Timber frame Trusses: Elegant structural roof components!

Feb 212012

When meeting with clients about prospective timber frame projects, we often tour some of our completed projects. And I try to take clients to see projects that bear a resemblance to what they are dreaming of building for themselves and show them what is possible with timbers. Nowhere are there more design options than in a roof system: what we can do with roofs is darn exciting!

It is a rare day in which we build a house that has a real attic, where the roof structure is hidden out of view with all those old boxes of stuff. With a timber frame and the complete exterior enclosure and insulation system of Structural Insulated Panels, “under the roof” is often the most architecturally exciting place in the house. In short, we like to flaunt our roofs. And we especially love building trusses.

Trusses are structural configurations of timbers that allow for large spans without the need of intermittent posts. As such, they allow for open floor plans and dramatic vaulted ceilings. Many of the trusses we have built over the years originated in the Middle Ages, and were used for great halls, churches, and bridges.

Here are some examples:
Raised cord king post trusses: This intimate living room with a fireplace at the end utilizes red oak timbers to do the real work of holding up the roof. The horizontal cross member that connects the two principle rafters of each truss is called the cord; the vertical center post of each truss is the king post, and the branch like curved elements going up to the principle rafters on the right and left are called struts. The raised cord gives the room a taller and more curved ceiling feel, but allowed us to keep the height of the side walls and ridge lower.

King posted trusses; one with a “live-edged” cord: For this “vehicle barn” that we built for our own family use, we wanted a garage-sized space with no internal supports. We wanted to create a building that was attractive and demonstrated our timber framing skill. We also wanted to use some of our left over timbers from our northeastern forests or timbers harvested from our land. As such, we have pine, hemlock, ash, red oak and white oak timber in this structure. The front king post truss has a curved red oak beam (often called a “Tyco Beam” in Japanese timber framing) that we sawed flat on 2 sides, which allows us to appreciate the interior grain of the log—something that does not happen when building with logs. The king post is also “live-edged”, and the “live-edged” struts are “book mated” by sawing from the same log and opening the faces to each other. The middle roof element is also a king post truss, but with a straight cord that is positioned at the eave height. Note that the kids’ barn swing that is attached to the ridge timber, is being enjoyed by my wife, Nan.

Hammer Beam Trusses: The trusses originated in the “Great Halls” of Medieval Europe. The utilize rigid triangular configurations of timbers that transfer the roof loads out to the walls. Dramatic and eye catching, they often crown modern great room spaces. These trusses are fabricated from old growth and very fine and dense Douglas Fir timbers salvaged from forest fire burned areas in Oregon. To see more photos of this beautiful home, check out the Ray Brook House in our Gallery section.

Burr Arch Trusses: This style of truss was designed for covered bridges that require large and strong spans. In such bridges there would be two trusses, flanking both sides of the road way, and the roof rafters would sit perpendicularly on top of the upper horizontal cords. The Burr Truss used an arching timber element to help transfer loads out to the end support walls or abutments. These trusses were designed for the roof system of a great room, and made of laminated red oak. We were able to fully fabricate and assemble each of the four trusses in our shop, load them on a truck, and transport them to the site and install them with a mobile crane.

Coastal Massachusetts timber frame studio progress

Oct 282011

Massachusetts Timber Frame StudioThese photos are of the work in progress on the Timber Frame Studio in Massachusetts. The detailing of the exterior is exquisite, utilizing red cedar shingles, and detailed with 2 shingle flare-outs. The main gable end is fenestrated beautifully with an upper curved top set of 3 windows and curved muntins. Below, the 3 window set is trimmed below with vertical cedar paneling. Elegant Greek Revival fascias and soffits trim on the roof, which will be done with standing metal roofing.

MA Timber Frame Studio InteriorThe interior photo shows the Structural Insulated Panels on the walls prior to any interior wall finish. Note that the Sips are put on the exterior of the Timber Frame, so that the insulation entirely wraps the timber structure and maximizes insulation efficiency. On the ceiling, white washed pine tongue and groove boards were applied over the purlins prior to putting the roof SIPS. The loft area is being planked with structure tongue and groove boarding. A concrete slab win radiant tubing in it will be poured for the floor.

With its complete SIPS enclosure system, high energy efficient windows, and a radiant in floor heating slab, the Studio will be toasty and easy to heat.

