25ft open span shed roof help

[river place]

The wife and I had an idea of building a house with a shed roof.  One side of the house would have a lot of glass to overlook our property.  The dimensions are approx 25ft x60 with an open kitchen, dining, and living room area at one end and the bed room at the other.  In the middle will be a mud room, utilities, bathrooms etc... 

For the bedroom and kitchen/living/ding areas we need to span the entire 25ft.  We're in mid Arkansas so snow load is not great.

I'm thinking of using one of the plans from this site to help with the framing but unsure of the roof.  I did see a shed roof design but it required a supporting wall in the middle.  How would I go about finding out if wood trusses would work?  If we use trusses we want to keep them exposed so I can stain them.  We wnat the open height in the living areas.

[John Raabe]

You probably have a local truss company that can provide options and rough prices for such a project. Ask at the local lumber yard who they use for trusses.
The lumber yard may also be able to supply 11-7/8" I-joists that might work for a 25' span. It will depend on snow loads.

[river place]

John thanks and I'll investigate both the truss and I joists and there's a big lumber yard in Glenwood AR which is about 30 miles from our place.

When I looked at your shed roof design with the center wall I thought about using a beam instead of the wall down the center of the 25ft width which would be easy in the 12ft wide bedroom but the kitchen/living area is 25ft x28ft so it's a trade off of a big beam or the full span truss/I joist solution.

Thanks

[n74tg]

River:

I'm up in Hot Springs and had great results with trusses from H&T Truss Mill.  Around here that's about all anybody uses, presumably because they do such good work and have such good prices.  I have heard disaster stories from users of competitors trusses.

They can be reached at 501-384-5249 or 501-384-5553.

No, I don't work for them (or have any other connection to them)

Good luck on your project.

P.S.  If including phone numbers is not allowed, let me know, I'll remove them.

[John Raabe]

n74tg:

No problem, that's the type of local information that our members can help each other with.