Prestige prefab Modscape raises the style stakes
by toby Horrocks
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We start with a fully welded steel frame. It is seriously over-designed when it ends up at its destination
M
odscape have been selling prefabricated houses for three years and sit proudly at the prestige end of the market. “We are not just about meeting the minimum,” says director Jan Gyrn. “We start with a fully welded steel frame. It is seriously over-designed when it ends up at its destination.” The Modscape steel frame makes the houses robust and portable. Frames get an instant cyclone rating and can stack as high as six or seven storeys. The frames can also cantilever (overhang) two or three metres without needing a supporting column. Their standard footing is a steel screw pile, which minimises site disruption and doesn’t need any concrete or termite treatment.
The walls, oor and ceiling of Modscape houses
Whatisascrewpile?
comprise two metal skins with a high-density
A screw pile is a deep oundation t hat, as its
polystyrene core for insulation. The polystyrene
name suggests, is screwed into the ground,
compensates for one of the main drawbacks of lightweight construction – low insulation values – but does pose the problem of waste and recyclability. ty. Jan Gyrn says Modscape have gotten around this by sending waste polystyrene to China, to come back as plastic chairs.
rather as a timber screw is screwed into a plank. The beneft o using pile oundations over shallow “slab” oundations is that they are generally quicker to install and require less soil to be removed. Screw piles, moreover, do not need to go as deep as
North and west walls are designed with an air
driven piles and also cause ewer vibrations
gap for additional insulation, and the gap doubles
during installation.
as a recess for north-facing sliding glass doors. The resulting R values are impressive: the roof is R5.7, walls are R3.7, and the oor is R2.5.
Modscape’s Merricks house was delivered with 13 trucks and 25 workers, and installed in 13 hours
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Merricksresidence Designer Location Project type Cost
Modscape Merricks, VIC Prefabricated house $550,000
Photography Peter Glenane
Strand-woven bamboo fooring, used throughout the home, is dense and hard wearing
WATERSAVING • Bluescope Corrugated Zincalume 8800L rainwater tank
PASSIVEHEATING&COOLING • Austral insulated panel R3.7
Merricksresidence Designer Location Project type Cost
Modscape Merricks, VIC Prefabricated house $550,000
Photography Peter Glenane
Strand-woven bamboo fooring, used throughout the home, is dense and hard wearing
WATERSAVING • Bluescope Corrugated Zincalume 8800L rainwater tank
PASSIVEHEATING&COOLING • Austral insulated panel R3.7 and Aircell R2.0
ACTIVEHEATING &COOLING • Futura ceiling ans
BUILDING MATERIALS • Recycled blackbutt timber rom Urban Salvage • Embeltons strandwoven bamboo ooring
The Merricks house was delivered with 13 trucks and 25 workers; 13 hours later it was fully installed, with services connected the next day. The homeowners were delighted. “We’d done big renovations before, and the savings in time, effort and hassle with prefabrication are amazing.” LIGHTING • Philips Lumiled LEDs
PAINTS&FINISHES • Berger Breath Easy low-VOC paints
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