Tips on wooden houses, the best house for your needs

How are panel houses made and why are they easier to assemble than blockhouses?

Our customers choose the panel houses because they are the easiest to assemble: simply place the panels side by side and screw them together.
We are often asked the question: "why should I choose a panel model instead of a blockhouse"?
The simplicity of assembly we mentioned is certainly one of the reasons, but not the only one.

A wooden house with 20 mm thick panels is more robust (and heavier) than the corresponding 20 mm blockhouse: this is because each wall panel is equipped with a counterframe in strips useful for fixing the screws.

The force exerted by the latter means that you will find very large 20 mm panel houses (e.g. our maxi chalets up to 70 sq.m.) but in the case of a large blockhouse you will need significantly higher wood thicknesses, with a consequent increase of the final price.

Finally, last but not least reason: buying from an Italian manufacturer is a guarantee of quality, assembly and after-sales assistance.

Most of the time blockhouse models are imported from Eastern Europe, and any problem (e.g. a damaged part, a component to be replaced a few years after purchase ...) can lead to long waits.

Timber used

Home Idea Italia buys exclusively high quality dried FIR with PEFC certification, this certification is the guarantee that the raw material derives from forests managed in a sustainable way.

Key features of our houses:

• 2 year warranty
• The minimum height is always 1.9 meters in almost all our houses (except where expressly indicated) 
• Roof and wooden floor are always created in wood with 20 mm matchboards (we do not insert matchboards with a lower thickness, chipboard or osb ...)
• Being manufacturers, every spare part is always available
• Hardware and screws are always included! We also guarantee before and after purchase technical assistance.

Should I choose a Made in Italy product or a low-cost foreign product?

We recommend the Made in Italy + low-cost combination :-) 

Let's take a small example to better explain the importance: customer X buys a cheap house at a well-known DIY chain, looks at the cheap price enticed by the offer, does not think about the after and the purchase.

For example, when the material arrives at home, it could be very rough and the roof is made of OSB. He thinks "ok I smooth and at the most I change the roof in osb that looks ugly inside and I assemble it". When he assembles it, he realizes that the house is small and if it had been 1 meter more, it would have been comfortable. Then he returns to the shopping center, but they told that it is not possible to extend it by 1 meter, since they do not have the pieces to do it.

By purchasing from a manufacturer like us who controls the entire production chain, the product has certainly been checked and selected, the roof is always in matchboards (we never put osb panels or similar), plus if one of our customers realizes that he wants to lengthen his house, we can send the additional panels.

In addition, being manufacturers, we always have all the spare parts available, so that if some parts are damaged in years, it can be easily replaced.

This is for us to give excellent customer service and give the certainty that his house can last as long as possible!

What is slate and what differences does it have with the Canadian tile?

They are basically 2 similar products (bitumen + stone flakes), but a clarification must be made: these 2 products differ greatly from the tar paper which is found in purely imported economic houses and which does not guarantee a good durability such as slate and Canadian tile.

The slate is in sheets of 1 m (90 cm with grit + 10 cm of overlap useful for the coupling of the various sheets), the tile has the shape of a flattened tile where one part is visible and another will be covered by another tile.

Certainly the Canadian tile is prettier to see, if, for example, you have a view of the house or if there is another structure near (e.g. a canopy or roof) in Canadian tile, but on a functional level they are the same (if compared to our slate from 4 kg per square meter -5 °). However, on the market there are qualities of slate lower than 3.0 kg or 3.5 kg per m2 and lower resistance at low temperatures such as -0 ° degrees.

Should I buy a house with or without a floor? Also what is the liquid sheath?

We premise that for the optimal installation of a house in panels, you need to have a concrete base: the choice to buy the floor also depends solely on your needs; for example, if the house is used to store bikes, motorcycles, lawn mowers, etc., it will certainly be better to opt for a version without a floor.

If, on the other hand, you want to have a raised surface from the ground (our floors first have a 3 x 3 cm strip at the bottom and then the 2 cm matchboards) and keep better or put shelves etc ... then it is better to opt for a version with floor.

The liquid membrane as shown in the image is spread on the lower part of the house: once the wood has dried it will not fear water and damp.