Framing a Roof with Larry Haun

[Music] hi I'm Larry Han this is the third in a set of three tapes which accompany a book I've written about framing an entire house now on tape one we built a floor and tape two we framed the walls now here in this final tape we'll put the roof on here's a preview of what you're going to see [Music] we start by laying out for the ceiling joists then roll and nail them off next we determine our rafter length mark the rafters and cut them one by one after setting the ridge we can nail off the rafters finally we sheet the roof and show how to join to gable roofs together one of the things that most of us want is a roof over our heads well we're about ready to build a roof on this house but before we do that we want to show you what that risk will look like here we have a model of just a simple gable roof the main parts of it are this common rafter here then we have a ridge it runs the full length of the building here we have some ceiling joists these ceiling joists and the rafters run 16 inches on Center in between we've run some blocks now let's take a look at this common rafter in a little more detail we've had to make a couple of cuts on here at the top we have a ridge cut that allows this common rafter to fits right snug against that Ridge down at the bottom now we have a seat cut we cut this notch out so this common rafter could fit right down on that plate now the pitch of this roof is four and twelve well what does that mean it means that for every 12 inches that this rafter runs in on the level it rises four inches it's as simple as that so how did we know how long to cut this rafter well one way to do that is this you measure the span the span of a building is from the outside to the outside here we have five seats once we know that we can use a book of rafter tables we open it to the pitch four and twelve and then we go over to the common rafter column down to five feet and we see that the length of this rafter is two feet seven and five-eighths inches now that's the distance from the center of the ridge down this common rafter to the outside of the building of course it doesn't include this rafter tail now back up here at the ridge this common rafter doesn't run to the center of the ridge so we had to shorten the length of all these common rafters three-quarters of an inch that's half the thickness of this ridge back on these joists you'll notice how we clip this joist so wouldn't stick up above this rafter now these joists are really important they get nailed into this rafter and actually the rafter and the joist form a truss that help hold this entire building together now on this end joist you'll notice that we didn't set it on edge rather we laid it flat that way we have backing on the underneath side for drywall round on this side we cut a notch in it right here so we can slip in this common rafter on top of this flat joist we nailed in these big gable studs these gable studs close in this whole end of the building and right here now we have what we call a sway brace this brace keeps this whole rafter frame for racking back and forth here at the edge of the building we've blocked in between these rafters this type of block is held flush with the outside of the building we had to rip it down a bit so it wouldn't stick up above the surface of that rafter now down at the other end of this model we run it at a different style of blocking this blocking we've run square with the rafter that means you don't have to rip it down and when you're running in siding or stucco from below you don't have to notch your material around these rafters now this isn't a complicated roof and neither is the one that we're going to build up here on this house we're going to begin that process by letting out and nailing in these ceiling joists now I need to be really careful when I'm up here walking the plates I wear a good soul shoe and my motions are slow and deliberate laying out for these ceiling joists it's easy hook a long tape with one end of the building draw it out marking every 16 inches you also want to indicate to which side of the layout the ceiling joist will fall now our 2 by 6 choice can't span the entire width of the building so they lap over the interior walls in the middle but where there are no middle walls Joe nails four by six beams which act as bridges and carry some of the joists I want to make sure I mark this plate every 16 inches just like the other one but the joist on this side will nail to the opposite side of the layout line so I make sure to indicate the correct side with my keel I also mark layout in the middle on top of the wall plates and on top of the beam now in this house the ceiling joists don't run the entire length of the building they're interrupted at this point because there'll be a cathedral a high ceiling over the living room well our ceiling joists layout is finished it's hard to see it up there so I built this model to show you what's going on we're using 206 joists and they run in pretty much like the joists that we ran here on this first floor here these two by sixes represent our exterior walls our ceiling joists come off