bridge so you don't need to have it at 450

centers

Matthew: and the other, yeah, that's a good, that's a very good point. And also I'm not sure if you're aware of like, the blocking systems for corners and California corners and advanced framing. Have you done much reading on advanced framing? So typically in a corner or a junction, we'll do like a stud block stud.

That's what we, okay. Instead of you, you pretty much are now running everything. Ignore the stud block system across your whole external walls. Just run at 600 mil centers. [00:37:00] So in those junctions, when you've got an internal wall that's going to intersect with that external wall, just put a few more noggins in there.

so the noggins, the code says you need noggins every, every 900. Nah, nah, nah, for the corner junction blocks, I'm pretty sure you need them only every 900. for your, for your C Stub box done. Just add a noggin in that section. So now all of a sudden, you're creating like a mini ladder system in there, but it allows you to get in there and insulate behind all those corners a lot easier, rather than when you're framing and you're trying to wrap the house, you gotta remember to put insulation in these tiny little corners.

So that will reduce your thermal bridge, can sit like a fair bit. And you're roughly with using the 140 sensors, Oh, that's 600 centers. You're gonna reduce your timber consumption a fair bit too. So, which is really good for thermal bridging.

Damien: So, would you say the same thing for external

Matthew: just run them. Our team just do essentially like on one of them is like an L.

So it's just an L. So you've got your final stud and then your other stud comes back [00:38:00] in on the L to pick up your plaster or your internal battening system.

Hamish: an example on site at the moment

we have an example on site at the moment in mount waverley if you want to come and have a look at it damer

Damien: Love

Matthew: yeah and I'll even give a plug here. We actually have an open day with pro climber at my project on the 28th of February in Yarraville in Victoria. if you want to reach out to me, we'll try and get you on the list. It's already full, but we'll see what we can do. We might even work with Proclimate to add in another one.

Damo, you're more than welcome.

Damien: That's

beautiful. Would you, would you recommend ProClimber for raps

Matthew: yeah,

not, non negotiable.

Hamish: i've just written i've just written

i've just written I've just written

in big letters here, performance membrane. So if you haven't talked to them yet, definitely do that now. I know, cause I've just booked in one of my team for the training. I know they had training on the 28th of Feb in, not down at their facility.

So I don't know if you want to go and see Matt's house or want to go to the training session. Although it sounds as if, if, if, [00:39:00] uh, climber coming at to your site Matt that training might be in the morning.

Matthew: There's not training in the sense of how to install stuff. We're talking about the need for building weathertight homes.

Hamish: Oh, no, no, no, no, there's training at performance membranes on the 28th because i've booked in one of my team eight to

Matthew: Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. the other thing that when you're framing to be really aware of is thinking of your air tightness layer from the moment you start framing. Okay. So that means using the IntelliConnect, which is a, an Intelli system, but it's a thicker, it's got a thicker fleece on it.

So it's more protection. There's more protection there for when you frame. out in the weather that is, and essentially is a starter strip for you to attach your internal membrane to your external, your internal membrane to those corners. So think about you've got your T intersection, how are you ever going to get that section airtight once that T section has occurred.

So you've got these starter strips that run from the floor to your wall, up on the top of the top of the um, [00:40:00] the internal frame. So you're creating like, junctions that you can attach to in the future.

Damien: So it's something that you could tape to from inside.

Matthew: so that's for your internal

membrane, not your external membrane. So that is so you can run your intallo, which is your air barrier on your wall. And then when you get to that T intersection of the wall, It obviously has to stop. You can't then run that behind that T intersection of the wall because that frame is hard into there.

Damien: Yeah.

Matthew: So now you've got this starter script that you have something to get your tape to and attach to, and then press fix it on.

Damien: So if that was a 90mm wall, you start a strip something like 150mm or

Matthew: Yeah, each side. Yeah, each side. We, we, I think it comes in

Hamish: Make it a make. Yeah, Yeah, yep. Yep. Yep. Um, just a quick one back

Matthew: the,

Hamish: sub floor sub

Matthew: can I just, one more, one more thing, Haym, one more, in that junction when you have your T section of your junction, sorry Haym. is when you butt that internal wall in, also start with a 45mm block where your service cavity is. So you've got a bloc and then put your first stud. [00:41:00] So do a block, block, block.

So you've like, almost like you would always, you'd almost do your sub block stud. Except it's block, stud. And then that allows your service cavity to run through on the internal wall on, on the external wall to internal wall junction.

