Sloping the "Flat" Roof, a.k.a. the Sleeping Porch

  

The part of the house which seems to generate the most confusion is the section of the roof which juts up and out from the rest of the roof line. This has also been one of the slowest areas to finish building. When it's finished, the area beneath will be a 2nd story porch (actually it's about five feet above the second story). Although it's covered by the "fly-away" portion of the roof, it will still receive a certain amount of windblown rain, so I've been working on creating a means of drainage. I began by including two scuppers in the layout of the parapet wall on the East side which will be cut out later when we know the precise dimensions of the actual scuppers. Then I made a crude tapered jig which I used to rip four foot lengths of 2x4's and 2x6's to taper evenly. I started with pieces that tapered from 1" to nothing. It would have been easy enough to create an even slope from West to East, but this would have meant that water would flow evenly towards the entire parapet wall, and would pool up where there was no scupper. So I began by sloping the floor along the bottom of the wall. This solved the problem of water pooling along the wall's edge, but it meant that at the East end of each joist, the desired height to achieve was slightly different. So with the rest of my first batch of shims, I cut off either a little or a lot off the thin end so that the height matched the shim at the edge. In the photos you can see the resulting wave pattern of shims. Although the shims all came out to different distances from the wall depending on how much I had to cut off the thin end, each is exactly the same thickness which made it easy to extend the slope. I just ripped a second batch of shims that tapered from 2" down to 1" and butted the 1" end to the already attached shim. Because the shims are structural in the sense that they will in effect become the bearing portion of the floor joists when I lay plywood down, I glued each shim before I nailed it. I'm not sure if this is necessary, but it certainly seems like a good idea and the small extra step seems well worth it. I also had to use a large nailset to drive the framing nails deep enough into the taller 3" to 2" shims so that the nails would catch deeply enough into the joist. Once the subfloor is down I'll apply flat roofing material ("flat roof" refers to roofs which are in actuality only nearly flat, 1/4" per foot is the minimal slope). On top of that I'll put down sections of decking (which won't be nailed down since that would puncture the roofing), rainwater will pass through the decking, run down the roofing material to the scupper, and leave the building. Of course, the entire process of shimming will have to be repeated in reverse in order to create a deck which is level on top of a roof which slopes! Now that it's basically just me working, the immensity of the work remaining to be done is pretty daunting. But I'm enjoying the problem solving, and seeing real progress day by day. 

In the above photo you can see the word "SCUPPER" scrawled on the bottom plate, and see that the shims along the wall and on the joist tapper away to nothing at this spot.

By notching the shims around the columns, I've created a place to nail the plywood, which will also wrap around the columns.

Here you can see clearly the "wave" pattern in the layout of the shims.

Update for New Year

Hope everyone's holidays were great. Before I get into all the updates I'd like to take a second and say THANK YOU to all the hands that have helped on our project, especially Rafe and John for travelling to come and get this project off the ground. We honestly could not have gotten this far without all the advice, talent, and sweat of all of you, we are truly blessed with a wonderful community. Thank you!!

John left last Saturday after putting in 2 months of blood, sweat, and tears into our house. I can't begin to express how grateful we are to him for giving so much of his time and talent to our project. John and I have known eachother since we were 11 and this is the longest time we've spent together since highschool. Miracously we didn't fight once (barring a couple outbursts). Which is saying a lot since we know all of eachother's buttons.

Updates, We finally have the house pretty dried in. For awhile there the stress of impending rain could be cut with a knife. Neurotically checking the weather and late night sweeping to prevent puddling. But now the house wrap and tar paper are on, Horray! We're looking at a couple different metal roof distributors. Hopefully we'll get the roof and fascia, etc on soon and can then take a bit of a break from the BIG Push.

In other news my sister and her 11 month old son returned with me to Austin after the holidays. Babies and Jobsites!? I know it sounds crazy but besides some dirty clothes from crawling around it went very smoothly. Maceo is a fantastic baby and Ila wasn't shy about getting out there to help. They left yesterday, ending 2-1/2 months of house guests. It feels really good to be back to just the two of us, although I do miss having a witness to Jesse's antics.

Onto the photos...........


Jesse finishing the rake board. No worries, he's harnessed in.


Jesse contemplating some door options. Not to boast, but I think our doors are going to be awesome!


This is the house with all the rafters on. The 'fly away' roof, as Jesse likes to call it, is over the porch

Sunset photos. Looking from the office up to the porch.

Sunset photos. From porch down to the master bedroom (R) and office (L)

Roof Decking!!

This picture is from the roof looking into the porch.

Jesse securing the sheathing after cutting out the windows

Standing in the living room looking up at the office (L) and master bedroom (R) on the second floor. The guest room (L) and bathroom on the first floor (R)

Again from the office to porch but with all the wall sheathing and roof decking. The kitchen is below the porch.

East wall

Tar Paper and House Wrap!!!!!!!!

Sunset from the porch. You can see the outline of the Frost Tower in the distance.

Last (and highest) Beam!

If you've been following this blog, you'll know that we already celebrated the raising of the highest beam in the house. But outside the house there is a section of the roof which extends upwards past the ridge beam. So today John and I raised the highest beam on the structure, which is technically not "in the house." So, no party, but it is very exciting to have now installed every beam that will be installed. Tomorrow and probably one more day should be enough to finish cutting and installing rafters, then plywood will go on the roof, and very soon we can have everything protected from weather, which will be a considerable relief. The photos aren't the easiest to make sense of, it was getting dark when we knocked off for the day, but soon there will be rafters which will clarify how the roof slopes run. The second photo shows the beam and also the scaffolding we brought up to help us get the beam in place. (The first photo was taken from the top of the scaffolding).