It was very icy when we came in to Lakeland to form the walls.
Feels good to frame again.
This is the edge of the Zip wall panels. They are self gapping.
The Zip panels install like any other sheathing.
You can see the slight gap.
Box of “seam” tape.
Routing the panels seemed a little harder on the bit. This stuff is dense, but not really any heavier than regular OSB.
The Tape gun works very well. It took a little for me to get it going, but it is very easy to use.
Ready for tape
It takes a little practice to get the tape staight.
A new technique that is working very well for lifting walls.
Some shots of the nailing.
Another wall. The TimberLok screws work very well and are very strong.
The layout “dots” are every 6“ in the field.
Ready to lift another wall.
I used 3 TimberLok screws this time. You can see the topplate nailing too, that is because there is a slice on the first topplate.
The wall stays nice and stiff this way.
Bryan is taping the corner of the Zip system. The tape gun works very well, so far.
Ready to start framing interior walls.
Now it is my turn.
Starting to frame the 2nd floor. Easy to nail the hangers now instead of off a ladder.
We decided to cantilever the front bedroom this time.
A stack of 14“ I-joists for the garage/bonus room and a big pile of Zip and Advantech.
The hangers fit really nice. We just nailed the top flange and will nail the sides now that the joists are in. Sometimes the hangers hold the joist too high, so I didn't want too many nails in them in case we needed to adjust.
We are nailing on the rim for the garage bonus room joists. They are 14“ deep, so this is much easier than wrestling with it up there on the walls.
I wore my rain gear all day, to keep the rain away. As soon as I took off my jacket, it'd start raining again. Off come the bibs
I cut the 14“ joists to length with the chainsaw, then we scattered them. Now it is time to start rolling, and blocking as we go for the cantilever.
This is the sun coming up behind the house and through the trees.
I layout stairs to the “points”. Doing the math with the CM makes for perfect layout because the calculator keeps track of rounding error.
I use a jigsaw to finish the cuts. I don't worry about overcutting the notches if I'm using engineered lumber.
The first stringer is the pattern for the rest.
Bryan has the camera, so who knows what this shot is :-)
On the rakewalls for this house we are not going to use the rafter in the wall. We are just using it as a pattern and marking the top of the rafter.
Marking the stud length at the line on the floor.
Ready to sheathe.
Sheathed and taped.
I'm a little tired, and you can see that in my “straightish” tape lines.
Ready for the overhangs, and rain forecast tomorrow.
We are framing as many of the overhangs as possible before we lift the walls. It lightly rained the night before.
The closed soffits for the 7-12 gable and then for the 9-12 eaves.
I ordered the 12“ non vented soffit from LP. It comes in 16' lengths which is just short for this overhang, but it will help keep the wall straight.
I build the overhang 12 1/4“ so that we have a little wiggle room. We'll cut off the flyrafter after the fasica is installed on the eaves.
All ready to lift.
Eliminating the rafter and framing the wall to the top of the roofline, with 2 plates and the soffit is keeping this wall very stiff.
Screws are holding just fine.
Just about there.
Next wall is about 14' long and is a 9-12
I set the timer on the camera, so I should have had time to pretend to be doing something ;-)
Starting the TimberLok screws.
Since we had to frame it away from where it would end up, I just lifted it off the deck and repositioned the forklift.
Screws are doing their job nicely.
The Zip gives the frame a nice clean look.
Tracing the top of the same pattern rafters that we used for the first rakewall.
The skeleton is nearly finished.
Getting ready to lift the rakewall. The boom landed right over the peak at full extension.
The screws are started and we are just about ready.
I put extra screws to the left because this strap is thicker than the others we used. There is a gap between the 2x6 and the plates, but with 2 3 5/8“ screws and 1 6” screw there, it seemed plenty strong.
The wall is up, I'm blowing off the deck and we are getting ready to call it a week.
We have one more rakewall in the main section and then one on the bonus room that will be a 4-12 and 12-12 wall. Next week we'll start the roof.
Finally a standard height wall. We framed for a 16+“ soffit. Bryan is hauling up a 16” x 16' vented LP Soffit panel.
