Hello everyone tonight:

To each his own I guess, but I agree with Will B. unanimously!

I was always taught to not use a centre line unless for some reason it was necessary, A centre line usually will confuse things big time, because in hewn material layout, you would need to snap more lines than necessary, and mistaken lines could cause mistakes.

As an instructor I would not consider using a centre line layout, but rather start with the 2" offset line from one face (usually the otside) as I referred to in my earlier post. I use 2.25" to allow for rough surfaces in reality.

As Will B referred to above it always keeps the outside surfaces of hewn material (nearly) flush which is normal.

In historical work all braces and girts were set to the outside surfaces of timberframes, even on interior surfaces only occasionally would you see ceiling girts crossing the centres of frameworks set to the middle of the supporting wall posts

The large anchor beams of Dutch barns are one of the occasional centre lined connections with the braces being in line with the large tusk tenons

NH