Good question...
I didn't mention it on the web site yet, but the backside of the house (where that cantilevered room is) will be infilled. My posts and beams back there are 8x8 white oak. My braces are 6x8 white oak. (no sapwood) I will show everything on the outside, and probably everything but the braces on the inside. I know, I know, all of the timberframe books and companies recommend against this, but I wanted the look of one of those old English houses that juts out over the street. (no there's no street in my back yard!) Also, I just could not figure out any way to make the pendants and cantilever look right with 4" to 6" of SIP wrapped around it here and there. I'm hoping that the generous roof overhangs (2+ feet), and the cantilevered room itself should help shelter the infilled walls and timbers.
I figure if they can make a log house air tight (OK, so a lot of them aren't!), then I can wrestle with these shrinking timbers and get the infill air tight for that small part of my house. (those rooms with infill will contain a mud room, a pantry, a utility room, and a bath room, so drafts will not be the end of the world if they are unavoidable or if I get lax with the caulking in my older age.) I got some samples of the chinking they use for log homes - supposedly it will stretch 4x it's original size _and_ stick to wood. I'll give it a try. I also bought some marine caulk. I'll probably stick frame the infill, and then stucco the outside to get that English black-and-white house look. I'm not brave enough to go all the way and use traditional lath/wattle/daub/stone infill.
FWIW, we're sawing and notching timbers today. I started raising my house with about 405 of the 465(?) timbers done - notching the missing ones as we went. But now we're out of raw timbers so its back to the saw mill for a little while.
-Thomas
