Buildings, Design & Construction, House Plans, Carpentry, Do-It-Yourself, Small Homes & Cottages 

Build your own dream home - with logs!

Whether you want to build a modest vacation cabin or a grand multigabled manor - whether you want to chop down your own trees or assemble numbered logs from kits - you'll find how to do it here, in the most comprehensive guide to building log homes ever.

Aside from the historic beauty of a log home, aside from the personal satisfaction of building it yourself, a log home offers enormous cost savings in return for your investment of "sweat equity." Even if you build from a kit, you can save up to half the cost of a contractor-built home. And log homes often increase their value faster than conventional structures.

So let the experts at Popular Science show you how to:
- buy land and draw up floor plans
- choose log styles and joinery
- select and use tools
- shape logs - both by hand and with power tools
- choose insulation, weather seals, and alternative energy sources
- find contractors for difficult tasks
- employ the latest, state-of-the-art building techniques

You can get started right away with the clear, step-by-step instructions, the 800-plus exceptional illustrations, and the detailed photographs that take you through each phase of construction, all the way to interior finishing. Once you're done, you'll be delighted by your log home's energy efficiency. With thick logs, it will retain more heat in winter and keep you cooler in the summer.

Best of all, browse through the special section of design options; there are lots more than you could imagine, including some truly unusual styles - vertical walls with a stockade look, or cordwood construction, which employs logs of firewood length laid up in mortar. Both of these alternative methods, and many others, are fully explained.

In short, if you're looking for the most useful book on log-home building ever, this is it.