so one of the questions that I get asked a lot is how do you straighten your roof
framing so that when you start laying your steel you don't have that crazy jag
that you get it to eat here on the fascia if your sheets are not running
Square to your building so the first thing we do is we always check plumb on
all of our walls most importantly the three walls that are part of the side of
roof that we are working on so with this side we'll go to this end wall will do
this front side wall and then we'll do this end wall the other back side wall I
mean yeah I want it close but I'm not really concerned about that right now
because it doesn't have anything to do with this side of the roof once we get
our walls plumb and we know we're good that's when we take out the string line
here and today it's like not even breezy it's like a perfect day to be running a
string and what I do is I just set my string on a nail it is kind of breezy
actually right now but this string line on the 40 feet ain't moving at all and
I'm basically going to set it so that on both ends it's just barely kissing so
I'll do the same thing on the far end get a set up and then what I've got to
do you can see the building has got a couple ins and outs and we'll go ahead
and set up our chains and we'll make sure that this front fascia line is
straight as the string and then we'll go to the next step which is getting the
peak square with the overhang on this end wall and the fascia board so we want
that sucker squared in with the eave that way when we run our sheets and we
mark it all out they're not gonna jag they're gonna be in a perfectly straight
line well this is probably one of our worse you can see going that way if I
get over the string line how the fascia is too far out so this this truss here
it needs to go out I'm sorry it's back so what we do is when we put our square
here you can see the distance between it that's how much we got to move it which
means this guy here it needs to come my way to bring that square to the string
line and I think I usually try to go to the middle of the biggest
and I try to push that so guerrilla man here Greg what are you doing is gonna
put that chain we've already got it here I'm the trust and we're gonna bring it
to a column below me and we'll we'll use the binder and I know some guys have
been like well why don't you use like one of those ratchet binders honestly
they take up more room a little bit more costly and it doesn't take a whole lot
once you figure out what you're doing to put the stamp binder on and you kind of
get a feel for how much it moves so we're just wrapping the chain around the
bottom of the column and then we'll just put tension on that chain with the
binder the snap binder and that's what's gonna move this
put a wedge on it Gregg got about an eighth of an inch so once we once we get
really close we just grab a piece of scrap lumber and kind of wedge the chain
to make it even tighter okay so you got a wedge on it okay once you give me just
a just a hair more yep too much
mmm I like that perfect a little bit of push and pull that little buildings are
honestly they seem to always be more of a struggle than the big buildings the
big buildings just seem to fall into place
the little buildings any amount of air seems to show up a lot easier I don't
know why we've now got all of our tails out to where we want them
the problem is is on eight-foot Center trusses you've always got to be
cognizant of your lumber and sometimes you might put a board up two days later
you've had weather on it and it might get a little squirrely on you and that's
okay don't worry if in between your trust tales that you've got a little bit
of movement on that board because I'll show you once we start installing the
roofing metal how you kind of deal with that and keep a straight face line so
now that we have everything straight we've gone and we've checked this string
line to be perfect we always do the ritual and that is you take the string
line you leave it fastened on that end you pull it back super super tight let
me sing it super lame super childish super fun and that's what you got to do
you gotta have fun on the jobsite because we are roofing roofing that was
lame ugh dude again no okay let's go so like I said the next thing
that we have to do besides put a block right here so we continue this purlins
line we've got this straight we've got our walls plumb now we have to do is
Greg's up there sitting secured and waiting for my tape measure so we can
pull a diagonal measurement from the peak of the roof back down I've got the
dimension here of twenty one five and a half that is from this point to the
ridge point I then measured from here all the way down
to this point that's 17-foot so I should be able to pull tape measure from his
point to my point and what was it great 24 Oh 27
four-and-a-half let's just check because it's always worth checking
I know I've showed the builders helper calculator well that is no longer
supported by iOS Apple so now I've got the construction Master Pro and I typed
in my rise of 21 five-and-a-half the run of 17 foot that gives me a diagonal of
27 foot four and a half all right let me see if I can fish out the Stanley fat
max that far I don't think I'm gonna get a 20 foot man you might to come meet me
halfway all right that was a bit of a challenge but the fat max they say
that's got like a 12 foot stand out well Greg's about 20 foot away so that was
interesting had to play the wind we got it now what we're looking for is 27
four-and-a-half Greg okay you're holding me on your point oh my gosh we're so
close 27 4 and at eleven sixteenths so we need to shorten this to 27 four and a
half that means zach is ready down there to tension the chain on the peak that is
right over there and he's gonna pull the one that goes to that post down there
just a little bit more snug that way we can bring this over so you're gonna see
what's gonna happen here guys that was a sixteenth too much brother take it off
and throw a wedge on it oh yeah put that back on and snug this guy up over here
okay so you can see I mean honestly that's that's really close but I'd like
to Snug that one back up so if you can see we've got a little bit of a system
that we go through we always plumb up our walls we straighten the eave or the
side wall then we get our peak square as perfect as we can because that is what
matters even more than having a straight eve so that you can reduce the jag on
your sheets cuz I get a lot of guys that message me and they say hey how do I
take care of like every time I put a sheet it like doesn't lap perfectly and
it's not straight that is the biggest thing you've got to have a square peak
on your roof system by far the most important if your fascia is not straight
it's gonna look like crap but your sheets will look good so always always
always spend a little time and make sure that that peak is Square to the rest of
your building a little bit more a little bit more whoa I think I can live with
that twenty seven four and a half all right I
think we're ready to rough house that end wall look
okay so next step after the peak is square the eave is straight the corners
are plumb we check our end wall and check it to be straight we could use a
little bit of a pole alright on this first post usually that's where you have
to pull we don't need much so I think we might even try to wedge a board on the
outside so now that we've got everything straight everything is ready for the
roof we've got to think about the next most important thing and that is the
layout your steel layout is what's important so that everything works
across the roof now on this one specifically if you look right up here
we've got a drop in our roof so our pitch and this building over here is
only 29 foot wide this is 39 foot wide so right here we've got an extension of
this peak where this peak goes back down and we've got to think about where all
the ribs lay out so that our gable trim works that gable trim works the sidewall
flashing that is back on the other side works all these ribs line up and then
the last gable trim on that end lines up but we're ready to put our filler strips
on you've seen us do that before that goes underneath the ribs that way you
know it closes up those little gaps and get this thing let's get it going here
Greg get that fall protection on Greg I value you so good luck man peace be with
you and also with you get up there come on