High end cedar porch construction: the finale

In the previous blog putting the heavy awkward rafters up by myself was discussed.  The result was beautiful and the structure looked like a pergola.   I pondered should I stop and leave it as is? No way Jose!  Now it was time to put on the planking.  Really the planking  has two functions.  One is to provide the finished ceiling and the other is to provide the roof sheathing to attach the shingles.  Since  I was required to use use roofing nails that were 1.25" to attach the shingles, I had to use  2" inch thick planking otherwise the nails would poke through the ceiling and make an unsightly mess

The 1.25" nails were galvanized which is not a good for cedar since it will make a black stain.  However, I figured (time will tell) that since the nail did not go all the way through the planking and was covered by shingles that I would never see the black marks.

I almost went with a tongue and grove system.  But in the end I decided on using ship lap with a beveled edge.  To make the ship lap I used my harbor freight dado blade on my table saw and cut the lap in in one pass.  It was actually a pretty big cut to take out of the wood all at once but I was impatient.  In fact my saw blade would slow down a lot and the saw would get all choked up with saw dust requiring that I clean the port out when it was running.

Below is a picture of the table saw setup.  Notice I have fence that embeds the dado blade, one feather board to press the board down to the table and two feather boards to keep the board up against the fence.  This assured that the ship lap is consistently and precisely cut every time.  I probably could have used another feather board to press the board to the table on the out feed end.

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In addition to the ship lap joint I used my Milwaukee router to bevel the edges.  Below are 6 ship lap boards after they have been finished with Olympic elite wood land oil.

Installing Planking can have its challenges.  It can be warped and when it is installed it can end up uneven and unsightly.  One thing I had going for me was the top plate or main beam was really close to being parallel to the house and the rafters were all really close to the same length.  So my attention to detail in the beginning meant I was set up for success.

To combat the problem of warped wood, I devised a system to take out the twists and turns making all the planks straight and parallel to each other.  To do this I made use of pipe clamps which pressed the wood together and made the lap joints tight.  In the end this required some long pipe clamps as more and more planks were added and even using multiple pipe clamps to grab on to each other to get the job done.

 

To fasten the planks to the rafters I used 3.5" stainless steel ring shank nails.  I put three nails in per rafter.

During the design phase of this project the designer was very insistent on using diagonal bracing to shore up the cedar porch.  But dad who had structural engineering experience knew it was unnecessary.  We submitted the design without diagonals to the professional engineer and he passed it. When the designer found this out he said, "he bought it" referring to the professional engineer and indicated that the p.e. would sign anything.  I decided to trust my dad on the diagonal brace issue and went to building the the porch.

It was actually quite wobbly in the beginning before I had installed the planks which made me think that maybe some diagonal bracing needed to be done.  But when I finished adding all the planks, the porch was as solid and sturdy as a brick shit house and wasn't going anywhere.  Dad was right!

After the planking, I had a number of finishing tasks for the porch like putting on the fascia and drip edge all along the perimeter.  The end result was beautiful and shown below.

 

 

 

 

In the end I am so glad that I stuck with the cedar porch idea.  But the question is, did I save anything by doing this work myself?  Exactly how much I saved is hard to estimate.   I really doubt that I could find any one in town to do the custom cedar porch that I had made.  Because I did it myself and went through several iterations of design I was able to get in touch with what I really wanted.  In fact I'm sure people have asked a contractor to do work for them and then realize once it is all done that its not what they really wanted and they end up unhappy.  Case in point what I had originally conceived of when I started the porch is totally different then what I ended up with.

But what rate would  a contractor charge?  I know one thing for sure is that every time I asked for a change in the plans, which there were many, the cost would go up a lot and it would be way more than the initial estimate.

My estimate is as follows:

For materials cost I spent about $7050.  The complete break down of materials is listed below:

$7.54       dowels

$30.13     gloves

$237.03   nails

$154.41   Simpson connectors, anchors

$17.47     anchors

$12.69     sand

$33.74     ledger anchors

$4329.32 cedar

$14.97     saw dust bags

$326.4     olympic oil

$89.07     sand paper

$70.2        mineral spiits

$26.87     paint brush

$$450      permit/

$450      engineering

$750      drawings

The number of hours I worked was 231.  Keep in mind that these hours are onsite physical labor hours and don't include things like planning and running to the store to get materials.  So I think my recorded hours are conservative and comparable to what a contractor would spend doing the job.  After looking at the site homewyse.com $50 dollar an hour for contractors labor rate seems to be on the low end.  Drywallers make this much and I think that the fine work required by the cedar porch is at a higher skill level and would probably cost more. Anyway based on $50 dollars an hour labor rate a contractor would have charged $11,550 for labor.

