Grants Pass Area Habitat For Humanity

Serving all of Josephine County and Western Jackson County
338 Ramsey Ave, 2nd Floor Caveman Color - Grants Pass, OR - 97528 (541) 474-2884 habitat@grantspasshabitat.com

Could you imagine getting those trusses up there without this? The gable ends have been set in place and two bundles of trusses are in place at either end waiting for us.

The next to final batch of trusses are going into place. It's pretty impressive to see them swinging around in the air that high off the ground.

Here's an interior view of where that last bundle of trusses is going. One person on either end holds the outer ends in place so they settle down on the top plate. The crane swings around for one last load.

Where there are no interior walls for support, the apex rests on this temporary T-post. We have quite a forest of 2x4's here with diagonal bracing in place to keep the walls true.

Look at that beautiful blue sky! In just this much time, it has gone from overcast to clear. We are going to have a really nice sunny day! The last bundle of trusses goes into place and we immediately start on gable end placement.

Have you got equal distances on either end? The gable trusses are the foundation for the roof and have to be centered before nailing down. Then you attach the line that will establish alignment for the rest.

Now we are ready to get the initial roof trusses in place. Several jobs are always going on at once. The gable vents are being installed.

The top plate is marked so the bottom chord of the truss is in alignment and this steel strip with cutouts taps down over the truss up at the apex to provide proper spacing there.

A little more detail here, you can see the steel spacer strip. It comes all folded up and you unfold and tap over the top chord when you have it in place. They're checking for spacing and final vertical leveling before tieing another truss in place with the temporary lateral brace. The gable truss and first three roof trusses are in place.

Oregon is a really wet state in wintertime, so this roof has gable overhang. The gable truss and first roof truss have to be notched for lateral support rafters to extend out to the end rafter. The end rafter will be nailed to the outer ends of the lateral rafters.

We're starting to move now!

The roof overhang is of the open soffit design with 2x4 blocking and a vent every third opening. The other gable gets notched for the lateral rafters.

Sure peeled down that stack of trusses didn't we? The last one is laying there waiting to go up. In the foreground, you can see the Y-post we use to push the truss apex up with.