Your leaking thatched hut during the restoration of a pre-Enlightenment state.

 

Hello, my name is Judas Gutenberg and this is my blaag (pronounced as you would the vomit noise "hyroop-bleuach").

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   weight of a roof
Sunday, April 22 2012
The weather had taken a turn for the cool and the rain that had begun yesterday continued spasmotically throughout the day, rendering the outdoors a generally unpleasant place to spend time. Nonetheless, I stood in the rain long enough to tally up the lumber and roofing that went into the construction of the roof for the greenhouse. I'd installed that roof with a view to one day raising it further so as to have usable indoor space beneath it, and I'm starting to think about actually doing that project. But first some planning is necessary, and part of that planning requires me to determine the weight of that roof, which will somehow have to be jacked up. The roof is made of galvanized steel and measures 160 square feet. At first I estimated "a couple hundred pounds," but then I did the math:

  • 90 feet of two by six rafters weighing two pounds per foot: 180 pounds.
  • 32 feet of two by six fascia: 64 pounds.
  • 16 feet of two by six false rafters: 32 pounds.
  • 32 feet of two by six rafter support girder: 64 pounds.
  • 30 feet of two by four inter-rafter blocking (at 1.28 pounds per foot): 38.4 pounds.
  • 160 square feet of 3/8 inch thick OSB (at 2.33 pounds per square foot: 372.8 pounds.
  • 160 square feet of galvanized steel roofing (estimated at being two pounds per square foot): 320 pounds.
  • Nails, bolts, screws, and other hardware: 4 pounds(?)

That comes to a total of 1075.2 pounds, several times what I had expected. Still, that is well within my ability to jack, though doing so will be awkward given the artificial terrain near the greenhouse and the tricky carpentry under the roof.

I actually have some experience jacking up a roof to make an interior space taller; in the autumn of 1990 when I began refashioning a small eight by ten foot smokehouse into the Shaque (where I would end up living for most of the 1990s), I jacked up its gabled roof to increase the height of its interior space from six to eight feet. That had involved pre-assembling the stud walls and gradually working them vertical and into place with the help of an automotive jack to force up the roof. My father had helped a little, but I'd done most of the work by myself.


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