Hacker News Reader

Comment by adamsea | Hacker News Reader

Wood and metal have very different properties with regards to insulation, weather, what it feels like to sit/lean on them, the psychological effects of being in a room made of one for an extended period of time, etc ...

Plus I would wonder what, if any coatings were on the shipping containers, and if they were toxic, and do they degrade over time.

Plus wood is significantly easier to work with.

View on HN

I'll also throw in the fact that even for some reason you wanted metal, we've also solved the 'make a metal building wherever you want it' fairly well too. It is designed for adding doors, windows, comes in a kit form, and also breathes and can be insulated to have pleasant thermal properties. Even just in $/sqft having rechecked on this idea the price was never so much better than other kinds of buildings that are more suited to be in livable spaces.

Really what I would have wanted to see is people handling disposal of containers and then using the broken down materials to build a structure and/or just being smarter about reclaiming the material, but I haven't seen that come up in passively looking into it.

I think the issue is that people don't trust themselves to build a wooden box with adequate structural integrity.

Shipping containers on the other hand are cheap, easily available and proven.

> I think the issue is that people don't trust themselves to build a wooden box with adequate structural integrity.

Why is that a concern? There are plenty of people who are more than capable of designing and constructing buildings. Even if you need to pay for their expertise, their work costs a fraction of the total building cost.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com