Day 183 - more trusses

Sat Oct 8/05

These are the cathedral trusses over the great room that were installed with the assistance of the crane on Thursday.




Although it was raining on Friday -- at times a light gentle rain, and at times very heavy -- the crew went to work and installed these trusses. I would not have wanted to be climbing up there in the rain!

Charles says it is a complicated roof -- it sure is.


This morning the weather forecast predicted rain for all of next week, but it is not looking quite as gloomy right now. In any case, it is pretty certain that we will not hit the October 14th date of having the roof on and the windows installed...

And yes, the amount of time it is taking to install the trusses is scaring us somewhat, as our current house is quite possibly sold with an end of January closing!

On the other hand, Steve Berry was able to find someone who wanted some of the rock fill that needed to dispose of, and hauled away about 15 loads or so on Friday. Fabulous!

Day 182 - trusses

(click any picture for larger view)

Oct 6/05: This is a closeup to show all the nails here - the three trusses are fasted by 5 nails every 4 inches (from each side). The joist hanger has 25 nails on each side, for a total that is, um, a lot of nails.


The crew installing some of the smaller trusses to one of the major trusses. First, the bottom piece of teh truss is toe-nailed to hold the truss, then the joist hanger is installed, and finally the top of the truss is nailed after it is installed after making sure they truss is plumb (vertically).



What a beautiful day! Another record setting day for OTtawa. The crane is holding on of the trusses for the cathedral ceiling on the great room, while the crew is fastening it to the main trusses (which weighed over 1000 pounds).




Dave clambering over the trusses like an experienced truss monkey... Given the shakiness of the trusses (since they were not braced), Dave is clearly very skilled at this.





The crane is lifting up the great room gable end. There was a little bit of a breeze so it was challenging to lift and fasten this truss.

Another record high day for Ottawa

Another record setting day for October - amazing weather for October!

Compare today's weather for Winterpeg (haha) and Ottawa - where would you rather be? No question in my mind....

The crew was making the final preparations today for the arrival of the crane (scheduled for tomorrow) to lift the trusses into place. Yesterday, the forecast for Thursday was for rain (which would not have been good) but the current forecast is now the same as today (mainly sunny) with a high of 24C, with the rain shifted out to Friday.

Day 180 - dead level

Tuesday Oct 4th (click any picture for larger view)

Day 180 - Charles went around the building with me today showing me how plumb the walls are. This was with 6 foot level, and not one of those kind where the bubble is fixed. :^)))


Trussess everywhere. These will fit across the house front to back over the master bedroom and laundry room.







Chris is trimming down the 2x12 to fit the 11" thickness of the wall. You can see the joist above BR3/Office, one of the major huge trusses (see below) will be fastened to this with a joist hanger.






Dave is preparing the beam that runs across the the front of the deck. This will be constructed of 3 2x12s that are fastened together with a hailstorm of nails.






These trusses are the reason we need the crane. The trusses were delivered as multiple parts, but these three (in the foreground) needed to be fastened together and the four (in background on right) needed to fastened together also. The truss structure on the left weighs approximately 1100 lbs. Hence the reason for the crane - currently scheduled for Thursday.

Day 178 - Trusses, trusses, and more trusses.

Sun Oct 2nd - 74 days to go...

(click any picture for larger view)

A third load of trusses was delivered on Thursday - that's these massive ones shown on the the left. The trusses enable all of the interior walls to be free standing (not load-bearing).

This is pretty amazing when you think about it. I guess it can be done because there is no floor (with the loading that presents) above.

This is what the cathedral ceiling in the solarium looks like. The peak will be about 12' off the floor. This room was quite difficult for the crew to build because there are more windows than walls in it!

These trusses are tied together with 2x4s (can't really see them in this picture). One of the major causes of roof failure in a hurricane is the failure of the truss structure generally because the trusses are often fastened together only by the plywood sheathing.

I mentioned hurricanes and hurricane clips in an earlier posting. Roofs that are blown off in a hurricane usually fail because the roof itself generates a low-pressure area (due to the Bernouilli effect - the roof acts like an airfoil which makes sense if you think about). This low-pressure zone vaccuums the shingles and plywood sheathing off the roof. Since the trusses in a mass-production houses are rarely fastened together by anything except plywood, a single failure generally causes a cascading failure. You can read more about it in this Nov/96 paper by "Hurricane Damage to Residential Structures: Risk and Mitigation" by Jon K. Ayscue, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland.

