Today the roof was started.
Well, it’s been a while since the blog has been updated. No, you haven’t missed anything, the weather was been too bad to be able to get anything done. We have been waiting to get the roof panels installed. First, we had too much rain, then freezing weather and 50mph wind gusts. The house is still standing and this week there is a break in the weather, so the roof panel installation has finally begun.
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Our structural engineer, Jim French, designed the structural elements for the house from the architect’s design concepts. We had a meeting with him on Tuesday to inspect the structural work that has been done and to go over the plans for the roof installation. The roof uplift from wind on a structure is as important as the load bearing design. A convertible house is not as fun as a car.
The front section of the roof over the garage is made up of two panel sections, while other roof sections have larger panels spanning up to 24′.
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So today the South roof was installed. Tomorrow is supposed to be a nice day and will allow us to get most or all of the clerestory window wall and North roof panels installed. Windows are in storage, waiting to be installed once the panel installation is complete.
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Below is a picture that I had posted before, but I wanted to point out the sunlight and shadow. This picture does a good job of showing how the light will enter the clerestory windows to provide light for the room and some additional heating in the winter. An overhang will extend from the roof over the windows, which will block direct light from heating the house in the summer months. It is also interesting to note that the shadow angle about now, close to the winter solstice, is roughly the same as the 6 12 pitch roof. In the picture you can see that the shadow angle and the roof slope are about the same. On the outside of the house this same shadow image will appear and we have planned to incorporate some sort of sun dial into the house siding.
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