Damien: Surface cavity running on the inside of the wall,

obviously. Yeah,

Matthew: yeah. So when you butt that internal T section in, Like that. You want to leave that first bit off a bit and then you have a block so in this section you can still run all your pipes and electrical without having to drill through studs.

Damien: Yeah, beautiful.

Hamish: just to round that out. So, internally damo You're going to have your internal barrier And then you're going to have another start, another 7035 or 7045 packer on top of the internal barrier. And then your plaster goes on top of that.

And that's where all your services run. So further from what Matt was just

saying,

Damien: that

Hamish: you're allowing for that cavity where you've got that internal and external wall junction. So that's the reason

Damien: Yeah.

Hamish: that packer off.

Matthew: And I'd also suggest [00:42:00] 45 mil there too as well. 45

mil just if you've got to put cavity insulation. If 35mm you might be compressing that insulation in the past, it's just plaster or have problems, just use a 45mm. And you can just get a 45mm 9045, rip it in half, and then just put your, use them as battens.

And just do essentially 45 by 45 blocks if you need.

Hamish: and with your sub floor, so there's a, there's a couple of ways to attack it, but it sounds as if you have quite a bit of space, from the underside of the floor to the ground. Is that correct?

Damien: Yeah, yeah,

Hamish: Yep.

Damien: at least.

Hamish: Cool. Okay. So you're going to have a typical setup where you've got bearers and then joists sit on top of the bearers. Yep. Okay. So you're not going to have your bearers and your joists in plane with each other. You're going to have them, the joists sitting on top of the bearers.

Matthew: Oh, it's like a

traditional subfloor.

Hamish: like a

Damien: Yeah. I mean, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Hamish: so there's just a couple of thought bubbles there. So you're going to like, if you talk [00:43:00] to Cam Munro, he doesn't always say that you need to have a membrane on the underside of your insulation on your subfloor.

However, we like to, and I know Matt likes to, so in your situation, what I'd do, screw poles in. Your, uh, bearers go on. Now I would encourage, and you guys are probably already over this, but make all your sub floor members, big, deep members. So you've got big spans

Matthew: Usually 1, I think usually 190. They'll usually detail 190 to get you an R5 in that subfloor.

Hamish: Yeah, but there's that, but there's also, you know, you don't want, you know, 90 45 everywhere and then have to detail underneath when you're putting insulation, then all your building wrapping afterwards. So you've got your one 90 bearers, which is spanning, you know, two, three Do another starter strip on top of that. So make that about 300 mil wide on, on all the bearers and then put your joists on top of that, then you can keep framing, you know, as you were [00:44:00] before. Also get your plumber to rough everything in and with all his rises or her rises, don't glue them in yet, glue them in later. Cause you want to be able to then building wrap or insulate building wrap, and then you can actually put your.

Plumbing rises through the sub floor and your insulation layer. And then you can detail around that, uh, from underneath afterwards,

if those penetrations, if those, if those penetrations are there, you know, if those rises are glued in to the pipes. Trying to detail around that and get your rap in there is an absolute nightmare.

Matthew: can we just jump back a little bit here? Now, while we're talking about it this way, and I'm assuming we're on the same page here Hamish, Damo has 900 mil that he can walk under his subfloor compared to say a traditional 450 watt. Hamish and I have. Now there's two methods. If you can't really walk under that subfloor and install, we're talking about installing insulation in [00:45:00] the future, at a future date.

I'm assuming you're thinking.

Hamish: correct. Correct Yes,

Matthew: Yeah.

Hamish: I was gonna say Maddie the reason I went down this path is because You can get access underneath afterwards. So you're reducing

that layer that you need to put over the sub

Matthew: I'm with you. Yeah, so I'm with you. So just so people don't understand here as well. If we were doing this on a house that Hamish and I typically work on, where we're maybe a lot closer to the ground, this method isn't what we would do. We would try to do this all in one hit. So we would have to glue our pipes in first, we'd have to run a full membrane under the subfloor, we'd have to insulate first, and then put our chipboard down, alright?

In this case, Damo actually has the ability to walk under and do a lot of this later.

Alright?

Hamish: which I think, yeah, which, which has its advantages. In my opinion, you you're not really worried about the insulation getting wet during construction. You, you don't have to protect that chipboard as much as if you had [00:46:00] insulation in that sub floor. So you just need to make sure that you're, you're preparing that sub floor.

So it's easy for you then to insulate and put your building wraps in. At a later day,

Matthew: what I would also do on a subfloor too, just one more bit of a suggestion. is run a rim joist around the whole perimeter of your subfloor. So, you know, instead of solid blocking every second stud, every second bay, you just run a full solid perimeter, like, uh, we'll call it another, like in line with your bearer, another joist around the whole outside.

