All,
Sorry for my delay in responding... I'm glad to see that my original question has generated some good discussion. I’m learning a lot from it. Will has hit it pretty much on the money with his last few points. I am an owner-builder, timber frame newbie, with some prior building experience and became interested in timber frame construction after reading one of Ted Benson’s earlier books, written (as Will has surmised) in the early stages of the timber frame revival.
I’ve been working on this project for about a year now and the learning curve continues to stay steep. I made some early design choices (with admittedly limited knowledge) which, in hindsight, I might have done differently. For one thing, I milled my own wood from trees thinned from my property. The result has been a stack of beams of middling quality, not very square, and relatively short (mostly under 16’). The limited length of my beams led me to choose the common purlin system, thereby reducing the number of longer beams (no large quantities of common rafters).
Another early choice was to try and make as much of the frame as possible able to be raised by hand. To me, this meant a two stage raising, first floor and then roof. This means, however, that there are no posts which are continuous from deck to peak. While my original frame did not include continuous wall plates, I was convinced by a timber framer to add them to the design.
My resulting plan represents a medley of ideas culled from books and conversations with other builders. As far as enclosing the structure goes, my plan has been to use SIPs, although I’m re-thinking this decision as well.
One thing I’m constantly reminded of is that there are very few obviously right answers, but a large number of bad ideas. Given that, I’m glad to get any advice I can.
Thanks again for all your thoughts.
Jon
