rafter support on a split roof

[Dorothy In Alaska]

Well, here's the only part of the whole framing of our planned cabin, that I cant picture....

We want basically two shed roof structures (a one story and a two story), back to back, with the roofs (rooves?) slanting in opposite directions....see  this link of the east view:

http://tinypic.com/4govfq

The 1 story part of the house has a celing going from 8 feet to 10 feet high for part of it (S to N), and the second floor has a roof going from 8 feet to 6 feet high (S to N), where the stairs are coming up the N side.  

On the upper story I understand that we'll be making a short wall and a taller wall to support the rafters at the pitch we want.  What I dont understand is what supports the top of the first floor roof. (We don't have a 10 foot wall seperating the two house areas)  In this plan, the top of the rafters would hit 2 feet above the bottom framing member of the tall upper story wall.

We were thinkng of adding blocking in between the verticle framing members on that wall, to support the tops of the rafters.....

Are we even close to the right track?  Any comments or suggestions would be welcome.

[John Raabe]

Here is an overview sketch of what is going on:



Now, if you wanted to you could open up the upper floor short wall under the lower roof with headers in places (just like a window). That wall is a bearing wall, however.

[dorothyinak]

So, what type of dimensions is that ledger, and how is it attached to the framing (just nails, special hangers, etc)?

[jraabe]

If you do a search on the word ledger you will find there are seven pages of information and discussion on this site.  The actual size of the ledger and beams are determined by your specific loads or those of the stock plan you are using as a model.