So you're creating like this box and all you need to do now is slip in all your joists, all right? That removes the need to one solid block, but what you'll find, it's a lot easier to run your external membrane up. underneath the subfloor and connect it to your vertical plane in your wall because you've got this nice continual piece of, timber that you can attach to.

It also means that when you're doing your [00:47:00] subfloor, you can pre cut all your joists, slip them in and just get a few screws through the back of it a lot quicker and a lot easier than nailing on the corners and nailing them down. If

Damien: Beautiful.

Matthew: sense.

Damien: Yeah, you get a nice 90 degree fold all the way

Matthew: Yeah, it's, it's just, it just looks neater too. Yeah. Like it just looks like it just, it's. Yeah. I think Hammingham pushes into two episodes, by the way.

So,

Hamish: it has to be two

Matthew: yeah,

yeah. So, I think now is there anything you haven't, let's go through stages of construction. Do you have anything, any more questions on say, the subfloor or the framing at that stage?

Damien: no, but having said that, like we've completely rethought the way the roof would work. so yeah, we're kind of out in space in a sense there, but it's making a lot of sense. so I reckon a lot of my questions come back to wrap. And for me, if like, from the outside, looking in To passive house. I reckon the key difference that I perceive is this wrapping [00:48:00] stuff.

Matthew: Internally or externally?

Damien: Both. Just, I mean, the whole, the whole membrane system.

Matthew: right. So, I'm going to, I want to make one thing really, really clear and this is for anyone. Okay. The external membrane is not a passive house thing. It's not a building better thing. It is just should be normal building. All right. We the, Jake asked this question, uh, on the podcast the other day, and I'm gonna ask it to you, Damon.

What's the purpose of a building?

Damien: Keep the outside out.

Matthew: Yep. So what does that mean?

Damien: Uh, it's a place to shelter. A place to control your climate.

Uh, so, shelter from the heat and the cold.

Matthew: what else? The

Hamish: The

weather

Damien: bears. weather. So you want to stop weather. The, the heat. You don't, the, the membrane is not to stop the heat and cold. It is to stop weather. No one goes into a house and goes, I want my house to leak, the [00:49:00] roof to leak. Stop, like, stop the weather getting in. That is the whole purpose of a house. It's to separate you from the inside to the outside, from the elements.

Hamish: And then where passive house comes into it. You're then just diving a little bit deeper into the into the arbitrary numbers that the passive house institute have Plucked out of the air and said you need to meet these numbers to get a certified

building Which is great because you you

need something to

measure against You

Matthew: You just need to follow it. You don't go sitting

there asking the, Yeah, you don't ask the engineers why they got to the decision of their comps and why that beam is comped at that size. Same thing with PHPP, you can ask a few questions around what if we did this and this because this might be a cheaper way of doing something compared to putting in extra wood fibre on the outside, but at the end of the day, they'll run the numbers, they should tell you just what we need to do and then you can go from there.

Hamish: and it sounds like you're gonna do this anyway demo because you sound like a pretty logical and thorough person, but [00:50:00] Every step along the way just take a bunch of photos because all the details that they're drawing in in the plans Which I know from the biotech you're gonna be awesome. All those details the The assessor is gonna want to see them in real life So they're going to want to

Matthew: Photos,

Hamish: Yeah.

Matthew: Photos,

photos, photos, Like, and I mean. Like if you get insulation delivered on site, take a photo of the bag of the insulation, take a photo from a wide angle of all the insulation, grab a bat out, get a tape, measure the insulation to prove it. Like you need photos of everything. And I mean, like in our file, I don't know about you, Hame, but we're submitting around 900 photos of project.

Hamish: lots of

photos.

Matthew: upload,

Hamish: then,

Matthew: we just upload everything that we have.

Hamish: yeah. And take more than you think, make, make, take more than you think is needed because you know, the more that they get, let, let the, let the assessor, you know, pick out the ones that they need, but you know, don't be in a position where they're going to be asking for it. And, and just on that. And with your [00:51:00] costing, there is an element of administration work that you need to do if you're getting a certified building.

So you're going to want to put a little allowance in your projects for these things along the way. So there's a, there's a, there's an additional cost for the, for the, from the designer. But there's an additional cost from, you know, the assessor obviously. And there's also an additional cost from you as the builder.

To make sure that you're doing it, documenting everything in the right way and checking everything.

