Is there any insulation? Also I don't think that 4 guys moving 380 lbs around will last 8 hrs.
Alan Belardinelli
They claim R13 insulation. Also, I am guessing that rather than lifting 380lbs for 8 hours, this is more of a thing that gets lifted once, popped into place and then connected. A healthy group of four people should be able to do that all day long.
Tony Smale
@ The Hoff, I agree, as someone who regularly carries that type of weight that type of distance for a living, my limit is about 20 trips per half hour, Im not a fit guy, but Ive been doing it for 10 years now, and new guys who are gym buffs last about 5 trips before looking like they are going to die. Considering the requirement would be for 200 trips carrying 42kg, one would have to make 40 trips per hour, or one trip every minute and a half, without breaks, and also laying the only slightly lighter base as well. Just not going to happen. Not without a forklift or 5
Alan Belardinelli
Dunno, I say it looks feasable with a limited amount of people power. Once a team gets good, setting the plates down should be a breeze (of course having a pal-finger or whatever they are called outside of scandahoovia would be ideal for that) then rolling the truck by, taking them down exactly where they need to be and then easing them into place should be pretty straight forward. Correct staging, planning, and execution and these guys go up like a charm, I bet. Incorrect and...its a SNAFU.
Dean Jones
i dont understand how shipping could be cheap if each unit weights a hefty 282kg in total.... also dont understand why they need to be so heavy unless your setting them up in the middle of the dangerzone its very cool that they can be connected to form multiple rooms but surely temporery housing should be temporery, you just need a place to sleep not a living room to watch the tv
tampa florida
with a custom hand cart, a single person should be able to set this in place
Matt Rings
I think part of the weight is for the inner and outer shells, insulation, wiring and doors. That weight is needed for weather protection, too, to prevent theft, and most importantly, protection for movement due to high winds (Caribbean hurricanes).
Jon A.
The idea that you could just reuse the same units every year for each new disaster area seems pretty iffy. For one thing, the units will almost certainly be needed for longer than a year in a given location. Once they've been disaster area housing for a year or two, I'm not sure you'd want them back. It might be better to simply make them out of materials that could easily be repurposed.
Gregg Eshelman
Steel shipping containers. Port au Prince had a huge amount of those containers because Haiti produces quite literally nothing anyone else wants and unless it's a very short trip it costs more than an empty container to send it back from there. There are other places with similarly poor living conditions, poor economy and an excess of shipping containers. Since most of those areas are also generally warm year 'round, insulation would not be required, but ventilation would. The containers have holes at the corners which are used to hold stacking pins. Those holes could be used to mount sun shades. For the quickest temporary housing conversion, design an insert for the door end equipped with ventilation fans and a duct to direct air the full length of the container. Beyond that, additions can (and have) been made up to welding many containers into stacks to build houses, apartment buildings and student dormitories. These containers are a relatively cheap and very abundant resource, especially in many areas that need good housing. Yet many of the people that need such housing turn their noses up at the very thought, just like the Haitians did at the US offer to give the country the surplus "FEMA trailers". They wouldn't even take the ones that were never used.
Gene Jordan
I like the concept, but I'm with Gregg Eshelman about the shipping containers instead of the above idea (which we all should realize is designed to hold armed troops and their support, not refugees). I have plans to build my own permanent house from them once I buy the parcel of land it will be built on. I won't stack them, but three or four will be connected in a U shape, a square, or a t-formation. The tallest size of them (HQ) gives 8' – 10 7/32” feet of interior head room. The space between them can be framed out in other materials, such as hemp-crete or natural cord wood from the property set in concrete. When it is finished, it won't even look like it was made from shipping containers. It will look like any other house in the area.