Outhouse (Privy)

Now that the excavation will be underway soon, I need to start planning what I should do next.  Once the dig is complete I will move my trailer to the new site.  The problem with the new site will be no facilities.

First things first, need a bathroom.  I will be putting up an outhouse for use until the cabin is completed.

The hard part about this outhouse design is situating it on a 32% slope.  Special consideration must go into the design.

Here are my initial drawings for the outhouse:

Once I decided on the basic construction, I put it into my design program to get a good visual:

Typical outhouses have the door on the high side to minimize the total height of the design.  In this case, I don't want the door up slope so I needed to create a design that would keep the door more accessible on the side of the slope.  This configuration minimizes the required excavation work needed to level the area around the outhouse.

I plan to build the outhouse at home in my garage, this way I can build in sections allowing me to test fit the walls and roof.  Then I will assemble the outhouse on site when the ground is prepared.  This would be much easier than building on site, were I would have limited access to power and tools (and a home depot).

Excavation

I decided to let someone else do the dig work.  I realized after the cost of renting an excavator and the time it would take me, a beginner, to complete the work it would cost just as much.  I got a great price from the company that has already been doing the work so far (survey, plans, septic tests, etc.).

I would recommend getting at least two or three quotes before you decide on a company.  Make sure you get the job details in writing, there are a lot of variables when it comes to digging on a slope.  They could run into rock and have difficulty removing tree stumps, so a flat rate quote helps prevent too many surprises.

I received quotes from a few thousand dollars up to fourteen thousand dollars, so be careful!

Tree Clearing

The trees have been cleared, now I can begin the dig work.  They will dig the driveway and pad and lower that 32% grade around the leach field area down to under 25% slope (per inspector).  It took me, and a friend for two days, 5 weeks (on weekends) total to clear about 20 trees.  Several of them were already dead so I don't feel so guilty killing trees, there was a beetle that came through many years ago and killed a lot of trees.  So, that was less than 40 hours total for clearing around 20 trees, not to bad!