of those walls and they land on this interior wall then we lap right here we ran our layout from the outside of the building on both sides 16 inches on center now here on this wall our joists will fall in front of that layout on this wall it falls through the back of the layout on the center partition we have a joist on each side of that line they're going to lap in the middle and they're going to look just like that [Music] look light don't pay that well Joe and I have taken a vote and we've decided we don't like moving these ceiling joists around but if you're a carpenter you have to move the wood wet or dry and we've got to carry these ceiling joists in to position our buildings about 33 feet wide so we have 18-foot joists coming from the backside and a 16 footer from the front and here over the kitchen just requires one length since the adjoining living room has a high ceiling here on the top we're starting to nail the joists in place the first one goes down flat for drywall backing we site each board for the crown put the crown up and hold the joist an inch and a half from the edge since there'll be a block between the rafters and toenail em to layout here I'm marking and cutting pressure blocks which helps support ceiling joists where they butt up against the beans Joe is taking these blocks to the middle of our body here's how they work a ceiling joist nails in then a pressure block with 3/16 penny nails you could use joist hangers here there's a lot more about that in the book then another joist is toenail into the beam tied up against the block with 16 the pressure blocks help support the joist and space him 16 inches on center now whenever there's an interior wall parallel to the way the joists are running I nail a joist flat on top of the wall leaving an inch hang over on each side for drywall backing still in the middle of the building Jose Tony Ling ceiling joists on layout with 16 penny nail then he returns Tony ailing the other choice to the wall and ties the two joists together at the lap with two 16 penny nails that's the code here's another way to run on backing for drywall this is a 2x6 wall we nail on a pair of two befores letting them hang over on each side it's often necessary to interrupt or run a ceiling joist in order to box out a hole for an abacus or for a stairwell in this case we have an attic access hole up through a closet we ran hitter's across two interior walls for support now if your hole was larger you'd want to double the headers and the side joist and speaking of larger holes this is a big one it's over the kitchen and we're framing a special light well for a large lighting fixture that will be above the countertop below I'm nailing together beams made out of pairs of two by sixes which fit into these joist hangers these hang off double up ceiling joists the Jo has already positioned then we fill in each side of the hole with short joists at the far left I'm nailing your gives pressure blocks which are nailed to a former 12 beam to the far right the end of Jos short joist right on top of the wall plate we finish up by nailing two before backing on top of the light rail now join I have a lot of experience walking up here but for safety's sake we like to use a catwalk this is one by six left over bracing stock once this position mid span on the joist we run a layout on it to keep our joy straight then we nail it off with a penny nails now everywhere joyce crosses an interior wall we toenail on each side this really strengthens the entire structure besides that it's the code we're down here on the garage floor cutting tube a drafter ties i mark one in with a rafter panel more on this later extend the line then clip it so it won't stick up above the two by six rafter now it's just a matter of setting them up on the plates most codes require tie on four foot centers you want to be careful up here you're working on a two before wall pay attention to what you're doing this garage doesn't have any ceiling joists so the purpose of these raptor ties is to tie the exterior walls together I'm glad they don't sell this lumber for the pound joke like yay letting the billing a South be our guide and mark and cut the Raptor title link and clip it just like the other end and drive a 16 penny toenail one on each side and by the way just like all Joyce we were careful to put the crown up on these boards this piece of tube a it on the end here allows us to nail on a two before strong back across our rafter tides strong back maintain spacing and ties everything together [Music] this house is a cedar porch out front and in order to put ceiling joists above the porch Joe and I have to first put up posts and beams they are supported at Joe's in with trimmer my end is mitered Antonio to the top of the post under these long beams we had posts in the center for support this high rake wall is filled with windows and doors so we couldn't cut a brace into it we're nailing on these sheer panels to strengthen the wall before putting up our porch ceiling joists we find it easier to sheet walls after they're raised the ceiling joists which go across the porch or two before they get nailed