I'm making sure the soffit is square to the wall.
Texting and nailing the brace. Just to show that multi-tasking is possible. Oh and I'm stretching too.
Braced and ready to rig.
The wall stays nice and straight
Layout for the roof is done, and you can see that the soffit helps hold the wall straight.
We are Kitsap County's greenest builder
New Bosch stick nailer.
Ready to set the ridge.
We just set the ridge in the notch at the gable walls and put a 2x4 under it to hold it. I like to hold off nailing the ridge in place so that I can get some rafters set. Sometimes they don't want to sit just right but lifting up the ridge a little will let them squeeze into place.
I didn't bother stringing the ridge. The back wall was dead straight with the 16“ soffit already installed. The ridge stayed very straight and the rafters fit just the way we want them to.
The rafters butt the 6x and we'll install double hangers for the ceiling joists/rafter/beam connection.
A shot of how the rafter ties into the soffit framing. I cut the tails 1/4“ short on the sawhorses and we needed it on some. I would cut the seatcut a little higher next time just in case the tails were to hit the soffit. I might also use a 2x6 for the outside ”subfascia“ next time. 5/4x8 fascia will install in plane with the top of the rafter.
Last one.
Knocking out the vent notch in the birdblock.
Next time I'll use a 2x6 for the subfascia. You can see here that there are enough nails from the tail to the soffit to hold it up, but not a lot of room for nailing the 5/4x8 fascia.
Planing in the fascia.
Soffits are strong enough for me to use as a step onto the roof.
Blue line is over the birdblocks. We have to nail the sheathing into the blocking line over the wall. Bryan is taping the seam before we install the next row of sheathing.
Trying to set the nails just right.
We've noticed that if the nail head is proud, the tape can rip. So Bryan is making sure he is the only proud head on the jobsite . . . . :-)
We taped the horiztonal seams last and Bryan is using the J-Roller to make sure it is nice and flat. It took us about 10-15 minutes to tape this section of roof. The panels are super grippy too. This roof is only a 7-12, but very easy to walk on.
Time for a new roll of tape.
With the sun hitting the roof, you can see how flat the panels are. The 2x12 we got from the lumber yard was very straight. You can also see how flat the tape is.
I metered off the sky for this shot and you can see the tape a little better.
Valley was very easy to tape. We just ran the roll up the valley, cut it off and then pulled the release paper.
The 2x12 sleepers are installed and we are ready to fill in the valley.
All the taping done and we are dried in except the ridge.
Rafter tail layout for the 12-12 rafters. A little trial and error, but there is 2x subfascia and 5/4x fasica drawn.
I decided to just juse the rafters to build the rakewall. We had rain coming and I didn't want to snap lines on the wet subfloor. That is a 12-12 on the left and 4-12 on the right. I calculated the rafters off the math instead of snapping out each pitch and going from there.
Just one nail to hold the wall together. I'll end up cutting out the rafters so the ridge can drop in.
Plumb cuts nice and tight.
The longest stud for each pitch is installed and then layout pulled. We frame the rakewalls this way if it is raining or too wet.
Here the birdsmouths are drawn including a 2x12 that will run down the ridge. Both rafters will butt this 2x12 and eliminate the need for blocking.
The ridge beam measures 17 3/4“. You can see that I needed to cut 1 1/2” out of the 4-12 birdsmouth for the 2x10.
Yup, it is raining. We won't be able to tape the seams on this wall.
I didn't have the flyrafter for the 4-12 side, but otherwise, the rakewall is done and up. Little did we know just how wet we were going to get the next day.
This is the birdsmouth for the 12-12 rafters. There is about 1 5/16“ bearing, which is not ideal, but fine.
It was too wet to get many pictures. But the ridge is set and a few rafters are in. I was soaked through everything under my rain gear.
The gap is just a hair bigger than 1 1/2“ for the 2x10.
Step one for figuring the shed dormer rafters and slope is to plumb down from the edge of the ridge the Stabila LaserBob.
