"How-to" Build This Log Cabin for $3,000
How to Build Your Own Log Home For Less Than $15,000 by Robert L. Williams
The Williams family was inspired by a tornado. The tornado destroyed their home in North Carolina and left them with little more than a wasteland of fallen trees. They had no experience with log construction, but learned to become resourceful with what they had. They ultimately built a 4,300 square foot log home for just $15,000!
The book includes coverage of site selection, drawing plans, chain-sawing and squaring logs, tools and equipment, foundation walls, sawing framing timbers, log wall construction, log girders, building floors, roof framing and sheathing, wiring and plumbing tips, chimneys, stairways, and decks, rustic windows and doors, cabinetry and book cases, chinking, insulating, and finishing touches.
The great thing about a book like this is that it helps put you back in the real world after you've heard so many "experts" claim that a new house is going to cost you $150,000. A good house shouldn't cost a lifetime to pay for it. Robert Williams' book should be an inspiration to owner-builders everywhere. 1996. Breakout Productions, Inc. 216 pages.
http://www.hollowtop.com/cls_html/do-it-yourself/loghomebks.htm
With the amount of trees down between Katrina and Rita those log cabins could have been built for free!
Backwood home magazine had a great article about a single woman who built her own log home(vertical logs), as awesome as that is...it's probably not something anyone can do.