Timber Frame Barn is ready for Harvest Time in the Adriondacks

Aug 302011

Adirondack Timber Frame Barn, Canton NYI just received some photos and an update from the folks for whom we built the Barn Timber Frame in Canton, NY, back in May. The roof is now on, and the walls mostly sided. Doors are in, and the windows were picked up last week from a local Amish millworks shop.

Perhaps more importantly, the goats and chickens have already taken up residence. And I am informed that while picking up the windows, some baby bunnies came home to the barn as well….

Like the traditional timber frame barns of the Northeast, this one was sided with locally milled, rough-sawn pine planking, sheathed vertically, i.e. the way the lumber grew in the tree. Boards are gapped about an inch, and then vertical batten strips will be nailed over the gaps to make the barn more weather tight. It will weather to a nice dark grey without any stain or paint. Continue reading »

Timber Frame Studio, Coastal Massachusetts

Jul 302011

This project is a timber frame for the studio of a metal sculptor, who does fabulous and intricate kinetic sculptor. We raised it in coastal Massachusetts in June.

It utilizes curved laminated timbers (glulams) that transition from the posts to the principle rafters, and in turn are held together with custom steel bands that are tightened with oak wedges. It was a unique, challenging and enjoyable project for us, with a great collaborative effort between us, the general contractor and the engineers.

Timber Frames on the TruckThe timber frame just barely fit on the truck, but boy were we glad we pre-assembled the post to rafter with curve with all its hardware components here at our full shop. It took close to 3 days to assemble the 12 sections…We had the engineers model a truck loading plan of the assemblies and other timbers and it just fit on the 48’ long semi.

Raising Timber FrameThe raising was honestly easier than anticipated. We raised with staging, as per photo, and accessed all purlins up to and including the 4th purlin up from the bottom. We then put 16’ aluminum picks across from 4th purlin to 4th purlin, and thus accessed the 5th purlins, ridges, and cupola jack rafters. A hard frame to climb on, even with full harness rigging and static lines, etc…. Not comfortable.

Finished Timber FrameInside timber frame finish view….the client loves it! He is a great guy….

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Cathedrals of Rural America: A new Timber Frame Barn goes up in the Adirondacks

Jun 062011

Timber Frame Barn in the AdriondacksThis past week we erected a new Timber Frame Barn for a family near Canton, NY. Our clients have one of the best organized and most extensive gardens I have ever seen. They also presently raise chickens for eggs and meat, turkeys, and goats. They produce most of their own food, and freeze and can for the winter months. Their bucolic setting and home is inspiration to all of us!

Not surprising that a while back they decided they needed a good-sized barn. When we first met, I questioned them about they wanted to use of the barn for, and discovered that their needs are diverse. They want a home for livestock: chickens, goats, turkeys, and possibly cows and sheep. They want dry storage for hay and grain. They want cover for a tractor and other farm machinery and possibly a roof over their car. And there is a desire to have a horse or two, at least by the female members of the family. So, of course they want the barn to adaptable.

Because their needs and the character of their small farm more closely resemble the traditional family farms of our ancestors, it is also not surprising that a very traditional Timber Frame barn is the right structure for their homestead.

Adirondack timber frame barn and house, Canton NYThis Timber Frame is a 4 bent and queen posted English style barn frame, and at 30’ x 42’, the floor plan is divided by the post placements into 12 – 10’ x 14’ quadrants. A large pair of sliding doors will allow access to the center bay from the eave side of the barn (there are 3 bays between the 4 Timber Frame bents), so machinery and animals can be brought in, and a traditional style transom window will sit above the sliding barn doors. The adjacent bays of the Timber Frame can be divided into livestock stalls or other functional spaces, and partition walls can be built and evolve as necessary. For easy human access, a hinged 3’0” wide door will face the house, which is about 80’ away. This barn will have a second floor for hay and general storage, and a walk up stair from the ground level. At both gable ends there will be second floor doors, so bailed hay can be elevatored up. The two young daughters also expect to get a hay mow swing! This barn will be a very adaptable structure, just as the vintage Timber Frame barns of rural America were and often still are.