Matthew: I, can I actually maybe not off topic Hame? I, with my business, I don't charge any more for the photo element and documenting the photos and it's not, my passive houses to a high, we'll call them high performance. They get treated exactly the same. So we take the same amount of photos for high performance as we would for a standard, not for a passive house.

and because we already take a ton of videos, we just put them into a file anyway because I don't want them all sitting on my phone.

Hamish: I think the point I was trying to make that Maddy is that you and I have been doing this for a while now. And I think over time, we've just kind of [00:52:00] intuitively made extra

allowances in for that sort of supervision thing. And

Matthew: I think that's the thing, it's just there, we know what it, yeah,

Hamish: I

think, I think if, you know, Damo's going into this for the first time, you know, that level of.

Because, Damo, are you on the tools? Are you, you, are you a Bags on Builder or, yeah, okay. So, you know, it's not going to be intuitive for you to whip your phone out every, you know, 20 minutes and start taking photos of what you're doing. You know, you just want to get in there and get it done. So, I just think it's important to, to have that rattling around in your brain.

Even if you choose not to take it, not to charge for it, but like there is a certain element of your time that's required to take those photos. Now you might decide that you're gonna, you know, one of your leading people on site, you say you are the person that takes all the photos and make them responsible for that.

So then you don't have to think about it. Circle all the photos on the set of documents, you know, in your site shed or whatever, and say, these are all the photos that we need as a minimum. Here's a Google drive [00:53:00] or a Dropbox or whatever, just start uploading photos into there.

Matthew: You can even ask, what you can even ask from EnviroTexture is you can ask them for if they have a folder system for the PHPP in the background that you can upload them all to. So we typically have a file system that we'll have in our backend that will have, it's a Passive House certification file.

What we would refer to it. Okay. So So just pretty much we break it down into maybe, you know, Eight different categories, and that's from assemblies to junctions, windows, ventilation systems, heating and cooling, domestic hot water systems, electrical equipment, air tightness testing, shading, and completing builders, completed building photos.

Ten, ten categories, roughly around that. It just gives you the ability to go to like, I need to take a photo of that, I need to take a photo of that. You, the one thing that I'll tell you is you will not forget to take photos. Like, and if you can do a video, a constant, yeah, video a lot too, because you can always grab a still from a video.

Hamish: um, [00:54:00] another thing that maybe is worthwhile looking into Deimo is, uh, I know Matt and I both have 3d cameras, 3d scan cameras. So at certain stages along the project, we'll go through with our little, camera and scan the entire building. So you can go back and look at that down the track. And I know that, some of the design passive house assessors that we've talked to, they're happy to have that file as well to actually go through, cause you can zoom in and, and, and blow up certain details.

it's not as clear as like, uh, uh, you know, front photo, but you can actually see it. Uh, see the 3d model in, in real life. and, and these five, these cameras aren't massively expensive. They're worthwhile looking

into it.

Matthew: maybe, maybe potential sponsor for the podcast. Right.

Hamish: All right. Let's, let's have a chat with, um, CR

Matthew: Done. um, um, the other, so we're, we're, we're probably now on the photos part. Now, now we're pretty much, let's now say we're standing at the stage of a project where your frame's completed. [00:55:00] You're externally wrapped. Roof battens is on. You've got a, you've got a probably a 19 mil batten, a cavity batten, and a 45 mil roof batten.

Same system applies to your walls. Just a wall is a vertical plane of the house compared to the roof. Now Hamish does have a, I know with Hamish, you've got a great idea with your houses where you just do 70 mil cavity batten, 70 mil cross batten. that's probably something you could discuss on this project because you do have the space, you're not tight on space.

So, it's just everything is the same from, from roof to wall, make it, make it one complete junction

Hamish: So just to, just to wrap a bit, wrap a bit of clarity around that. So, you know, Cam Munro talks minimum around about circa 20 millimetres of cavity batten. We've chosen to do 35 mil cavity batten, and then a 35 mil cladding batten, Now that's for vertical cladding. If we've decided to do horizontal cladding, like, um, weatherboards or something, we'll just turn a 70 45 on edge and [00:56:00] that will create our 70 mil, you know, from the, from the frame to the back of cladding, it's always 70 mil, regardless of it's vertical or horizontal cladding that is allowing us to standardize our cavity closes at the bottom and our reveals into all our windows.

And we're working on something at the moment. So what's this space so we can actually roll this product out. So we're getting some prototypes made. and trust me, if you've got that detail standardized across all your projects, you don't even think the team on site don't think about it.