Design

Over the past couple of months I have really been putting a lot of thought in to the design and lay out of our home. You would think we would already know what we wanted by now, and we do, but trying to decide weather to compromise what we really want verses what's out there in a stock plan. We had decided to have our plans custom drawn and had contacted a couple of companies to give us estimates. BUT, as I sat down and started thinking about what we wanted and drawing sketches I remembered something I once read. It was in some news article about computer technology, It read something like "Engineers Becoming Obsolete". It went on to tell how computer software was replacing the need for engineers.

So I've decided to try and design our plans myself, using one of these programs of course. I started doing the research on what software other log home companies were using. Few will tell on there web sites what programs they use, but I found a few using Archicad . Archicad seems out of my league. I did find a lot of owner builders using Punch Software and Chief Architec. I really liked the Chief Architec's demo on there web site it seems very user friendly.

I found some discussion forms comparing the Punch Architectural Series and Chief Architec. It seems that people think that they are very similar, but Punch is a better buy.

We decided to try Punch and bought a used program on eBay, it should be here the first of next week. After I come up with workable plans I would like to get with Bill Lasko to see what I need to change. I'm looking forward to learning something new.

UP DATE:

As I go through this learning process I learn as I go and I'm learning that ultimately some things will have to be engineered in order to pass inspection.