20'X35' -1 and 1/2 Story Cabin in Oklahoma

Started by okie-guy, August 06, 2006, 08:16:34 PM

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okie-guy

This is our project out at our farm. We have made the following changes to the plans:
1) We increased the length 5 feet
2) We will have a 20X24' porch that we will enclose with single pane windows ( I'd like it screened in but the dust is too much)!
3) We will have a outswing French door going out to the porch
4) We changed the configuration of the windows
If anyone is interested I have photos of the progress so far at  http://www.flickr.com/photos/11831239@N05/
We figure this will take us another year to complete


okie-guy

I've been gone for awhile and added a few new photos on the yahoo site . The windows and doors we spent alot on ($ 2300.00). We chose double pane single hung windows with a bronze tint and a low "e". also light brown color.  Did not go with the argon filled option. We ordered through Home depot and they gave us the rough in openings when we ordered. So that didn't hold us back. I've been putting up facia, then around here everyone puts on a 1"X2" piece of Smart trim at the top of the facia . It will then be ready for the roofers, who will the put up a drip strip all the way around. I've decided to put up a 2X8 facia around the main building which I think will strengthen everything up and will be easier for my sub to put up the metal facia and viynal soffet.



okie-guy

I tried to mitigate the potential problem with the 1 foot wall in the loft by doing the following:
1) I added rafter ties to spread the load down insted of out.
2) I doubled up with another stud wall and tied the two together with a 1X10
3) We were always worried about putting a strong enough railing in the loft to protect people from leaning on it. So I added a basement jack and put pressure on the ridge board. This I hope will distibute some of the weight to the wall between the kitchen and bedroom and take some of the "outwards" pressure and direct it down.  Plus I will frame it with with wood and it will provide a strong and secure end to attach the railing to.
The next  problem I need to overcome is that I am not putting on the large porch on the front of the cabin like the plans call for.I'm planning on putting on a 5X6 front entrance. Because of this the front wall (since it goes up 20 feet) has a certain amount of give to it since there is no back bracing to the wall. I really don't want to add back bracing to it since I think it would detract cosmeticly to the interior.
Any ideas???




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jraabe

#4
Paul,

I expect that front wall will stiffen up sufficiently as the finishes are added. Also your porch, even if a smaller one, will help anchor the wall.

You could also extend the porch line over the windows on either side by building an "eyebrow" window hood that could be made of three triangulated 2x12s and became a box beam. It would help keep rain off the windows and could become a decorative element or a break between siding types.

PS - You're doing a good job and building a very sturdy place.


okie-guy

I decided that I would try and "stiffen" the front wall before I put the siding on. I know what John said so maybe this is overkill ,but I sort of overengineer everything.( you can tell with the loft walls!).  I lag bolted the front porch to studs on the front wall , and then used 4; 4X4 douglas fir lumber to brace the outside corners of the porch. I will then fill in later and make a railing about 3 foot off the slab. With the front corners  braced they transfer their bracing to the front wall in both directions since I lag bolted the whole frame together. Seems to have done the trick.
I've been working on the stairway and had to use two binders to make the whole thing fit. The rise is 10 inches and the tread is 9 inches.I have read where the maximium rise for some building codes is 9 inches and that some cities won't allow binders on primary stairs.We are going the add a book case in the front of the steps using 1X12's.
I am going to use 2X4's for the balusters that I will round off the outside edges with my router table. The hand rail will be the same I think. I will probably lag bolt them into the frame of the stairway with 3 lag bolts to be sure it is secure. It seems with the steep stairway everyone is trying to grab on to something sturdy to help them either up or down.
That's what's new. I added more pictures on the Yahoo picture site if anyone is interested. Also included three here to show the front porch bracing,the staircase and the outside of the cabin.
Comments are welcome!




bizzyPDXgal

Thanks for the great pics! Yahoo pictures show wonderful detail.
What is the pitch of the roof on the larger/glassed-in porch? And - is that top step also angled?

glenn-k

A side note -- Yahoo pics are fine when linked to as an album but they prevent them from showing here after a couple of links to them.  They can be copied to Photobucket to  always appear here as they should. :)

jraabe

#8
Looking good!

And overbuilding never hurts - someday it may be your insurance policy against unforeseen forces  :o. (PEG is someone who usually advises such an investment.) Your porch and stair look very sturdy. I'll bet the extension room is bright and sunny!