The total contractor cost for installing the cedar portion of the porch would be about $18600.

That's means s whopping $11550 or 62% was saved.  Cue the cash register sound.

Happy Building!

The Dr

 

High end cedar porch construction: the rafters

In the last two blogs, the ledger and the main beam (top plate) were discussed.   After having put these two structural members in place it was now time to make and place the rafters.  There were a couple of challenges that I had to  overcome with the making and placing of the rafters.  One of the challenges would be I had to make my first birdsmouth ever on a large beam without any second chances and the other was I had to place these awkward rafters up higher than I could reach.

The porch required 10 4" x 10" rafters.  8 of them were exactly the same.  Each of them had to be cut at an angle at one end so that they would be flush to the house and account for the roof pitch of 12/2.5.  In addition I had to run a router bit down the two edges to make the rafters more appealing to the eye.

Each rafter also had to be drilled at an angle at each end for two countersunk 14" 1/2" lag bolts which secured the rafters to the ledger and main beam.  The lags provide 1000 lbs withdrawal strength and have the nice feature that they are hidden from view.

In addition each end of the rafter needed a birds mouth which allows the rafter to sit nicely on flat surface on the ledger and main beam.   The positioning of the birdsmouth is important.  If you don't get it right then there will be an unsightly gap or it will cause the wall it sits on to become out of plumb..  Also the angles of the heel and seat must be perfect to make it look professional.

To help me with these challenges I made a guide out of 2"x8" lumbers.  I already knew how to position the birdsmouth against the wall of the house.  So I made a birdsmouth in the end of the guide.  But for the other birdsmouth that rests on the main beam I did not know the position.  In fact the position is slightly different depending on what part of the main beam the rafter sits on.  So I left that birdsmouth off the guide.

Once the guide was made I attempted to put it on the ledger and main beam by using brute strength and a ladder.  It didn't take much to cause it to fall to the ground and leave a mark on the ledger.  Time for plan B!

To assist with the placement of  the guide, I built a crane using the cheap harbor freight winch and dock lumber which is shown below. 

This helped stop the guide from falling to the ground and allowed me to mark where the birdsmouth should go at my leisure.  Only there was one problem, if the rafter were to be installed with the crane I had built it would be difficult to get the crane removed from the rafter.  Woops!

The next step was to cut the birdsmouth.  I followed the procedure used in this video for the seat cut in the birds mouth.  I actually had to come at the birdsmouth from both sides of the beam because it was too thick and my circular saw was too shallow.  To make sure the angle was correct I marked it on the rafter and followed the mark with my saw.

For the heel cut I had to tilt the saw to 21.8 degrees and make the saw the appropriate depth.  Since there were a number of birdsmouths to make I took a spare block of cedar and cut it when the saw was adjusted.  The block served as a means to quickly setup the saw when going back and forth between saw adjustments.  I would just put the saw in the block and make the saw match it.  Once adjusted I made the heel cut with one pass.

Since the saw blade is circular the wood was not completely freed from the rafter, I had to use a chisel to knock out the wood from the birdsmouth where it was left attached.  It was easily done but left an undesirable uneven surface so I used my Makita 1/2 sheet sander and smoothed it off.  The end result is shown below.

 

Next I drilled the countersink hole and the shaft hole for lag bolt holes, sanded the rafter and applied Olympic elite woodland oil to finish it off.

After the beam was ready I redesigned the crane and installed the beam shown below.

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As was said before 8 of the rafters were the same but there were two rafters that were not.  These beams rested on the ledger but not the main beam.  The reason that these different rafters came about was because the way the house sits on the property.  The porch I wanted ends up crossing the set back line.  This required that one corner of the porch to be cut off at an angle in the design.  Well if one corner gets cut off then so does the other to make it nice looking.  Even though the set back line is a pain in the ass, the end result was much more architecturally pleasing cedar porch.  So I'm kind of glad I had the problem to deal with.