off to a two before ledger which is held place to this chalk line a chalk line is snap flush with the top of the walls we nail off the ledger with 16 s into each side now the span on this porch isn't very great so two before joists are adequate we pre-cut these joists to length and you can see that again we use a pressure block between these joists the porch takes a little jog here so these joists are a little shorter [Music] time to cut some rafters for this gable roof we'll start out here in the garage the first step is to measure its width or span then I look up the correct length in my rafter book these garage rafters are 16 inches on center so for this garage we need 32 boards racked up on the horses okay we want to make sure all our crowns are up here's one this down so we're gonna turn it over take a look again everything looks pretty good now this one here Joe the next thing we do is to flesh up the ridge in by holding a tuba for tight against the end and moving each board up against it with our claws we've got all our rafters racked up here we're ready to cut them neither Ridge got here and a seat cut now to do this we had to make this template let me show you how that's done you can use this framing square the pitch of this roof is four and twelve so we set it over here on four and twelve over here and then you can make your Ridge cut mark right here or you can use this small square it has a pivot point right here and this is your common rafter line move it till this four four four and twelve is flush with this edge of the board and then you make your reach cut mark right here now we're going to move down about a foot and make this seat cut set it on four and twelve just like before and make that mark now we're going to leave about four and a half inches height the buff plate take your square and just square off of that plumb mark for the level cut of the seat cut this is going to cut out just like this one for our seat cut with our tape hooked on the ridge end we mark the length of our common rafters taken from the rafter book to the stock on both sides the line we snip is where we'll make our seat cut back at the other end we're using our rafter pattern to mark all our Ridge cuts then we just work through the stack doesn't take long to make the cuts [Applause] now with the same rafter pattern I can watch the seat cats I line the mark on the pattern with a line on the stock and Mark the birds mouth with the stock on his side and a couple of cuts and this rafter is ready the tails are cut once the roof is framed we've mark can cut these rafters using basic tools the template and the saw but there are other ways to do it [Music] carpenters now have available a wide variety of tools that we can use to cut rafters a lot of these tools are much more efficient than the ones we used to use instead of having to cut one rafter at a time we can rack them all together like this and make one cut all at once now I put together here a few sample rafters so I can show you how some of these tools work this first tool is half circular saw half chainsaw set at eighteen and a half degrees you can make the ridge cut in one pass it's a great tool but be careful with it this is not a one-handed saw and this is a skill saw with a dado head on it it's built for one purpose to make seat cuts in one pass don't use it for anything else the newer models of this saw come with a better guard here's another way to make seat cuts in a rack a rafters with a regular saw set to eighteen and a half degrees I make the heel cut then cutting from the other side and using a saw with a swing table I cut the level part of the birds now here's another way to support a whole rack of rafters just two by six cleats which are space to hold up a tuba 12 this stack will be for the main part of the house now in this stack we need to crown all the rafters down since we're gang cutting them here I'm placing them up to a straight edge but they don't have to be perfect with this method because we snap a line back from the end for the ridge cuts boy let's get the length of our common rafters three half-inch that's the span so here in the common rafter column we got 17 feet point 3/4 and then a half inch is 1/4 inch 17 5 we'll take off 3/4 of an inch 17 4 and 1/4 this mark is to the edge of the building where our seat cut will be but first we need to make our Ridge cut the saw is set to 18 and 1/2 degrees for our 4 and 12 pitch and cut the whole stack will cut the seat cut with a dado saw like we showed you a moment ago you don't need production tools to cut a roof but it sure does speed up the operation Joe and I are scouting the rafters around the building Ridge in DUP remember the model roof we had blocking between the rafters that's what I'm cutting here and a chop saw helps speed up this job here I'm cutting nuts is every 32 inches on these rake rafters they go on the very end of a gable roof to before.look house pass through these notches and support the overhanging barge rafters more on this later the holes are simple to make first kerf the outside edges then plunge cut [Music] before Joel meets me up on top he first leans up the