A new Folly at Full Moon Farm-- build thread

[cbailey]

Beautiful job! It will bring joy to you, your family and guests for years. Well done.

[SandySpringsPizza]

Great thread. Very helpful. Did you find that 18 gauge was strong enough? I want to enclose my oven with a dog house like rwiegand using faux stone. Will 18 ga. support it?

[rwiegand]

Great thread. Very helpful. Did you find that 18 gauge was strong enough? I want to enclose my oven with a dog house like rwiegand using faux stone. Will 18 ga. support it?

Yes, 18 would support almost anything. I think that I ended up using 20 or 22 ga-- I can't remember and I didn't find it in a quick perusal of my own thread. Going up to the really heavy ones would have cost about 5x as much, and I was assured by the guys at the lumber yard completely unnecessary. I did space them 12" OC in a sprit of overbuilding. No sagging yet (actually no detectable deflection), and it has had several feet of snow on it, as well as my full weight on multiple occasions.

The stone veneer puts very little weight on the frame-- the frame just holds it vertical and it the weight is supported at the base. The roof (and any snow load) is what might stress the framing. The slate and plywood, while heavy, doesn't require exceptional framing. Because I wanted to keep the structure as short as reasonable I didn't have the equivalent of ceiling joists to hold the walls together at the top of the wall. I substituted with beefy collar ties as low as I could place them over the dome. (Weight on the roof will tend to push the walls outward) So far so good!

Short answer is that any structurally rated stud should be fine. Just avoid the lightweight ones from the Borg.

[SandySpringsPizza]

Thanks for the fast reply. I am going to use structural steel, not stuff for drywall. I did forget that I"m not hanging the stones on the frame, just stacking against it.

Thanks,

[Chach]

Thanks for the fast reply. I am going to use structural steel, not stuff for drywall. I did forget that I"m not hanging the stones on the frame, just stacking against it.

Thanks,

Hi Mark,

I throw my 2 cents in. I used structural steel studs 18g . Very very strong stuff. I purchased mine from a contractor supply house and it was pretty reasonable. I paid less than $200 for all the framing I needed. The place I purchased mine from sold it by the foot so it didnt matter how long of a piece I purchased as it was priced by the foot and I could buy 1 or 1000 no minimum quantity needed. There is a store called Menards similar to a home depot by me but they are not by Georgia. They also sold them by the 10 pack. You can check the pro desk at depot and see if they can special order them for you. Thats what i did at Menards but also needed a piece and went to the supply house after the fact. If you get charged by the pice and you know what size you need for your walls and roof it might make sense to buy a longer stud and if it works out cheaper and you get more usable pieces out of it. if you needed 3 foot pieces and they have 8 footers see how much a 12 footer is it would give you twice the pieces but cheaper than two 8 footers and have lottle to no waste. Hope this helps.

Ricky

[SandySpringsPizza]

I am framing with 18 ga. steel studs and tracks. What did you use for roof rafters? I can't find anything called a steel rafter. Did you use studs or tracks?

[Chach]

I am framing with 18 ga. steel studs and tracks. What did you use for roof rafters? I can't find anything called a steel rafter. Did you use studs or tracks?

You would have to make them out of studs.

Ricky

[SandySpringsPizza]

thank you. Very helpful again.

[rwiegand]

Yes, I used studs to make the rafters, You want the added stiffness that the extra bend in the stud provides.