Yes, I recall reading that in the Sloane books.

Missed this threads rollout because the Forum is still running squirrely, and things still seem to appear only willy nilly like. If you don't happen by when a when a recent post appears out of place, typically in the general forum questions section, you may not see it at all.

Historical structural ridges - done a lot of looking at a lot of frames in alot of locales, and I've not seen one ever, and I don't expect to.

Here in Common Purlin Land, one finds a four sided Ridge Purlin, (Rectilinear not square - With one of the two shorter sides clipped at roof plane) in frames on either side of the transition from Scribe to Square. This serves as nailbase, and like the other Common Purlins, to carry the thrust and dead/live loads of small subsections of the roof deck laterally to the Principal Rafters

will -

go to 'active topics'.
select 24 hours, 48 hours, 7 days.

bookmark that page.
next time you want to come back, hit that bookmark... and you'll see the latest and greatest active topics.

That is the first thing I do when open up the Forum, punch Active Topics. And if some activity has happened in Northern Hewers thread I have a couple of extra hoops to jump through. Any tricks for that one?

Will, do you think it makes sense to scribe all the rafters on one side of the roof and then the other side with a ridge, or scribe rafter pairs? Then you have to deal with the rafter foot to plate aspect all over again, on both sides. And so, you don't see a decline in ridge beams, even into the late 1800's early 1900's?

When I do see a ridge in my parts it is usually on common purlin roofs, and the ridge is let into the fork and tongue principal rafters, just like all the purlins, via daps, cut into the top side of the rafters. No ridges with common rafters. All of the frames are scribed as well, houses and country side barns and out buildings. It is the larger community building which I can find square rule, churches for the most part. Also usually common rafters suggest the roof may have been changed at some point in the buildings history, but not always the case.

Excuse me if I am rehashing this.

not sure what you mean. i see the northern hewers thread just like the rest... depending on how often i log in, and how active the forums have been.

Mike - I know active topics is there, and thanks. My comment was more about the Forum being messed up, and for months now. (not the first time I've mentioned it and there are others who share the same problem) This squirrel in the attic has made the Forum far less navigable, and is the root of my comment.

Tim - Common rafters are not my norm, but I have done it both ways. From purely a layup and efficiency viewpoint, a roof system with a ridge is easier and requires less layups -

If you're scribing a frame without a ridge you must do multiple quick layups of the pairs at the ridge- If using a Five Sided Ridge you have the ridge taken care of in the same layup in which you scribe the commons to the Plate, avoiding the layup of all the pairs.

I have seen but two historical Five Sided Ridge / Common Rafter combinations north of the Mass line, and both were in border towns, though neither was in the border region of the Merrimack Vally where I came up.

Not being from a Common Rafter part of the world, I never considered if the advent of Square Rule led to a change in their use ? Interesting question.

Hi Guys;

I live in an area, Mid-Coast Maine, with five-sided ridge beams. I know they are common in the Connecticut river valley too.

I have seen a couple of references for these ridge beams in England, but I do not have much information on their origin or distribution.

As for ancient history, posts supporting a structural ridge beam is one of the fundamental ways structures were built in prehistoric times. They were common and widespread. The name for one type in Danish is a sulehus, sule being a name for a post. Another name for these posts is a gavel from Latin gavala, meaning forked stick, and this is where our word gable comes from!!

In Germany buildings with a structural ridge beam and supporting post are called a Firstsäulenbau, Firstständerbau, Hochsäulenbau, or Hochfirstsäulen sometimes translated as a “Ridge Pillar House”. I am not aware of American examples of this building type.

Here is a web page in Danish with a drawing of an interesting example of a sulehus if you scroll down: http://www.kulturarv.dk/information-om-b...kik-paa-landet/

Here is a German page with good photos of a reconstruction:
http://presse.aoeza.de/2010/06/neuer-hausnachbau-im-steinzeitpark.html

If you use Google you can translate the text and almost understand what it says. There are some other types of historic framing presented on this page.

Take care;
Jim

Here's another good paper on types of frames of ancient (Greek and Roman) design where the ridge is important.

http://www.pierreseche.com/poteaux_de_faite.htm

What?! You cant read French! (I'm just learning)

Jim

The German Firstständerhaus is one type of the Low German hall-house, and is typical of the post built Germanic style, the style predating the frame-built house. It is an important step in the development of framing traditions across the Germanic world.

In the early middle ages, most houses that were built were built this way, or with a variation with 2 posts supporting mid-span purlins instead of ridge beams. This is called in German Zweiständerbau. In this style the exterior walls are non-loadbearing, but the weight of the roof is born by the mid-span posts. This works only for very small buildings of course. This was replaced by the 4-posted house, or vierständerhaus, which allows for much wider buildings. In these houses the middle hall is the living quarters while the outer aisles function as animal stalls with the space above being used as hay lofts. This basic style of the aisled barn is still used to this day in America. A bit of a side track from structural ridges, but it illustrates how the structural ridge is related to other building styles. IT seems that the simple structural ridge leads to the development of a pair of purlins, which in turn leads to more complex roof framing.