Bob meets with Pat Fricchione from Simplex Industries of Scranton, Penn. to discuss the modular home industry and specifically the home being built in western Massachusetts� Berkshire Hills. Simplex delivers homes all over the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states. Today�s modular homes are designed to meet the needs of the modern discriminating homebuyer. The materials used in a modular home are essentially the same as those used in a site built one. They can be customized or built from existing floor plans. The homeowner gets the advantage of buying in bulk for all the materials in the home. And its always perfect weather in the factory, so there are no delays due to rain or snow. A typical home can be built in a week at the factory and delivered to the home site in ready-to-assemble pieces.

In this segment, Bob continues his tour of the Simplex Industries manufacturing facility. The plant workers are precutting all the plywood for the project house, as well as other homes currently in production. The efficiencies created by using large industrial saws to make precision cuts save the homeowner time and money and insures a well-fit house. Dave Boniello from Simplex guides Bob through the cutting area of the plant. Unlike most site-built homes, all of the scraps of wood are sent back to the manufacturers for recycling. Continuing the tour, Boniello and Bob overlook the construction of the interior and exterior walls, which are built in sheets of varying heights (up to 10 feet) and up to 64 feet long. Modular homes are built from the inside out, meaning that instead of starting with the exterior framing, roof and sheathing, the modular home starts with interior walls and drywall. The wallboard is glued and screwed to the stud walls, which have additional steel plates to maintain rigidity during transport. Bob points out the inspection process for a modular home is different than for a site built home as local inspectors would be hard pressed to visit the Simplex plant in Pennsylvania. Simplex hires independent inspectors that are certified in multiple states and they correspond with local building inspectors to insure that all building codes are met or exceeded.

Bob Vila oversees the delivery and installation of the first section of the second floor of the home. Bob points out the complexity of this piece with its dormers and gable roof. The modern modular home can be conformed to the homeowner�s desires. The second floor in this example has an exterior egress, which will eventual permit the owner to walk out onto a small terrace over the first floor dining room. In Simplex modular homes, the ceilings of the first floor are manufactured separately from the floors of the second story. This separation of shared framing timbers reduces the noise transfer from one floor to the next. This is especially advantageous in multi-family dwellings and business structures.

In this segment, Bob Vila visits the Simplex Industries modular home plant in Scranton, Pennsylvania, where the Home Again project house is being constructed. Dave Boniello, the Vice President of Marketing for Simplex, gives Bob a plant tour during the construction of the Modular Mountain Retreat project house. Building the majority of a home in a factory and delivering it to the home site to be assembled presents unique challenges. Simplex Industries, a privately owned company that ships over 400 homes a year, utilizes a mix of traditional framing techniques and modular home construction-specific practices to ensure that the transportation of the home from factory to building site can be accomplished without structural or cosmetic damage to the house. Examples include eaves that can be folded up for transportation, extra bracing between walls and floors, metal shielding to protect rough electrical work, and drywall that is glued, not screwed, into place.

Bob Vila takes an early interior tour of the modular home. Bob is in a 15-foot-wide-by-48-foot long section. The flooring and walls are almost complete and much of the molding and cabinetry is laid out and ready to be installed. Bob points out an archway between the kitchen and breakfast nook�one of the pleasant design surprises that can be added to a custom modular home. The floors are Bellawood�s Northern Red Oak with a gunstock finish. The darker finish gives a more sophisticated and formal look to the room. The hardwood floors are installed in the modular home just as they wood be in a site built home. Mike Snyder from Mike�s Flooring, a flooring sub contractor in the Simplex plant, points out the quality of the Bellawood noting it has very few flaws and a durable finish. The flooring is left incomplete where two pieces of the modular home are to be attached. On site, quick work will be made of the few details left when the large modular sections are joined.

Bob Vila tours the modular home project in the Berkshire Hills in Western Massachusetts. Bob reviews the exterior skin products on the house. Starting with the multi-textural roof composed of environmentally friendly composite shingle shakes from Enviroshake, and with center portions constructed from carbonized steel from Englert Roofing. The siding is a Cedar Valley Shingle�s two-by-eight Western Red Cedar shingle panels and a lightweight Cultured Stone treatment from Owens Corning on the lower portion of the home and chimney wrap. Completing the skin are the Pella double-hung Architect Series six-over-one windows and a board and batten look created with Georgia Pacific�s Catawba engineered wood siding. On the back of the home, ChoiceDek from Weyerhaeuser completes the home�s environmentally friendly eye pleasing exterior.

The second section to be secured of the four main house pieces is the first floor front section�including the front door. The workman use a �come-along� tool to join the two pieces into what is called in the modular home industry a marriage point or joint. Bob heads down to the basement to view the sections of the home from below. The lally columns from the basement will support the beams of the first floor at several points along the marriage joint. The unfinished basement will soon be a large family room, exercise area and TV den. On the first floor Bob reviews the marriage wall and how the two sections will be joined with steel brackets. The pieces have been engineered so that the bulk of the on-site work consists of securing the pieces together with bolts and removing the additional framing and supports that were added for shipping. It is almost like opening a new computer crate. You open up the box remove the packing material, plug everything in and you are almost ready to start, or in the case of a modular home, move-in.

Bob begins the final an interior tour of the modular home project in the Berkshire Hills. The interior doors are Woodport MDF panel doors with M-tech hardware. M-tech specializes in antique reproduction hardware. Bob points out that many of the home�s features, like the Merillat cabinets and the staircase were installed in the factory and are complete. However many of the finishing touches, such as the spindles on the stairway banister, the appliances and the paint that would have been added on site are sitting warehouse style, in the living spaces.

Bob meets with Pat Fricchione and Dave Boniello from Simplex Industries to observe the delivery of the modular home pieces to the home site. The 15 ton pieces are craned directly from a truck bed onto the Superior Wall�s Insulated Concrete Form basement foundation. Prior to delivery Simplex Industries scouts the route from the plant to the home site to insure the fifteen plus foot wide sections can be trucked safely down the road. Simplex must also obtain permits or permission from every state they traverse; this insures they are in compliance with department of transportation regulations. On site a team of skilled workmen secure heavy-duty cables to pick-up points on each section to maintain a uniform weight distribution and prevent the twisting or bending of the home�s frame.

Bob Vila takes a quick look at the sustainable mahogany front porch and deck. The decking, secured by stainless steel fasteners, can be stained or simply sealed depending on the tastes of the homeowner.