hello everyone tonight

hi DL

that term "American style" really throws me, but I visualize a building that looks like other TF structures that are being built presently in many areas, with interior construction traits that represent a technique that originated in another area of the settled world, and of an earlier period--is this a reasonable assumption?

It appears to me that the TFR"s of the present time pretty well use the standard model of framework, working some interesting variations in where possible to create unusual effects, and interest for the buyers--it also appears to me that in doing this it is stretching the limits and creating a nightmare for the architects and engineers to stay abreast matching the standards and building codes

I personally really enjoy the plainer look without all the frills and would really enjoy looking at what you might come up with

One example I can think of is the "Dutch Barn" with the large anchor beams that created a long sloping roof line. Viewing the structure against the horizon made one think of an old "mother hen' with her wings spread out over her chicks-it really gave you a great feeling that seemed to live on through time

This is one structure that you might add some of your old world structural knowledge to the interior, to make it more useful, and take up where the old framers left off as they were slowly overcome by the march of time and the pressure of change

It was always my assumption that had history not went in the direction it did some of these old world structures would have continued to evolve retaining many of its original traits

NH

By 'American Style' I am referring to the fairly broad range of proportions, roof designs, etc. that are 'normal'

We often don't realize how small in terms of the broader scope of things our North American architecture is.

For example, I wouldn't build structures with 3-sided balconies, half hip roofs and 8 foot overhangs. I'd build something closer to the American 'normal' -smaller overhangs, gable roof, etc.



I think also you are right about the ethnic diversity in architecture and how things could have been. I have long felt that there is much more to 'American timber framing' than what we often look at. A lot of our modern knowledge is based on the fairly narrow scope of New England framing customs. We forget that there is a fairly significant range of other traditions, for example there are large German settlements in Pennsylvania, Virginia, Texas, Wisconsin, etc. where distinctly German methods were used right up to the rise of stick framing. Even here in Indiana, we have a great deal of German and Swiss style frames in certain communities.

As for the Dutch barn, that's an interesting thought. I'll have to think of that...

Hey David -

I think the thread a good idea, and do like exploring regional variation driven by settlement pattern. And would like to see it discussed more often here on the forum.

Though I have borrowed from other traditions, I do have more buildings standing which I see as part of a continuing tradition of the typology dominant in my area historically, that being English Tying with the curious local improvement of Common Purlins, (redirecting all thrust away from the Plates with the full absence of Common Rafters is a game changing improvement for this Frame type) Though I do use the Cog & Clasp in lieu of a Dovetail in the Tying Joint and have looked to the Old World by making use of natural curves. Something that the ample strait timber yielded by the virgin forests available to those building in the colonial period did not see those who carried the tradition across the Atlantic making use of.

I am curious if you or anyone else has made study of the timeline of historical changes in method in Framing in your community, as compared to those in the immediate surrounding communities. Part of that is just plain curiosity on my part, of all traditions timber, and part of it is a curiosity as to where both might fit into theories floated in this year old blog piece -
http://bridgewright.wordpress.com/2012/12/01/a-now-two-century-old-overnight-turn-on-a-paradigm/

As far as our local community is concerned, where I live in Indiana, there is not a very big tradition of timber framed house construction. There is a long lived and significant tradition of timber barn construction which here was only supplanted by a combination of the economic collapse of the 1930's, world war II, and the explosion of easy-built construction post war. We have timber barns built right up to the 30's

Houses were built first in the log cabin manner -some of which according to the evidence at hand were originally built for the Indians. Then houses were built mostly of solid brick with very few timber framed homes.

Barns are a different story.
Our oldest barns still standing are log barns. these are exceedingly rare. The oldest full sized barns of of the Schweizer style, large forebay barns. These were built by Amish and Brethren settlers -the first people to settle this part of the country. Then beyond that, it just moves into the realm of the common midwest purlin barn types built mostly for dairy use.

Settlement here began in the 1840's...

The question of layout is an interesting one as well. I have a very rocky reltionship with layout. On the one hand, I think the notion of square rule is perhaps the single greatest innovation of the American carpenter in terms of timber building. So much else was simply adaptations of other methods (which is how folk carpentry works, we adapt whatever we learn from others and continue to apply it in new ways) but square rule was a brilliant innovation.

On the other hand, I don't really feel free to apply the principles of square rule to my Swiss framing methods. It would be out of place.

But here's the kicker,

In many ways, Swiss frames of the frame-and-plank variety actually apply the idea of square rule -and have done so for half a millenium or more- they just apply it to the entire timber by virtue of the type of joinery involved in the so-called 'Bohlenwand' or plank-wall construction. This of course is not the case in roof framing which is left irregular and scribed.


But to take a timber and reduce it to regular dimensions at one spot, that is unprecedented and even today unknown in Swiss shops which often still use scribe joinery (they don't trust even machine milled timber to be accurate enough)

This carries over also into log building, which in switzerland involves logs cut and planed to very perfect dimensions so they will fit well together.

Continuing on with your question and blog post,

I am actually faced with some very similar dilemmas in my own research. I am faced in my research with 2 sudden revolutionary changes in carpentry practices -both with no clear reason as to why they might have occurred. Add this to the extreme inconsistency for the most part in building across the region my research focuses on -the entire Bernese portion of the Swiss Plateau- it makes it very hard to pin anything down and to see what is really happening.

But we face some this same confusion in America. Scribe rule barns, for example, were still built on occasion well after square rule had become the norm.

