501 NE 4th Street - Dry at last - The Roof !

28 foot height limit 

    There is a mandatory height limit set within the town of Coupeville of 28 feet . This is to preserve the character of the town and to ensure conflicts over new buildings restricting the view from old buildings is kept to a minimum . I was aware of this from the earliest stages of the planning . From my earlier experience in England I was aware that the extra cost of having a full sized basement was not that great over the cost o simply foundations and a crawl space . I actually purchased the particular plot with this in mind . The 28 feet is measured by determining the highest point and the lowest points on the original surface within 5 feet of the finished building . Then the 28 feet is measured from their average - thus with a steep slope such as I had it is possible to have a full sized basement with good windows and functional drainage to the front as the height is balanced by the ground level at the back being much higher . In my case the attached garage was two steps lower than the ground floor at the join with the main building and to its rear was dug in by about 2 feet .

Thus I was about 4 inches under the 28 feet rule with  8 foot ceilings  and a normal pitched roof . The people who had the house behind and to the right were not too pleased as they had to reduce their planned ceiling height and build a barrel roof to keep theirs low as their plot was not steep enough and now I had achieved what they had not and restricted their view too . I do say I feel a little smug over this and have given myself a pat on the back - though not as smug as this man ?


   
Also during the construction of the walls I had considered the room over the garage and therefore its roof . As I stated earlier  the garage floor was laid out to be two standard steps down from the floor of the main house . This gave it a quite high ceiling so I was able to have the top floor run level right through into the " bonus " room above the garage . I had to consult with the " roof truss " companies the exact size of the lower member so that I could achieve this by having the exact garage wall height required . I also wanted the ceiling height of the bonus room to be as high as possible and went for specially modified attic truss

    Though slightly more expensive they made the bonus room so much more functional they were an obvious choice to anyone who properly considered the options . They did of course result in a higher ridge height for the garage but I calculated that it was still low enough to make the join with the side of the main building well below the main ridge height .  The roof pitches had been defined already by the architect and were standard and defined in the old imperial way as 10 in 12 for the garage and 5 1n 12 for the main roof .  The Engineers squares here are also so marked instead of being in degrees as I was used to . 
     The building plan was submitted to a few " truss companies and a contract to supply was signed with Cascade Lumber on Camino Island .
    Once the walls were all done sufficient OSB sheets were ordered to cover the roofs and were positioned and made ready to be moved  to the upstairs by the truss lorry crane .

 A team was organised to assist with the positioning of the trusses and the wall plates were pre marked . Some longer lengths of 4x2 were also marked in 2 foot units to be there to ensure the correct spacing at more central points .
     
    The trusses were ordered in due course as the walls neared their completion . We were not quite done with the garage when they were due having " borrowed " the fork lift driver from a cascade lumber  delivery to position the door beam across the garage opening . It still needed some more diagonal bracing and I was rushing to get this done and not taking proper care with the positioning of my ( Darrell's ) step ladder . Disaster struck and it slipped and I fell - only a few feet but with hammer in hand I landed badly . I remember trying to sit up and looking at my painful hand and noticing my thumb was dislocated - then as I watched going into shock I saw it pop back in and out I went . I was woken by a concerned Darrell who lifted my head up and positioned a piece of OSB as a pillow then left me to go back to work as the lumber truck arrived .

     When I came too I assisted fully in the unloading process from ground level attaching the chains to the trusses as they were individually lifted onto the sole plates at the top of the finished walls where Darrell and Dave organised and arranged them . ( p.s it wasn't till a few weeks later when I finally got an x ray back in the UK that I found I had broken my fifth metatarsal but luckily it had almost healed by then .

    The erecting of the trusses was pretty straightforward but great care needed to be taken especially when working so close to fatal drops . As will all framing everything had been fully marked out earlier and the trusses were braced and nailed into the marked locations at the correct spacing with supplied " bird blocking " between them . Where sheeting was to be needed it was nailed into position on the trusses before they were erected . Once all the trusses were fixed the supports for the barge boards were put in place With string lines the truss ends were trimmed and fascia boards fixed ready for the sheeting . This was quite hard and involved much leaning and stretching out .

Here to limit expense and to some extent to reduce weight and therefore the required strength of the structure " shingles " are the most typical material used . They also lend themselves to lower pitches than slates or tiles . These are asphalt products ( like flat roof felt in the UK ) but much prettier and requiring a goodish  slope . They are sold in squares , come in wide strips and are generally delivered direct to the roof top from the specialist roofing suppliers . I had Tobin Thompson work out the quantities and planned to work with him on the construction . I went for a so called 30 year architectural shingle in grey for the best mix of economy appearance and durability .  Initially the fully sheeted roof is covered with a flat "felt " which is also marked out with parallel lines to aid in keeping the shingles straight .  Asphalt shingles have a randomly cut surface to give a sort of random slate  like appearance and are simply nailed onto the 7/16 sheeting .  They come with the instructions on every pack - work from the bottom up overlapping and never having vertical joins inline .   They are hailed either by hand or with a special roofing nailgun . here is Tobin using his !

 - I borrowed one from Darrell and soon got the hang of it . The valleys between the pop outs and the main roof were lined with " valley metal "  At joins between the roof and vertical surfaces metal squares were folded and placed as flashing on every course .

 The skylights had their own flashing kits which were used as instructed . There are also a variety of other metal roofing products to protect edges etc but Tobin who advised me did not think their cost was worthwhile so we did not use them .    Tobin disappeared after a couple of days and I carried on on my own till later on when I discovered he had been suddenly taken ill and I recruited the expertise of Ron the roofer on an hourly rate through Darrell  contact book to which I am grateful . 
    All in all I really like the American way of roofing which is so much less expensive that together with much lower land prices allow ordinary people the opportunity to own much bigger homes for a much more reasonable price .
        Getting the roof on was quite a milestone in my rather large self appointed task of " building my own home " which is now in its third year with much still to do .

More pictures                          HERE and                                     HERE