As you travel through the rural northeast and mid west, you will see an abundance of old Timber Frame barns that are in disrepair or worse. Fact is, many of these structures have suffered from the demise of small family farming and from the shifting face of American agriculture. Clearly traditional barns don’t fit the needs of large agribusinesses with huge tractors and equipment and large-scale dairy operations, so one sees new style “barns” and agricultural pole barn type structures. And, if not of use as farms have shut down or ceased to be productive enterprises, traditional barns are often ignored and then fall into dis-repair. I know of at least 3 barns in our area of the Adirondacks that came down this winter due to dis-repair, bad roofs, and heavy snowfall. If you don’t have a need for it, you generally don’t maintain it—and then you lose it.

It is always a pleasure for us to build Timber Frames that are going to be working agricultural barns. With proper care– especially a well-maintained roof–this barn should be functional for a few hundred years. When we raise a Timber Frame like this one, we feel like we are doing our small part to replace the vanishing “Cathedrals of rural America.”

Seasonal Structures in the Adirondacks: Timber Frame Barns, Boathouses and Cabins

May 062011

Timber Framed boathouse under constructionOver the years we have had an increase in demand for seasonal and non-house timber frame buildings and structures. So, in our updated website, we feature more of our boathouses, gazebos, studios, pergolas, car ports, cabins, and of course, barns.  The craft of timber framing nicely dovetails with a wide variety of structures. And we certainly enjoy building unique and different structures….

There is a long tradition of magnificent and architecturally significant boathouses on the lakes of the Adirondacks. Most of the traditional Great Camps were built on lakes, and boats were important for transport and access as well as recreation. We have had the privileged of building a number of timber-framed boathouses in the last 15 years, and most have been built on sites that are inaccessible by road. Which, aside from presenting some construction challenges, means that boats are vital to the clients gaining access to their properties, and our boathouses serve a very real function of sheltering these boats. Some of these boathouses are elaborate Adirondack structures with beautiful enclosed spaces, while others are and graceful “car ports” for boats. In the winter when the lakes ice over, the boats are lifted and hung out of the water within the protection of the timber frame boathouses.

Traditionally barns in the North East were timber framed. One architectural historian has referred to them as the “Cathedrals of rural America.” And although the last decades have seen a dramatic loss of many of these historic structures, we are proud that the timber framed barns that we have built in NY and VT are enhancing the traditional agriculture landscape.

Seasonal kitchen, residence, teaching space, greenhouse, and root cellar, for agricultural instituteAs long time instructors of timber framing classes at the Yestermorrow Design Build School in VT, our classes have built many timber frames for garden sheds, picnic table and sand box shelters, wood sheds, of course cabins, and even sign posts. One of the cabin timber frames cut by our class is now the home office for a local writer—just far enough from his house to allow him uninterrupted attention.

We also recently built a timber and log cabin high on the side of a mountain, which is only accessible by vehicle seasonally. In the winter, the owners ski or snow shoe into their cozy retreat, which features a photovoltaic electric system and a composting toilet.

On a different note, we are negotiating building a timber frame band shell for a local Adirondack town. As you can see, size, shape, form and function can be infinite in the world of timber framing.

Boosting Energy Efficiency: Time for Net Zero Timber Frame Homes in the Adirondacks?

Mar 152011

Photovoltaic Net Metered Electrical System at Amstutz Woodworking, Upper Jay, NYBy design, timber frame homes are already much more energy efficient than traditional stick-built homes. But as an energy conscious timber frame builder, I have always entertained the dream of building a Net Zero timber frame home. Net Zero buildings produce as much or more energy than they require to operate. Last week I attended a conference to learn more about making the dream home a reality: the Northeast Sustainable Energy Association Conference in Boston.

The conference features professionals in sustainability and whole system thinking and included daily sessions and presentations and an impressive trade show of building materials, mechanicals, etc. The sessions were organized around 9 thematic tracks such as Renewable Energy Technologies, Germany and Upper Austria, Regional Models for Sustainability (because these folks are way ahead of us), and the one I focused on: Residential Buildings Retrofit and New.

Integral to the presentations in the residential track was Net Zero buildings. Nationally, our residential buildings consume a very large portion of our energy usage, and as energy costs continue to rise and the availability of oil and gas, which are after all limited resources decreases, we need to couple new technologies with sound building practices to build more efficient structures. I saw presentations on dozens of houses that have been built in the last years in the Northeast that meet this specification. Our timber frame homes have always been better insulated than standard stick framed homes, but this is new territory.