street to before here on the gable end we nail it on edge against the end near the center of the building we'll use this stick to help plumb up the rafter frame the next thing is to haul up a couple of pieces of long straight tube a rich stock notice that we nail down a wide plywood walkway now we're hauling up the rafters so we don't bury the ridge we only pull each rafter partway now it's important to watch your step make sure you have solid footing now the roof can start taking shape this is the rake rafter with the lookout notches cut in Johto nails one in place with the edge then I bring up the end of the second rake rafter enjoy nails it off now we come down to the end of our first piece of ridge and we set another pair of common rafters Joe nails his into a ceiling joist and the same on the other side then we slip the ridge between the pairs up we go raise the ridge beam high now you'll notice that this rafter nail is only half way on the ridge that leaves room for the next piece of ridge we want to make real sure that this rigid level before we nail him the rest of our rafters here we got sixty two and a quarter we can make sure it's level by just hooking our tape on that joist the bottom of the joist and measuring it up under this ridge here we got sixty two and three-quarters now that means this ridge on this end is a half-inch high so we got drop it a little bit we're gonna do that by coming down here to the low end we'll just mark it too before right there underneath that Ridge to make a cut [Applause] we'll just tack this one in here temporarily now we go down to the other end and drop that one here's another leg cut the same length as that one behind us there's the half inch gap we drop this Ridge it'll be level cut her loose Joe it only takes a slight adjustment to bring the ridge down to level and then we can nail off this rafter you'll notice it has no tail that's because this is where the main roof joins the garage roof we call a rafter without a tail a mule then a nail off the ridge post these will also keep the ridge from sagging so I like to put one every 10 feet or so well the rinse is now level so we want to make it plumb to do that we nail in a permanent sway brace down to make this rich plum all we have to do is move the rafter over till it barely touches this long straight edge just like that go ahead and nailer Joe now you can see we place this sway brace so it doesn't fall on a rafter layout good here we go working efficiently means we said all of our Ridge before going back and nailing off the remaining Raptors well all our Ridge is set the sun's out and we're nailing off the common rafters Joe picks up each rafter to make it easier for me to nail here at the ridge holding the rafter flush with the top of the ridge I Drive in 216 about every 10 feet Joe drops down and nails off a rafter at the plate line to help hold the ridge straight later we'll come back and finish blocking and nailing when nailing the opposing rafters no need to toenail angle the 16 through the ridge into the rafter we're nailing off the rafters at the plate now and here's how it goes first one of the blocks with the Belleville on top is position it's nailed off with 2:16 then a toe nail into the plate and three 16s into the joist where they lab then two nails to hold the back end of the block here it is again the block is placed snug up the rafter toenail into the plate nail off the block and nail the lab and turn around then and finish off the block that's the code and that's the way it goes all the way down well the garage rafters get the same treatment I begin by building up a bigger catwalk in the middle so we can work safely then the rafters are handed up these rafters are 16 inches on center but many plans call for rafters to be 24 inches on center now just like any other roof we set the ridge between two pairs of Raffles measure for level and adjust if necessary nailing mid-span rafters and fill in between finally block a nail along the plate [Music] we're ready now to close in this end with our gable stats what we do is we measure over seven inches right here from the center of this Ridge and make a mark that'll leave 14 inches right here between these two gable studs so we can put in an invent then we measure the length of our first gable stud which is forty three and a half inches that's all we need to know we're ready to cut our gable stuff now and it's a real good time to use up some of this scrap lumber we're working on a four and twelve pitch just like this so each gable stud that runs down this pitch is going to be five and three-eighths inches shorter than the previous one and we call that the common difference let me show you what that means gable studs cut in pairs our first set is forty three and a half inches next set the common difference of these gable says is five and three-eighths of an inch so we mark that so how did I find the common difference well this is explained in detail in the book now we said I saw at eighteen and a half degrees that's the degree of a foreign tall pitch roof these cables Hazzard nails 16 inches on center and when you're nailing off the top