Because the 2 different rafters did not sit on the main beam they had to sit on posts.  This called for a more complicated joint.  It required a two oak peg mortise and tenon joint and an embedded lag to secure the rafter to the post.  In addition a birdsmouth is involved.  The mortise was difficult for me to make due to its angle in the wood but I'm happy with the end result.

At this point the cranes broad base made it impractical to use at the end of the porch without wasting a bunch of time to try make it work.   So I placed a call into the cavalry and asked my friend Glen to help me put in the last two rafters.  Nice to have backup when you need it!   The end result is shown below.

  

Now that the rafters were all installed, it was time for the cedar planking.  The planking job came out perfect and after having done it I can see how it is easy to totally screw it up making the job look unprofessional.  In the next blog we will discuss what techniques I used to make the planking come out as good if not better than a professional would have done even though it was my first time.

Happy Building!

The Dr.  

High end cedar porch construction: the main beam

In the previous blog I talked about the ledger which required that I make my first ever lap joint.  This time around I want to focus on the largest piece of wood in the whole cedar porch.  It is the main beam that holds the other end of the rafters.

The beam was a very nice piece of wood.  Its dimensions were 6" x 12" by 20'2".  I actually really needed the extra 2" in the 20' measurement because of the patio slab dimensions and was lucky that 20' beam I ordered came a little longer. It was rough cut western red cedar.  It was gorgeous and smelled wonderful.
 
To start off I decided to plane the beam. Luckily before dad left he helped me plane the beam through my inadequate 6" porter cable thickness planar. It was ridiculous shoving that huge piece of wood through there.  The beam was actually 6.25" wide so we were maxed out with the planar.

One trick I learned through this process was to put Johnson Paste Wax on the the wood bearing surface of the planar which would make the wood slide more easily.  Also I had bolted the planar down to the sturdy shop bench I had made but even so everything was just too small so that the beam never quite aligned right with the planar and so we ended up pushing with all our might to get it through.  We ran it through a couple of times but it was not the best planing job. 

Once the 6" dimension was done it was time to tackle the 12" dimension.  I decided that a joiner would be the way to go.  I have a 6" Joiner from Lowes and there was no way I could run this huge beam on this little joiner which only has a 31" long table.  I had a hard enough time with 8' lumber.  20' lumber would be impossible.  Ever since I owned the joiner I wanted to get a better one I just never could find one for a decent price.  But now I was forced to put in an order for a joiner with a 6' long table for about $1000.   I wasn't sure that this would work but I had to try something.

Luckily, the item was discontinued and I did not get it.  I say luckily because my dad came up with the idea to use the joiner I had upside down.  When I did this I was quite amazed how well it worked.  The joiner even has two convenient bars on the bottom that function well as handles to hold the joiner as I guided it along the wood beam.   Its almost as if the joiner was made to work upside down.  After working so well my opinion of my little joiner had changed from I want to get rid of this piece of shit  to I kinda like this useful tool.  I think I'll keep it.

After planing the 20'2" beam I worked on the post joints.  By this time dad was gone and I had to do the rest of the work myself.  For the post joints Dad and I had designed a mortise and tenon joint with two oak pegs.  The joint was stronger than hurricane ties but also provided the beauty of a natural wood joint.  The mortise was designed to be 5" deep by 2.75" by 5.5".

To make a 5" deep mortise, I turned to youtube for instruction.  I found this video which makes use of chisels.   After watching several videos like this I decided to buy the cheapest mortise chisels I could find which are still pretty expensive.  They are Narex mortise chisels from the czech republic found on amazon.com.

I also saw this video of a chain saw mortisor and started drooling.  A chain  saw mortisor would have been so nice for this project but its hefty price tag of $1700 dollars put it out my reach.  I did think of using my drill press with a Forstner bit or mortise attachment on it but the beam height of 12" made it so that it would actually not even fit on the drill press once the bit was in the chuck.