With the laser in place, I measure from the outside of the dormer wall to get the dormer rafter's “run”.
Next step is to get the total rise off the floor to the top of the ridge.
Here is the math for the rafters.
This is the layout at the ridge. There is only one problem, at the plumbcut this rafter will be lower than the 12-12 rafters that are already installed. I want the plumbcut to match the 12-12 rafters so the “tips” are the same height.
Redo the math adding the adjustment at the ridge to the total height to get the correct rafter slope and length.
So I end up adding the 1 5/16“ to the HAP so that the ”tips“ of the two different rafter slopes match.
You can see the rafter tips are about the same. It would not have looked right if the shed rafters were lower than the 12-12 rafters.
Bryan is cutting studs for the dormer walls.
I'm butting sheathing to get stud layout. We'll frame these walls 24“ oc.
Just plumb up from the layout.
Shed is done.
It is supposed to rain hard tomorrow, so I'm taping the vent pipes.
I shouldn't have taped the bottom. Whoops, I wasn't thinking.
I went ahead and taped the ridge so the house is totally dried in.
All taped. The roof to wall is a little tough but after some practice it isn't too hard.
Time for the wobble lights. It is a little dark in the morning.
Step 1 for installing windows is to put the sill flashing on. I'm quickly marking 9“ for the edge of the flashing instead of measuring the flashing length.
I'm just marking 3 or 4“ and I'll do that on both sides. We look like idiots if the flashing is way out of level. Might as well take the 5 seconds to make the flashing level.
I hold the flashing to the 9“ mark and then feed it over to the other mark and then cut it off.
I don't want this flashing to come off the zip, so I use the J-roller to make sure it is nice and smooth and there are no air bubbles. Another thing that will make us look sloppy is if the flashing curls off the wall.
I prefer to use Grace VyCorners. They are easy to install and pretty cheap.
A couple staples to hold it nice and flat. We don't want it to stick out inside or the finish carp will have to monkey with them when he wraps the window or installs the sill.
The roofers showed up and 2 hours later they have the back done, the shed done, the left side of the garage and most of the upper front. There were 5 guys. The gun there on the 12-12 roofs without a toe board. I tried to get better pictures but couldn't. he leans back into his harness and then just goes to town. This company does an excellent job.
Nailing off a corner board I hit a nail with my knuckle. If it hadn't been for my knuckle I think it would have been a lot deeper.
Next step is flashing the sides of the window
Taping the roof to wall before we install the bottom piece of flashing.
Started siding today with Hardie. It was misty all day, not raining. There is a very important difference.
Try a new slip sheet. It is like a giant Post-It note. I'm not sure I like them. I prefer the metal slip sheets, but its cheapest to make our own out of a mechanical flashing.
Head flashing installed and the cut end of the trim primed.
I'm wiping off the moisture so I can tape the flashing to the wall with Zip Tape.
The reverse lap is unavoidable unless we want to do all the exterior trim then tape the seam. I'm not worried about it though because the tape sticks to tape really well.
Blurry picture, but there it is.
Bryan is taping the metal drip cap to the wall with the Zip tape.
Bryan is using his chisel to hold the trim out. The trim won't lie flat to the wall because of the nailing flange on the window.
Taping the step flashing before we start siding. Once I use the J-roller it'll be nice and smooth. I try and get it set in spots before rolling the wrinkles out.
I'm using a 2x4 to space the siding off the roof.
I added a piece of tape part way down the rake and left some of the release paper on so we can tape the 12-12 side the next day and have a proper overlap.
We put some tape behind the kick out flashing and then taped the step flashing to the wall.
It really started raining just before lunch. I decided to put an awning over the platform. It took just a few minutes to build and clamp to the platform.
Gotta be a little smarter than the rain sometimes . . . .
Kyle is back!!
Our “quick release” supports for our tent.
It rained so hard today but we have stayed pretty dry .
Taping the step flashing. We wiped off the moisture and installed the tape. I can't believe how sticky this stuff is.
I like to start at the rake with a full angle on it and then work to the corner board.
Bonus Room.
Master Ceiling.