into the rafter be careful not to push it up every gable end gets closed in with gable studs here I'm finishing up the north end of the house [Music] we're back here on this model we want to show you a few details you remember we cut notches in our end rafter well this is a reason that we did that we nailed in these two befores they're called lookouts they come from this first inboard rafter through this notch in the Hangout over the outside edge then we cut them to length so we can nail on this barge rafter right through those lookouts the barred rafter on this side it'll nail into these lookouts just like that I've cited down the rake rafter made sure it was straight and now I nail the lookouts with 216 through the top into the reycraft and 216 through the end of the inboard rafter [Music] now before we seat this roof there's a few things we have to do these tuba six rafters here they're over spanned they're just not heavy enough to carry the weight of the roof so what we're going to do we come underneath here and we're gonna put a brace this brace is called a purlin it goes right up underneath these rafters the nails in place then we're going to brace it off this wall down here the first thing I do is toenail through the rafters into the top of the purlins I know where to nail because we mark the layout on the purlins this will keep these rafters nice and straight one piece of purlins isn't long enough so we add another piece lapping two or three rafter bays and nail them together at the gable end Joe nails the purl into a gable stud and further supports it with a two by underneath then we supported with a nice two by posts at least every eight feet this spacing depends on the amount of weight the roof will support for more information now check your local code finally Joe toenails the bottom of the post to a load-bearing wall and we do the same on the other side [Music] this is a good time to find lots of Hell this is a glulam beam which supports the cathedral ceiling over the living room the blue lamb is an engineered beam made up of two by sixes laminated and glued together under pressure then we lift one end onto a six by six post and into its pocket the other end is supported by a long four by six post which sits over a foundation here now you can see that the top of this beam says right underneath the existing ridge board the rafters from each side will rest on top back at the other end Joel nails a two by six to either side of the post and beam to lock them in place later he'll do the same with the other post now we're setting rafters over the kitchen area and you can see the rafters run long here at the top no Ridge cut but at the bottom end there's a regular seat cut and it nails in like any common rafter now the reason he's run long up here is because they'll lap and tie with the rafters from the other side and be cut later now we're cutting the rafters to go over the main part of the living room these have to be too bad because they clear span without any sport in the middle here I'm ripping the tails through the width of a two by six so they match the rafter tails on the rest of the building one by one I pushed the rafters up to Joe we cut a two inch deep seat cut here on top so these two ways were playing in with the tuba six down here they block a nail like a regular rafter the rafters have all been nailed if they're lorian's only so I can go ahead and cut these top ends off without hitting a nail now the idea here is not to make perfect cuts we just want to saw these ends down below the level of the sheeting up on top the glulam Joe's blocking and nailing everything together two 16s tie the rafters where they laughed and then toenails into the blocks and beam [Music] getting right friendo we're working now on positioning a pony wall for the high wall under the cathedral ceiling in the living room it serves as a purlin for the tuba six rafters and it provides backing for drywall [Music] [Applause] [Music] we're done finally with a lot of that heavy work up on the roof so we're ready now to run out our barge rafter and here on the ends of these rafters we've got patient well these are pieces of trim people are gonna look at those for a long time so we want to do a real good job at that that's why we waited until now to mark and cut these rafter tails once these rafter tails are cut and our fascia is nailed on it's going to be perfectly straight on this model we want to give it a 14 inch overhang that's why we made a mark at 12 and a half inches because our fascia is an inch and a half wide now that we've got it marked we're using this piece of rafter template it has a core 12 plumb cut on it and we're marking our rafters once they're all marked we'll just come back and cut you will notice we cut a mitre at the end of the bar after this makes for a neat joined with the fascia and we nail it together with galvanized finish nails you'll notice how right here we held our fascia down almost a half inch below this rafter tail that way the fascia planes in with the pitch of the roof so when we put on our seating you can see how everything comes together real nicely after snapping along