Yes, that steep a riser on your cottage stair will not fly everywhere but makes for a more compact staircase. I like it better than the Jefferson Stair (go to the bottom of the thread for a photo) which requires going down backwards.


peg_688

#9
Okie guy your doing a great job , generally! And some of your over kill/ engineering is over kill , but hey your doing what you think is right and will let you sleep better at night , so it's all good .

 That being said , and you did ask for comments , so don't be offended  when you read mine. I'll just try to be gental and touch on issues I see that other folks might want to do that I see as improvements to details / ways things where done and also code issues that here in Washington , would be major issues with code officals.

 The added pony walls won't do much for what you hoped for , they did fir out the walls to flush with the rafter seat cuts , so IF your going to finish all the way into that area with your drywall / interior wall coverings / paneling you've covered that. If your still going to frame in a knee wall so you don't have that small / low ceiling / corner the knee wall would have / will provide added bearing / spread the load support , in a way .

 The porch area is great support for that gable wall , I hope ypu provided for uplift as Ok. is tornado country . So holding that porch down in a wind , althought a tornado strike very close is going to do what it wants , so I'm talking more to a close call / in the area tornado here .

 How are the post anchored to the concrete? How are the beams attached to the posts? Etc, etc. Thats the weak point,IMO.

 Anothet issue are those window on the low pitched area , around here that would be a big no no , engineering bill , with windows right into the corners there very little shear strenght in the walls / corners , same way with the other corner .   4 feet is generally required of wall panel , yes it can be reduced using a  alternate brace wall pnl.

 The stairs are  no where near code , but maybe  thats not a issue for you.  Others that need to be with in code should disreguard that idea / way of doing it .   Yes a code stair takes a lot of floor space.  In a small place thats a hard deal giving up that space , but ......  

 Sure they'll work for you , and your strong railing idea is good . And your way of building them looks to be stout .   So all good , unless you have to pass a code check.

 I'd also have tied the ext. wall sheathing in better from the main house to the low pitched roof area . I'd guess a wall framing break exists at that area so if you would have staggered your sheathing at that point it would have tied you together better.  Try to spread your sheathing joints out / stagger the joints better.

 So no offence , I'm I little reluctlant to post this as it could be taken wrong , so just look at it as a what it was intended constructive review.

All in all a very nice job :)

Keep up the good work , and if you have questions , a photo and question will MTL result in a answer before you press on. Some times we ask after the fact and we all get into problems with the answer :-[


 The steel post is  super over kill up to that ridge board , if your doing a pony wall at the loft I'd take it down , the way you have those collar ties thru bolted that ridge will never settle even with 10  feet of snow or a pink elephant  ;)placed on that ridge . If your doing a wall all the way up to the ceiling / roof under side ,  just leave it in the framing , some one will be impressed in the future when they remodel the place  :)
G/L , PEG        

glenn-k

Good information from a pro's point of view, PEG.  Others can well use this insight when thinking out how they want to do their place. :)

This is the type of information I stick in the cobwebs in the back of my head and then someday when I need it, it pops out. :-/

Nice job on the house, Okie-guy.  There are so many different ways to do things - wants, needs and requirements, that it is nice to see how others have done it.





okie-guy

Bizzy- The pitch coming off the 12X12 roof is a 3X12 pitch for the porch. There is a new tar paper that is rubberized and has a peel-off backing that adheres to the decking. We went up about 2 feet up on the main roof and put it on the whole roof of the porch. We also used  Atlas storm master shingles on the whole roof. This is a 50 year shingle that is hail resistant. I recieve a 22% discount on my insurance because of this. Hail is the big deal out here more than tornados.( The insurance company just totaled my roof on my home in town for a $21,000.00 loss from a hail storm in early November)
The stairs have a double binder during the first turn and a single binder when it turns to go up into the loft.
I know that this isn't to code but since we are outside any city and in the country, so I have no inspector looking over my shoulder to protect me from myself. The only 2 officials I will need to meet with are the health dept. to tell me the length of the lateral lines. and the county assesor to put the cabin on the county tax rolls.My wife can climb the stairs, I can and my 12 year old can and those are the only three people I need to please !!!
I took down the basement jack about a month ago. It broke up the view from the loft up and doesn't serve a need anyway.When I put the railing up I was able to lag bolt in 4 places each rail and it is stout .
The porch was orignally going to be screened in. I framed the basic structure with  4X4 posts and double 2X6 runnig on top standing up. I found these 36X60 single pane windows at Home depot for $52.00 a piece so I decided to  put them up instead. They also had a truck load of  8400 BTU AC's for a $125.00 , so I bought one and framed an opening in the porch. I'm planning To only heat the main rooms in the winter when we are out there.
I Have't put the door on to the porch yet and 2 weeks ago we had 50 mph winds wih gusts to 65 mph. everything was fine afterward, So am not to worried about the wind.
I will post some more pics when I get the siding on.

glenn-k

Looking at the above photos again, It looks like the internal house wall - behind the porch has plenty of sheathing for shear and that shear will transfer across the roof sheathing to the front wall if everything is tied together well..  We had similar problems in steel buildings with lean-to's.

