This project embarked on a new philosophy of information and knowledge collection. This was to mine the frustrations, solutions, and experiences of building products users. As clear methodology for this type of research was not readily available, much of the early efforts in the project involved working with different survey methodologies with a small group of builders and code officials. What we learned is that occurrences of innovations were too few to collect via field surveys. However, traditional paper surveys are not good at fostering reflection and creativity which were important to the study. In the end, the methodology employed was a paper survey with heavy reliance on visual clues such as diagrams of common building systems. This allowed respondents to visualize problems and solutions and to sketch to explain their ideas. Another modification to this project was the addition of building inspectors to the survey population. This was beneficial as inspectors see several homes per day, whereas most builders build only a few homes per year.
Data collection yielded a total of 37 usable completed surveys, including 19 building inspectors and 18 builders. All data was qualitative. Data was analyzed by building component and building system.
Results provide information on:
which materials are used in each application,
the positives and negatives of materials by application,
material modifications for specific applications,
ideas for improving building systems.
Few in-practice innovations were identified. However, there were many new or modified product ideas that were desired by respondents.
Major themes included:
Finishing, cutting and fastening of finishing products
Optimization of traditional and engineered structural material sizes