and cutting the look house to link Joe and I hang the barge rafters there two bays cedar the same size as our fascia make sure you're well braced before leaning out over the edge we nail off with 16 pinning galvanized to at the ridge and to into every lookout yeah beings run wild and will be cut later NIC's the fascia fascia hides the ends of the rafters and gives a trim look to the house here's a mitered corner and again we're using hot dip galvanized 16 eventually we'll nail off our fascia with two nails into each rafter you can see here how we hold it down a half inch just like on the model on a long run of fascia joints our mitered and nail in the rafter tail even if the wood shrinks the joints still look good that's not long now we have cheating on this roof and all this rain we've been having will people on the outside not on the inside now we're out in the garage but all our eaves from below they're open so instead of running the sheathing material clear down to this outside edge we like to cover these eaves with a starter board here takes three pieces that way when people look from down below they'll see a nice-looking piece of wood once the starter board is on then we can sheet the rest of the building with the sheathing material you can cheat your overhang with plywood but for a more trim look use these long links of starter board and if you need to buck them do it over a rafter on the gable ends we run the boards in the other direction across the lookouts and cut them in place finally we can shoot the roof the first thing we do is snap a control line at 48 and 1/4 inches above the starter board these are sheets 1/2 inch OSB or ela strand board and engineered wood plywood is also commonly used we nail them down with a penny sinkers at the end of the building we often have to make a cut just slap the panel you're cutting over its neighbor snap a line and make the cut with the saw set to the right then we also snap a control line for the first course on the main roof we work each panel to the line lapping the ends of the middle of the rafter if it's off a bit nudge the rafter over and nail it in place and as we keep sheeting we make sure to stay with the joist by starting every other row with a half sheet [Music] we've got enough of our roof sheathing down now so we can tie these two roofs together it's actually a very simple process the first step is to extend this Ridge here the garage Ridge over to the main roof when that Ridge touches then we can mark it for length right here then we have to get a level cut on it that's simple mark it like that that gives you the level cut once that Ridge is cut it's going to look like that and then we'll have a valley one that runs down each side the first thing we do is nail our Ridge at both ends and then snap a line where the blind valley will be we're using scrap 1x6 for our Valley support we eyeball an angle cut at one end position it and cut an angle at the top in now when we nail it down you'll notice that we hold it back from the chalk line about 3/4 of an inch that way the sheathing on top of the jack rafters will plane in with the rest of the roof you get the bottom of the jack rafters good bearing we double up the 1 by 6 supports here's our rafter pattern for these jack rafters this our level cut and here's our plumb cut it's going to fit just like that we measure the length of our first rafter here 54 inches we give ourselves a mark right there we'll put a little cut on that just like that ridge cutter a plumb cut right up here at the top okay this gets cut now we have to set this at eighteen and a half degrees that's the pitch of the roof one by one we measure mark cut and they limit place a couple of sixteen through the ridge into each one and two sixteen penny toenails ends with the support this is one fairly easy way to tie the two gable roofs together we're ready now to cut this sheeting to fit it into this valley now one way to do that is just move it over till that lower in touches the main roof then here at the top you can measure straight across until your tape touches the roof we got 44 inches we'll transfer that measurement down here to the lower edge of the board 44 inches and we'll snap a chalk line once we cut that it's going to fit right into the valley and we use this cut off end for a pattern to mark the rest of our boards now it's just a matter of cutting and filling in the rest of the pieces you know it's a great feeling when the roof is finally sheeted our basic framing is finished and it's not long now we'll have Schindler's here Joe and I we've been carpenters for a long time but there was a time when when we didn't know how to build the entire project like this framing a whole house in a way it is pretty complicated but it's true that complicated projects are made up of simple steps and what we learned how to do you can learn how to do [Music] you [Music]

Channel: finehomebuilding

Views: 1,687,361

Rating: 4.8815894 out of 5

Keywords: Framing, Larry Haun, Construction, Building, How to, Roofing, Carpenter

Id: 0Y6n6kf7vdY

Length: 53min 42sec (3222 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 27 2019