Modular Home Construction Basics

Project: Modular Mountain Retreat, Episode 2, Part 2



The crew from Superior Walls is preparing for the pre-cast foundation walls, which will provide the base for the modular home.

To learn about the manufacturing process for the pre-cast panels, Bob travels back to the Simplex plant in Scranton PA, where he sees how each module is framed and prepped for delivery.

Back in the Berkshires, once the panels have been lowered into place by crane, Mel Zimmerman from Superior Walls explains the foundation assembly process.
Part 1: Pre-cast Concrete Foundation Installation
Part 2: Modular Home Construction Basics
Bob visits the Simplex Industries modular home plant in Scranton, PA. Dave Boniello, the Vice President of Marketing for Simplex, gives Bob a full tour of the plant.

Building the majority of a home in a factory, then delivering it to the site for assembly, presents unique challenges. Simplex Industries, a privately owned company that ships over 400 homes a year, utilizes a mix of traditional framing techniques and leading-edge modular home construction.

Specific practices are in place to ensure that the transportation is accomplished without structural or cosmetic damage to the house. In service of protecting the home in transit, the eaves are able to fold up, metal shielding can go in to protect rough electrical work, and drywall that's glued, not screwed, is used.
Part 3: Advantages of a Pre-cast Foundation System
Beautifully sited on wooded acreage with breathtaking views of some of the most beautiful countryside in New England, this Arts and Crafts style bungalow certainly doesn't look factory-built. You'd never know it was a modular home unless Bob took you to the Pennsylvania factory where it was built, almost from start to finish.

The house goes down the assembly line from framing, through wiring and plumbing, all the way to the installation of flooring and priming for paint.

The house is trucked to its pre-fabricated foundations on the lot, and start all the finishing touches that will prove that a modular house doesn't have to be a cookie-cutter affair.

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