Designing a preppers home

[Wulf202]

Your perspective is refreshing. I'll respond with some additional thoughts:

1) I did not mean to advocate breaking the law, especially not during times of peace and prosperity. I do believe steel is healthier than tar and shingles. I'll volunteer an additional con to steel roofs: rain is NOISY on them!

2) I agree, the well in the basement would be a nightmare to maintain, and probably should not be the only well on the property. There are other detriments as well, including possible out-gassing. The real concern from a survival perspective is to have the well and tank in a defensible location, and there are many ways to accomplish that.

3) Concrete walls on the interior have pros and cons. One pro is thermal mass. You're right that cost is a little bit of a con here in the United States where we have cheap manufactured materials. Folks in the Philippines use concrete on interior walls and it seems to work very well for them. That is where I got the inspiration. (I have no first hand experience.) One additional benefit is the confidence I would gain in home invasion scenarios in terms of ballistic protections between rooms. It transforms interior walls from concealment into cover against smaller calibers.

4) On the topic of steel plate: I'm no expert in material engineering. A brief google search indicated that 3/8" is indeed adequate. I suppose that if I shoot that steel at the range, it ought to be just fine for protection. (Thanks!)

More food for thought. Cheers.

~Omni~

Not an expert myself but i've got a decent amount of experience. I also currently live in a place with 12" concrete exterior walls...

Cons for concrete walls; they take up more space than standard construction thus increasing your footprint for the same living space, thermal mass works both ways, noise reverberates well like gunshots or the tv set real low two rooms away, r factor sucks, bullets bounce and skip off of them so a safe direction is questionable at all times.

Pros of concrete walls; bullets bounce and skip off of them, thermal mass, they reflect sound real well (we live next to a train track)

The R factor of concrete is 1.35 per 8" thick wall. Which is roughly a 1/2" peice of fiberglass batting or 2 sheets of 5/8 sheetrock (the same as a standard interior wall). Modern construction of houses provides r-13 as standard for an exterior 2x4 wall.

This place sucks in the winter the summer isn't bad since the south exposure is limited.

[tmckay2]

why not use ICF instead of straight concrete? or is it an older home?

Not an expert myself but i've got a decent amount of experience. I also currently live in a place with 12" concrete exterior walls...

Cons for concrete walls; they take up more space than standard construction thus increasing your footprint for the same living space, thermal mass works both ways, noise reverberates well like gunshots or the tv set real low two rooms away, r factor sucks, bullets bounce and skip off of them so a safe direction is questionable at all times.

Pros of concrete walls; bullets bounce and skip off of them, thermal mass, they reflect sound real well (we live next to a train track)

The R factor of concrete is 1.35 per 8" thick wall. Which is roughly a 1/2" peice of fiberglass batting or 2 sheets of 5/8 sheetrock (the same as a standard interior wall). Modern construction of houses provides r-13 as standard for an exterior 2x4 wall.

This place sucks in the winter the summer isn't bad since the south exposure is limited.

[Great-Kazoo]

why not use ICF instead of straight concrete? or is it an older home?

Allegedly, the exterior was used for filming Omega man.

[Irving]

Roof overhangs to provide shade to your windows in the summer and sun in the winter? Why doesn't every house do this??

They are called window awnings. My house has them. They do a great job keeping the house cool in the summer with no A/C. They are ugly though. Well, my awnings are ugly. I bet some HOA's don't even allow them.

I like this style.

[earplug]

Having barbed wire and a way to hang it will be handy. No need to put it around the place now, as getting around it would be a hassle. But having the wire and poles ready to put up would be nice.
Just enough deterient or to slow bad people, to give you more time to react.

[ChunkyMonkey]

They are called window awnings. My house has them. They do a great job keeping the house cool in the summer with no A/C. They are ugly though. Well, my awnings are ugly. I bet some HOA's don't even allow them.

I like this style.

How about Carbon Steel 'awning'? They are popular in Southern China, Taiwan, The Philippine Islands for storm protection (hurricane). I wonder if gulf coast area has them.

[Wulf202]

why not use ICF instead of straight concrete? or is it an older home?

if by older you mean more than 100 years. yes.

jim; you realize of course the film is quite a bit older than i am right? youre lucky ive even heard of it.

[Danimal]

This is something that I have put a lot of thought into and what I came up with is the bigger the area you try to make impervious, your costs increase exponentially and in the long run make yourself more vulnerable because you will draw more attention, and have to adapt your defense strategy to cover a larger area. You can fit everything that is truly important into one room if it is organized. For example, if there are 60+ people wandering through looking for supplies, hopefully your house appears to have no supplies and you can sit quietly in your safe room until they pass. If they are starving and in a big enough gang they will find a way in eventually so you don't want your house to be a beacon.

My idea is to build a regular house with a couple exceptions. Hardened steel beneath windows and either inside door, or steel plate able to be quickly hung on the door. Also put a steel plate next to the door on either side that goes up to waist height. Then use secure materials (security doors, security windows) to prevent quick and easy access to the house. The idea being that you will be able to see and identify a threat before it has an opportunity to enter the house, mount a formidable defense then if need be retreat to a safe room.

I personally think that having a safe-room under the footprint of the house is the best idea. Metal detectors are able to mark the re-bar in concrete so if it is outside the footprint of your house an angry mob might not find it, but .gov easily could. My ideal safe-room is just a bunker that has its own hepa-filtered ventilation and two entrances, one being from the house, the other being a defensible hidden exit away from the house. Hidden pill box if you will. Then have your well supply pass through this room before anything else, and have a manual pump tap in there.

This sets a small portion of your house up to protect you for extended periods of time. This leaves the rest of your house open to looters, but it will look just like every other Joe Schmo's house and if the situation is that severe, you won't be running your big-screen TV any time soon anyway. I think that it is important to have a house that will not attract attention like a big tower or barbwire perimeter fence. If nothing else the people that are attacking you will know that they need to be more prepared. This frees up the expense of building a fortress and allows you to buy supplies for longevity and training for you and your loved ones who will be staying with you.

Another thing that I have thought about would be a hidden closed circuit monitoring system that could be battery powered from inside the room so that you could accurately asses the situation in the event of an invasion. You could rig it up to where the batteries would last a long long time, and assuming that you would only use it intermittently during a crisis situation it would last through the worst of the worst.

I would love to have one of those fortress houses that were linked to earlier, but the cost of that would be more than I would care to pay. From a practical standpoint it makes sense to make a safe point to survive in, but if you never need it it would really suck to invest your entire life budget to build it. There is a fine balance between preparing and living a comfortable life, and making preparing your entire life.

[Great-Kazoo]

if by older you mean more than 100 years. yes.

jim; you realize of course the film is quite a bit older than i am right? youre lucky ive even heard of it.

Thought you were using hair color for Men!. Yes i know a lot of my movie and general references are lost on you young un's. However i wish i possessed 1/2 your "prep" knowledge.

[tmckay2]

How about Carbon Steel 'awning'? They are popular in Southern China, Taiwan, The Philippine Islands for storm protection (hurricane). I wonder if gulf coast area has them.

These were my plan for all widows. Doors I would buy steel and put some safe/blast doors on the bunker room.