BeanAnimal's 42" build - Pittsburgh PA

[BeanAnimal]

For the structure (like many other builds) I chose to use steel studs.
Without a HUGE hassle - only 25 gauge was available. Not pleased, but not willing to chase down #18s for such a small quantity.

Following the theme here (bomb shelter) and the light gauge - I used 12" OC spacing for walls and rafters. This also fits the 3'x5' cement board dimensions better with far less waste.

Also - I plan on a slate roof and a large snow load capacity, as the timber frame may get pushed off for a year due to timing and my workload.

I framed for a cast iron "vent" in the rear that will be mostly hidden by the fence. This is simply for an aesthetically pleasing access hatch for thermocouple replacement. I may or may not actually go through with this.

I got the order process started today for my veneer stone
I also found a local slate expert (Joeseph Jenkins, http://josephjenkins.com/) willing to find suitable material in his yard and offer a bit of help/advice and his book as part of the deal. I am kind of excited about this actually.

I built a jig for the steel trusses, so that they were all the same shape. I then (not shown) assembled most of the roof on the ground by attaching the offset ridge tie and end channels. I then simply lifted it into place and started securing it and adding bridging (again overkill, but I have the spare steel).

Excuse the few crooked braces - it got dark again and I couldn't see. I couldn't stand seeing these in the morning, so removed them and replaced them using the square.

FWIW - there are no CAD plans for this portion. I started to lay them out and decided it was not worth the trouble. So just framing as I go.

[BeanAnimal]

Other updates:

I had planned on a few soffit lights in the front - but looking at photos of can lights in soffits (no offense to those who have them), bleh! Wow are they ugly in use.

So to those of you that have them - do you find them useful or just bug attractors?

[BeanAnimal]

I have ordered the stone veneer and my landing area stone - The price did not shock me, but at this point have just given in to the fact that my break even point....

Well let's just say that for what I have in this thing, for the same cost, I could quite literally fly (first class even) to the top 25 pizza parlors in the US and still have some cash for beer!

Copper drip edge for the slate roof anyone?

[UtahBeehiver]

One of the members did a slate roof with copper trim this particular year or so. Might search slate as a key word

Found it
https://community.fornobravo.com/for...d-thread/page6

[Chach]

One of the members did a slate roof with copper trim this particular year or so. Might search slate as a key word

Found it
https://community.fornobravo.com/for...d-thread/page6

rwiegand did a roof like that with the copper trim and looked great

Ricky

[Chach]

Other updates:

I had planned on a few soffit lights in the front - but looking at photos of can lights in soffits (no offense to those who have them), bleh! Wow are they ugly in use.

So to those of you that have them - do you find them useful or just bug attractors?

I find them very useful...as far as bug attractors any light will attract the unwanted flying bugs. I have yet to encounter any crazy amount of bugs due to the lights. I also used these lights because I didnt want something that the kids could break easiky by playing in the yard. I used the extra thin recessed led lights no can housing needed. especially with space limitations.

Ricky

[rwiegand]

Copper drip edge for the slate roof anyone?

The slate is not so bad, the copper flashing will kill you. The copper nails for the slate are expensive enough that you'll find yourself crawling around in the bushes looking for the one you dropped.

Looks really nice though.

[UtahBeehiver]

Yep, when I took all the scrap copper, from my oven covering, to the metal salvage I got 50$ just the the scrap pieces.

[BeanAnimal]

I find them very useful...as far as bug attractors any light will attract the unwanted flying bugs. I have yet to encounter any crazy amount of bugs due to the lights. I also used these lights because I didnt want something that the kids could break easiky by playing in the yard. I used the extra thin recessed led lights no can housing needed. especially with space limitations.

Ricky

To be sure - I was not speaking of any oven builds. I have neighbors who have can lights in their soffits around the fronts of their home, crisp white (blue) spaced on 6’ centers. Really ugly in my opinion... looks like a house shaped UFO starting to take off and I can’t make out if they are running lights or some sort of propulsion technology with blue exhaust plumes.

I planned small dimmable gimbal led trims on the warm side of white, maybe square with bead board t&g soffits. But hope to rely on a spot or two in the timber frame in hopes of moving the point source further from the oven. I hate bugs.

[BeanAnimal]

The slate is not so bad, the copper flashing will kill you. The copper nails for the slate are expensive enough that you'll find yourself crawling around in the bushes looking for the one you dropped.

Looks really nice though.

I priced a standing seam copper roof... not going to happen, even DIY. I just can’t justify the cost, regardless of how much I like the look.

[BeanAnimal]

UtahBeehiver thanks for the link.

rwiegand the slate looks great. Did you buy a slate cutter and slate hammer?

As much as a love tools, the older I get, the less enthused I am about buying specialty tools. I hate buying junk, so usually opt for quality, even for rare use items. I put a mini split in my 12x14 insulated shed yesterday, after waiting 2 weeks for 3 different friends to get to it. Free HVAC help falls behind paying customers in the summer heat! Anyway, I now own various Yellow jacket HVAC adapters, a 2 stage vacuum pump, a digital micron gauge and a new set of gauges (yeah the valves on the harbor freight gauges leaked under vacuum). So $500 worth of specialty tools that I may use 3 times in the next 5-10 years. I still saved money (let alone waiting on the backlog) but am not thrilled about more rare use tool storage.