This is Cyril and Renee Rogers, with their baby boy Jakob who is almost 9 months old. Cyril and Renee came out to the new house today to see it and have a little visit.

truss progress - more photos soon

The crew has started putting the trusses up. They are working today (Sat). Photos soon.

Day 173 - Stripping the strapping

Tuesday September 27th, 2005

Sean and Patrick are busy stripping all the strapping and bracing from the ICF. Once this is completed, the WASS and all the wall bracing inside the building will come down also. The house will seem a whole lot bigger inside, once all the bracing comes down and out of there.

Meanwhile, Dave and Chris are busy putting the plates on top of the walls. After using the 2x12 for the scaffolding on the WASS, it is cut up as needed to be reused for the wall plates. The trusses will sit on top of the plates and be fastened to them with hurricane clips.

In the Small World department, Dave told me that Jennifer Dickson (mentioned in this Day 171 - Truss photos post) was a teacher of one of his classes at Algonquin.

Day 171 - Truss photos

Driveup Sun Sep 25th.

This was the sight that we saw on Friday evening (but didn't have the camera). This photo was taken today (Sunday) - an overcast and misty drizzly dull day. Hmmm... just the way England is...

This photo is taken from the back of the house, looking through the great room windows and door space, and out the front door (center of photo). This is what Ottawa artist Jennifer Dickson calls a "glass house". She is very fond of this type of house in England, which are usually found only in old artistocratic estates.



An example of some of the bracing that was required when pouring the walls of the main floor. You can see that some of the extra strapping and bracing in the window bucks have been removed (see window on left side).




A closeup of one of the two piles of trusses. These are engineered specifically for a particular building, using computer programs that compute the static and dynamic loads, and thus the required forces the trusses must carry. These trusses are made with 2x4s, which I presume is because of the size of the building. We walk our dog Tawny around some of the new construction that is going on around our current house. The trusses for most of these tract built houses seem to be made out of 2x3. There is some wane on some of the pieces but I presume that won't affect the strength of those chord segments.

Day 169 - trusses arrive

The trussess arrived Thursday afternoon. It looks like the crew spent Friday removing some of the supports and strapping.

Photos later this weekend.

Day 168 - Pouring the walls for the main floor

Tuesday, Sep 22nd - the concrete is placed for the main floors. Here are some pictures from the event. (Photos courtesy of Charles Irvine, Admirable 2000 Homes Ltd.)

Remember to click any picture for larger view.

Mr Murphy pays a visit...

Despite detailed preparation, anything can go awry, and usually does. Murphy's Law applies to construction too, of course. This collage shows how everyone keeps an eye out for Mr Murphy interference.

1a. Dave (L) and Brian (R) are directing the concrete into the wall of the great room. 1b. Brian and Charles notice that one of the joins is coming apart, so... 1c. Dave takes the concrete hose over to the corner to relieve the pressure on the joint. 1d. Meantime, Charles handed a piece of 2x4 and a drill up to Brian to reinforce the joint.

All in all, quite a minor problem.

Straightening up and cleaning up...

2a. Charles and Sean are working to straighten the back wall on BR2. Charles is describing to Sean what to do in order to get the wall straight. (You only really get one chance to get this right.) 2b. Here Charles and Sean are straightening the wall. It's tough work, and a 3rd hand is really needed, so Chris came over to help finish the job. 2c. Sean is pouring concrete into the wall section below one of the windows in the great room. 2d. After taking care of the lower wall section, Sean cleans up the spattered concrete so the floor will still be smooth. (Otherwise it could be difficult to put the finish floor down later.)

Preparing for the wall plate and trusses...

3a. Charles is measuring and inserting the bolts that will be used to secure the wall plates to the wall. The roof trusses will be secured to the wall plate, so these bolts will prevent the roof from getting blown off in high winds. 3b. Charles is inserting the bolts on the angle wall above the great room windows. Meanwhile, on the right, Brian and Dave are doing the WASS two-step. 3c. Charles and Brian are discussing if the concrete is set up enough to trowel while Dave is checking out the wall for bulges and plumbness. 3d. Charles is trowelling the concrete in preparation for inserting the anchor bolts.

The snazzy new pumper truck...

(top) This is the view of the concrete truck and the pumper - the pump arm looks like a mutant spider leg or a grasshopper leg. (bottom) This is a closeup of the pumper truck - it sure looks brand new (there wasn't any dirt or grease buildup around any of the joints on the pump arm). Either that, or else someone did a flawless job cleaning this McNamara pumper truck!

As you can see from the photos, there is a lot to do in a very short time, and you don't get a second chance at it! This is why you hire the pros...