What I actually ended up doing was using my milwaukee router with its plunge base and a 5 inch straight bit.  The five inch bit was the longest I could find.  I really wanted a 6" one, but this is just another example of why its so hard to make anything custom in the world today.  For making such a deep mortise I found that a 1/2" shank bits work best because I actually burnt my router out on a previous project with a 1/4" shank straight bit that bent.  Because the bit was bent, it vibrated the armature and then the router went up in smoke.  Long story short I got a professional to fix it and he screwed up the repair by not torquing it so that it fell apart when I was using it.  Luckily I was not hurt.  I had to buy the expensive tool to fix it and I decided not to ever let that guy repair my tools again

To aid in the making of the mortise I used a wood guide so that the mortise came out accurate.  Unfortunately, the mortise I made was only 4" deep. 

 

To carve out the final inch I resorted to a using a cheap drill guide,  drill extension and a Forstner bit.

The Forcner bit left a pretty rough bottom in the mortise so in the end I used my czech mortise chisels to clean the mortise up.  The end result is shown below.  Luckily the shoulder of the tenon covers up the roughness of the mortise edge so it is not seen

The next step was the tenon.  This was easily done with my harbor freight dado blade on my Dewalt table saw.  I also used a table saw sled that I had made previously from this video so that the shoulder and tenon would be square and accurate.  Shown below is half a tenon cut on the sled.
  

 

Once the tenons were cut it was time to fit them into the mortises.  Because I made the mortise and tenon accurately it was a tight joint.  There was a little clean out of the mortises to get the tenons in all the way and in fact it was necessary to apply Johnson paste wax to the tenon to prevent the tenon from getting stuck.

The next step was to drill the holes in the beam and tenon for oak pegs.  There were two pegs per tenon and I made sure to drill the holes when the tenons were fully engaged in the mortise.  I also made sure not to mix the posts up since each had a custom mortise and tenon joint.

To finish off the beam I ran a router bit down the edge, sanded the whole beam with my Makita half sheet finish sander and put Olympic elite natural woodland oil on all the wood pieces.  

Before I move on here I would just like to say that through this process I was sweating bullets and was stressed.  I feared making a mistake on this beautiful ancient wood and rendering it useless for the project.  What a waste that would be.  This is kind of the way it is for all my wood working projects.  All tasks have to be done with precision which requires great focus.  It pays not to rush things.

Once the wood was dry I was ready to put them in place.  But the question was, how could I possibly do this?  The wood was so large that a helper seemed to be the only way to mange it.  But because of liability concerns with bringing uninsured people over to help I came up with another way. 

To get the wood out of the garage and onto the patio slab in the back yard I made two dollies out of harbor freight caster wheels and some leftover wood.  This allowed me to easily transport the lumber to the porch.

 

Next I assembled the posts and beam and secured them with the oak pegs.  I then installed the ABU66 Simpson brackets on the cement pad which already had the anchor bolts sticking out ready to accept them.  With brackets in place I made use of a harbor freight winch and wood crane to erect the wall.

 

The winches from harbor freight are great for short time use.  When I buy them I use a 20% coupon that I can find online on my phone when I'm in the store.  I actually have owned 5 winches now and had to return 4 of them before the 90 day deadline because they broke.  I actually had to pay for one because it broke after the 90 day period.

Notice from the picture, I took care to protect the wood from the cable by wrapping it in wood and cardboard.  Once the beam wall was up I made sure the posts were plumb and the right distance from the house and nailed the posts into the Simpson brackets.  I left the top secured to the crane because it turns out that you cannot rely on the nailed Simpson post brackets to keep your wall up.  The nails could pull out and the wall can come crashing down.

In addition to the nails I put two through bolts in each post to fasten it to the  Simpson bracket.  The bolts are required because a hurricane could  strike my location and the roof would tend act like a giant sail creating a great force on the posts that could cause them to separate from the foundation. The bolt nail combination provides 2300 pounds of uplift protection through each post.  The porch would eventually have 5 posts.

Now that the main beam wall was up, it was time to start thinking of putting the rafters on.  This of course required more ingenuity on doing the task myself.,  This time the heights involved  were as high as 15', the rafter lumber dimensions were 4" x 10" x 14' long and the rafter weight was about 150 pounds.

In the next blog I will explain how I mastered putting these rafters up by myself.

Happy Building

The Dr.