[Chach]

To be sure - I was not speaking of any oven builds. I have neighbors who have can lights in their soffits around the fronts of their home, crisp white (blue) spaced on 6’ centers. Really ugly in my opinion... looks like a house shaped UFO starting to take off and I can’t make out if they are running lights or some sort of propulsion technology with blue exhaust plumes.

I planned small dimmable gimbal led trims on the warm side of white, maybe square with bead board t&g soffits. But hope to rely on a spot or two in the timber frame in hopes of moving the point source further from the oven. I hate bugs.

No I think you were talking about my build LOL Everyone has their own likes and dislikes....Seriously you asked a question and gave you my experience with it so far and why I chose them...Either way you go it will function great and look good because light is better than no light at all. Just make sure whatever you go with you install the electric per code and I would make sure you put the lights on a ground fault circuit (GFCI) along with any receptacles if you add any. Easiest way to do that is get a GFCI circuit breaker and then you can use regukar devices outside and still be protected but without the bulky GFCI receptacles. If you choose to go with the GFCI receptackes make sure you purchase WR rated GFCI which stand for Weather Resistant asthere are two kinds now manufactured. Non WR for inside and now most codes require WR for outdoor applications. I was actually thinking of painting the trims the same color as the soffit to minimize the white ring look but I didn't want to start getting silly and crazy and having paint fade and or flake off so just left them for now.


Ricky

[BeanAnimal]

Thanks for the detailed response! Your advice is spot on and Information that needs to shared more often in DIY project threads. I would go a step further and tell folks to not to even consider DIY electrical unless they actually know exactly what the hell they are doing. I cringe at a lot of the stuff I see on forums, and in person. Killing yourself is one thing, putting other folks in danger is another.

When we purchased the house, (wow 15+ years ago), a 30x30 ranch with finished basement, I pulled the 6 circuit 60A service and 1958 cloth insulated BX cable out and rewired everything. As with the theme here... a bit more than needed. 200A - 32 space panel, 12 space sub for kitchen, 12 space sub for the shed/workshop, 12/2 everywhere, mostly hospital grade Hubble or Leviton. Just about everything has its own circuit... 3 of them for outside lighting and utility. In before the insane afci rules, but have added them where appropriate now that they work better.

The oven area already has a circuit that will be switched and branched into the stand (1.5” pvc) and converted to MC in a JB just inside of the wood storage area. It tend to use a GFCI per box outdoors, as I don’t like downstreams, stickers or a trip to the basement to reset the breaker when I do something silly like cut the cord with the trimmer or drop the grinder in the brick bath . Honestly, I am embarrassed to say how often I cut a cord with a saw or the hedge trimmer, or shovel, etc. I will tell you that I buy Hubble weatherproof male and female ends by the box and have a lot of short SOJW cords instead of a few long ones. Just don’t take a DIY cord or repaired cord on a job site, the OSHA guy will mumble and twitch as he writes a violation.
.
I used to hate bubble covers and liked the damp location metal springy covers. Lately I am a big fan of the new generation of bubbles, so will sprinkle a few near the oven.

[rwiegand]

UtahBeehiver thanks for the link.

rwiegand the slate looks great. Did you buy a slate cutter and slate hammer?

.

No, I didn't have that many cuts to make. I just cut the slates on the wet saw and then chipped the edges with a rock hammer so they looked like the ripped edges. I broke a couple in the process, but the cost of that was way less than buying the tools. After the first few I didn't break them. I don't think anyone who was not a pro slater could pick out the ones I cut; I'm not sure I could pick them out now. I didn't put them all at one edge, but mixed them in. Using mixed widths of slate makes for a more informal look anyway; harder to see imperfections.

[Chach]

Thanks for the detailed response! Your advice is spot on and Information that needs to shared more often in DIY project threads. I would go a step further and tell folks to not to even consider DIY electrical unless they actually know exactly what the hell they are doing. I cringe at a lot of the stuff I see on forums, and in person. Killing yourself is one thing, putting other folks in danger is another.

When we purchased the house, (wow 15+ years ago), a 30x30 ranch with finished basement, I pulled the 6 circuit 60A service and 1958 cloth insulated BX cable out and rewired everything. As with the theme here... a bit more than needed. 200A - 32 space panel, 12 space sub for kitchen, 12 space sub for the shed/workshop, 12/2 everywhere, mostly hospital grade Hubble or Leviton. Just about everything has its own circuit... 3 of them for outside lighting and utility. In before the insane afci rules, but have added them where appropriate now that they work better.

The oven area already has a circuit that will be switched and branched into the stand (1.5” pvc) and converted to MC in a JB just inside of the wood storage area. It tend to use a GFCI per box outdoors, as I don’t like downstreams, stickers or a trip to the basement to reset the breaker when I do something silly like cut the cord with the trimmer or drop the grinder in the brick bath . Honestly, I am embarrassed to say how often I cut a cord with a saw or the hedge trimmer, or shovel, etc. I will tell you that I buy Hubble weatherproof male and female ends by the box and have a lot of short SOJW cords instead of a few long ones. Just don’t take a DIY cord or repaired cord on a job site, the OSHA guy will mumble and twitch as he writes a violation.
.
I used to hate bubble covers and liked the damp location metal springy covers. Lately I am a big fan of the new generation of bubbles, so will sprinkle a few near the oven.

Just remember the most important part of the system is the ground. I too started liking the in use covers since I leave my pool cleaner plugged in all the time it's nice to plug it in and close the lid. I have been using Taymac expandable covers. When you use them you pull them out and when not in use they lay very flat and less intrusive. I think you will like them for your project. What trade are you in?