In Bernese timber framing, we have the situation where suddenly and inexplicably the entire approach to framing changed -twice- but did so on a regional basis and not a cross-cantonal basis. The first change involved abandoning the use of tall 2-story posts in the walls and heavy timber connection in exchange for a platform-based framing system (story-by-story construction) using lighter, simpler joinery. The second change saw a total revolution in wall construction, adopting what I would characterize as an Urban system involving half-timber construction with long slanting braces. The reason for both of these changes is not clear at all.

What makes this hard is I can't pin down a year or even a good range for any of this, because changes were so variable by region, and some communities held on to ideas for centuries that others had left. It's not even clear whether the tall post, heavy joint construction is even indigenous to many of the communities at all, and if rather these used platform methods -derived from log building- from the earliest times.

I can see, for example, a tall-posted house that may have been built around 1780, for example, and feel as if this is a good date for the end of that tradition. Then, on the other hand, you find in a different community a platform framed structure dating from close to 1600, and it makes you wonder what is going on.

For me, this is a question of whether or not Bernese timber framing actually arose from a single archetypal form that evolved in different ways and at different rates from region to region or if, rather, there were a number of vastly different framing traditions that gradually converged over time into a more-or less unified tradition.

Whatever the case, the rise of Half-timbered construction was a game changer (and I really don't know why. There was no timber shortage driving this change) which in many cases blasted away all of the older regional traditions. Half timbering in the Canton of Bern is, in a sense, their equivalent to balloon framing in that it was a single framing method that arose and supplanted everything else, perhaps for no good reason.

Continuing my marathon of posts...
(When you write a book, there gets to be a lot of information that doesn't quite fit anywhere, but you want to write down SOMEWHERE)

Regarding the connection of Bernese timber framing to log construction...

We have in the Canton of Bern 2 significantly different traditions of wooden building. We have the timber framing customs of the northern lowland valleys and the log building of the Alpine regions. These two traditions today appear to be very different and unconnected.

We are also used to putting timber framing and log constructions into nice little boxes and keeping them separated from each other. The one, we reason, has nothing to do with the other. The Canton of Bern, and really most of German-speaking Switzerland, throws a very wrench in the gears here, however.

And I think we ought to look closely here so we understand what is going on in other parts of the world, and so we understand how compatible the 2 systems actually are.

You might expect there to be a point somewhere in the Canton of Bern where timber framing stops and log building begins. After all, they are very very different. Such a sudden change is to be found in the switch from timber framing to the French-style stone buildings to the north and northwest, so why would we not also expect it to happen to the south. It makes perfect sense if we assume the 2 traditions to be different, to have arisen from different sources. The only problem is, it doesn't happen this way. Yes, there is a pretty sudden change in building profile. You get to the mountains and suddenly proportions and roof lines switch. However when looking strictly at construction methods we see clearly that there is no simple switch. As we move closer to the Alps and even into the rugged mountain region we observe a very gradual transition toward pure log construction. As the Bernese Midlands slowly rise up into the mountains, we see joint types appear with clear connections to log building. As we get into the mountains themselves, we see buildings which we would classify under the log building tradition that exhibit techniques we would consider to be more in line with timber framing. For example, it is common to find log structures employing structural posts in the exterior walls and timber framed roof structures. It is just as common to find large timber framed houses employing log-style connections in horizontal wall timbers.

It seems to me, as I learn more about it, that the Bernese style of timber framing arises from 2 different sources which collided and melded together 1500 years ago. Germanic timber framing does appear to have had a clear impact, however for the most part I speculate that this timber framing tradition arose mostly out of Alpine log building customs adapted to the lowland environment. Perhaps the best evidence of this is the frequency of the log granary -built clearly in the Alpine style- in the timber framing regions. This is not an example of two cultures crossed, but a simple preservation of the archetype from which all of the regions building practices arose.

As I study the oldest buildings, it gets easier for me to see how the frame-and-plank method must have began life as simple stacked-timber construction, at some point adding posts to simplify the construction of larger structures and better hold the steep roofs (Log building, we should observe, is not overly well adapted to the construction of large, steep roofs. The flat roofs of the mountains are not practical in the lowlands)

hello everyone tonight

Hi DL

Just a thought but over the centuries, religions change along with the ruling kings, could it be possible that they strictly for one reason or another suppressed certain building styles, which resurfaced again under new rulers and new ideas/customs?

NH

Interesting that you should bring this up, the matter of religion and ethnicity does matter, but it is only important about a millennium before the time period I'm discussing.

In the mountains starting about the 6th century AD, the pagan Germanic tribes arrived and brought with them some timber framing customs that were foreign to the region. The use of the lap dovetail braces is a Germanic influence.

A certain Germanic custom was labeled as the 'Heidenkreuz' and was attributed certain superstitious connotations until eventually being passed off as taboo centuries later.

But beyond this, there is no clear evidence of deliberate suppression of building styles and techniques in the region.

You can always speculate as to what happened, with out facts.
After which you can research if said speculation was correct or not, and even then it still could be correct just no proof it happened in the speculated manner. Many things need to be considered for an out come to be verified. And in the end the story can still be changed due to new information. This holds true not only to the topic at hand but things we simply take for granted.

More to the point I would appreciated a description of how the planks are fixed to the joist in the picture most recently posted on the FF.

Will, I use cogs and common lodged purlins in my English Tying frames and now splined plank walls to boot.