Never lost one yet. :)

okie-guy

It's been a exceptionally cold and wet winter and have not done anything in 2 months. Did get someone to put up the vinyl soffet and siding . Next step when it gets warm is to put up the log cabin siding.I put up some more pics in the yahoo site.
This calf was born 2 days ago at 5 degrees! they are hardy suckers! So much for global warming.




glenn-k

Healthy looking little rascal.  I did my snow for this year - I don't want any more. :-/

Amanda_931

January was so warm, now we're getting something like the weather we should have gotten in January.

I think we got a your snow today.  Hasn't been into the low single digits yet.  It doesn't have to as far as I'm concerned!

glenn-k

Updated link to photos in first paragraph, first page.  GK

Homegrown_Tomatoes

Okieguy,
 Have you done any more to your house.  My husband and I really like the sunroom and wondered how it turned out when it was finished... how was your floorplan laid out?

okie-guy

Hi home grown Tomatoes; Thanks for asking on my progress. It's been slow. I had surgery and was off for 2months, then I plunked my eye with some barb wire and although it didn't penetrate; the blood vessel burst and I couldn't lift any thing for a month. We are experiancing the wettest year in Oklahoma's history and it was hard to get out to the farm. I sold my business and after 33 years of making a payroll our family took most of the summer and traveled. I also think that the project was pretty overwelming and now I'm back on track!
I'm putting up log cabin siding which starts out as 2X10's ; so I've put up 1and 1/2 X2 inch facing around each window and door. I'm using a Sherwin Williams product called "Woodscapes" that is a stain/sealer. The color is riverwood. I was worried about the sheathing "wicking" water and also the critical connection between the slab and the 2X4 base as to critters ,spiders, etc, So I put up a flashing all the way around the cabin with a good bead of silicon caulk to cover the sheathing. It took awhile to drill the screw holes into the concrete, but I think it will be worth it. The three pics are of the trim, flashing and a nice picture of the filled pond. I will include more pics when the siding is done.




Homegrown_Tomatoes

sounds like you've had a rough year!  You're not kidding about all the rain this summer...my family is all in OK, so believe me I've heard about it.  I couldn't believe how rain-foresty it looked when we were there in June.  Bet it'll be a gorgeous fall. What part of OK are you in?  Looks like somewhere west of I-35...  Pond looks really good after all that rain.  Anyway, I think the extra sheathing is worth the trouble... we used to have problems with snakes and scorpions coming in our house there all the time, so to me, I'd go the extra length to make sure they stayed out!  Looking forward to seeing your progress... it looks great so far.


Homegrown_Tomatoes

Well, has the weather been clear enough to get anything done lately?  I think we want to build either a 14 by24' or 14' by 28' cabin with a shed porch on the long side and maybe a sunporch on one of the shorter ends... I think I've been obsessing about this just a tad.... have a notebook full of sketches and floorplans, different layouts, and the other night I was awake half the night reworking it all again, only mentally instead of on paper.  

I'm really hoping to be back in the Stillwater area by Christmas... and hopefully buy land in the early spring and begin building over the summer.  Guess a little time will tell.  DH has an interview this afternoon.

Homegrown_Tomatoes


glenn kangiser

I reset the hyperlink to the Flikr photos.  Just highlight it then click the url link in the modify box if anyone else has this problem - or let me or Don know. (click the  report to moderator button will do it).
"Always work from the general to the specific." J. Raabe

Glenn's Underground Cabin  http://countryplans.com/smf/index.php?topic=151.0

Please put your area in your sig line so we can assist with location specific answers.

okie-guy

Haven't updated you all in awhile. This is an ongoing project which I think will never end.


The pool table has kept us from working on stuff!!!

I will add more pics when we are farther along on the decorating.

glenn kangiser

"Always work from the general to the specific." J. Raabe

Glenn's Underground Cabin  http://countryplans.com/smf/index.php?topic=151.0

Please put your area in your sig line so we can assist with location specific answers.