Achieving net zero in a home requires excellent design and engineering modeling and an interesting mix of building techniques and mechanical systems. Firstly, size matters {like to modest-sized homes post}, so reducing the size of homes to what is really needed is the first order of business. Secondly, getting a handle on the energy consumption habits of the homeowners and reducing that load is very important. Next, and probably to my eye, most important, is the insulation of the envelope. It is not uncommon for designers and builders to craft homes with R 50 in the walls and R 80-100 in the roofs. These R values (i.e. measure of resistance to heat loss in a wall or roof or window) may seem excessive compared to our New York State energy code of R 26 in walls and R 40 in the roof, but pushing the envelope to this degree of insulation dramatically reduces the heating system needs. Integral to this envelope is also the absolute reduction of air infiltration and thermal bridging (which refers to structural components of the house, such as wood framing members bridging through the insulated envelope from the inside warm wall to the outside cold wall, and as such transferring heat from inside to outside). In short, with proper design and construction, superb envelopes can be built, and heating needs become very, very low indeed.

Most of the houses presented had their own net-metered solar photovoltaic system for producing electricity. In the ìnet meteredî system, a photovoltaic array is designed to produce of the kilowatt hour needs of the house for an annual cycle. Rather than use storage batteries, electricity produced in excess of the house’s need in the more solar summer months is banked in the electrical grid and considered as a producer credit to be used in the darker winter months. We have had such a system since 2004.

With heating needs substantially reduced, one presenter noted that his house could be heated with 2 hair dryers and an 80 watt bulb–which was hardly fictitious. Some homes also utilized ground source heat pumps, i.e. systems in which the heat from water in a well or in underground tubes is harvested and warmed further through a reverse refrigeration process (i.e., a heat pump) to heat the home. And integral to such tight homes is the use of heating recovery ventilators (HRVs) that ventilate these homes but avoid heat loss in the air exchange.

The resulting homes were well crafted and attractive structures that elevated the concept of energy efficiency to amazing heights.

What was exciting for me as a timber framer was to learn how we could quite easily boost the R value of our envelopes and to establish contacts with design and engineering professions who could make the net zero Timber Frame home a reality. Now, we just need to find some interested clients..

Do we really need such big houses? Timber frame homes demonstrate the beauty of the small house

Jan 212011

Small Timber Frame Home under constructionConsider this: The average American house size grew from 1800 square feet in 1989 to about 2600 square feet in 2008. That is an in increase of 44%. And amazingly, this happened during a time in history of dramatically increasing material and energy costs, and increasing concern and understanding about global energy issues.

In her well-articulated book, “The Not So Big House”, Sarah Susanka discusses the trends that have grown our houses so large, and makes a very compelling case for smaller homes. At the heart of her story is the notion that one can design a house that has no wasted space (including getting rid of rooms that are generally unused), and therefore can be smaller. She makes a point of prioritizing quality over quantity – a fine recipe for very unique and personal homes. Continue reading »

Using What Knots: a Favorite for Adirondack Local Vore Timber Framer

Dec 142010

Adriondack Timber Frame Sawyer Ernie Bedard sawing less than straight cherry to make book matched curved brace stockI first met Ernie Bedard of What Knots? Lumber Company in about 1997 when a retired forester named Mitch who lives 6 miles up the road, asked us to build a turn key timber frame addition for his late 1800′s home. Mitch wanted to harvest his own spruce off one of his wood lots and have it sawn into timber, and he knew a chap who had a portable band saw mill who could do it. I confess I was skeptical about this, for I was concerned about the sawyer’s attention to accuracy and how well the mill was tuned up, and I had seen good sawing on such machines, but also a lot of bad sawing. That was before I met Ernie… Continue reading »

Invoking the "Local-vore" ethic in the Adirdondacks

Nov 082010

In the building industry the local movement refers to more than just good produce. In the timber framing business here in the Adirondacks, it also refers to my favorite building material: wood. I have a great love and reverence for wood and my craft allows me to work with wood in a relatively natural state.

One of the great joys of timber framing is working with real (and frequently large) pieces of wood, rather than many of the building materials in the construction industry that bear little resemblance to trees. Like any business, procuring materials for timber framing is a challenging mix of cost, availability, and quality. And of course, finding good suppliers who say what they are going to do, and then do what they say. Continue reading »

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