ASHRAE Journal -November 2012 - 50

building sciences

I Was Younger Then
(I’m So Much Older Now)
By Joseph W. Lstiburek, Ph.D., P.Eng., Fellow ASHRAE

remember sitting around listening to stories my dad and his friends would tell when they were hanging

around in the basement playing cards. They would laugh uproariously, tease each other, get serious sometimes, and tear up when they were telling stories about the old

country and the war and friends that were no longer around. I kept telling him he should write them down, but he never did, and I never did, and then he was gone.
Not too long ago I was hanging around with some friends in a bar in Denver drinking scotch and telling stories. The laughter was loud, the teasing was good-natured, some serious things got said, and a lot of truths got stretched. It was late, and they told me I should write some of them down. I remembered Dad and said that I would, mostly to shut them up so I could go to bed in peace. Well, one of them called me a couple of days later and asked if I had written them down. He said if I didn’t he would. Well, he has a blog and he gets most things wrong, and I couldn’t risk that.† In 1978 I was 23 years old. I was a builder. I thought I was one anyway. My dad was a builder and an engineer, and he taught me stuff. I learned building from him. I, of course, was smarter than he was. I got my own engineering degree and left him and went out on my own because who would ever want to work for his father? One evening in early December of that year I ended up at a Home Builders Association meeting listening to some old guy talking about walls. I couldn’t believe the stuff he was saying.

I called him on it. He pushed his glasses down his nose and looked at me with bemusement and replied: “Sonny, when you finally learn your high school physics you can come and sit with the big boys.” Just as I was going to do I don’t know what, another guy gingerly put his hand on my shoulder and gave me a look that said come with me. Kind of in shock I went out into the hall with him. He said: “Gus is like that a lot. Let me get you a drink.” I followed him up to his room and he poured me a scotch. It was a single malt. I had never had one. He handed me a book.‡ “You should read this,” he said. “That guy that you wanted to punch out wrote it with a guy who told him a long time ago the same thing he told you. The book hasn’t come out yet. This is a draft. I have another copy. Give it back when you are done.” I figured if I was drinking with him I should at least know his name. I asked him who he was: “John Timusk,” he replied.§ I couldn’t put the book down that night. It kept referencing the Canadian Building Digests (CBDs). I read them, too. The one guy, N.B. Hutcheon was some real smart guy. He headed the Division of Building Research of the National Research Council of Canada. The guy I wanted to punch out, G.O. Handegord was also real smart and from the same place. What was a guy like Handegord doing at a Home Builders Association meeting? I couldn’t believe I almost punched him out.# They sure knew walls. Roofs, too. Windows. Airtightness. Energy. Everything. I had a mechanical engineering degree, and I thought I knew stuff, but I knew none of this. But I could understand the language. I read and learned. The buildings I was going to build and design forever changed that night. It pays to go to Home Builders Association meetings. Really. Put the insulation on the outside and make the building tight. Made sense. Problem was no one was doing it. Not where I was building, just outside of Toronto. No one doing things never stopped me before. Did I mention I was 23 and invincible? In the beginning of 1979 I started a bunch of houses based on

*Apologies to Bob Dylan and The Byrds. †You, of course, know that is not true; it’s a fabulous blog written by a guy with a girl’s name. His name also has a number after it. What is that about? ‡Hutcheon, N.B. and G.O. Handegord. Building Science for a Cold Climate. §Professor John Timusk, Department of Civil Engineering, University of Toronto. Retired now. Friend. Mentor. Doctorial advisor. Role model. Great father. His son Chris is a professor at George Brown College and takes after his dad. #I am exaggerating here. I think I got close to growling.

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November 2012

ASHRAE Journal -November 2012

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