I've never used them, but the FrameFAST screw from FastenMaster is marketed for exterior use. I think they recommend against using them in areas exposed to saltwater/spray, though.
FrameFAST Structural Framing System
"Approved for use in exterior applications including treated wood (ACQ-D)."
In terms of construction tolerances, how much misalignment do you generally find to be acceptable between the outer face of the rim board and the outer edge of the sill plate?
I have a house under construction, and the outer face of the 1.5" x 14" LSL rim board isn't flush with the outer...
Good point about constructability. A 40-ft 3.5" x 14" LSL weighs about 600 lbs. A crane will be on-site.
Straps are an option. After working on it some more, I'm leaning toward leaving it as a single piece.
As mentioned, the uplift force might not be a practical issue. Either way, it's...
I have a braced wall line in a single family home that spans from interior to exterior. I'm using a 3.5" x 14" LSL beam under the interior portion of the braced wall (spanning points 2-3-4 in the diagram below). This beam runs parallel to the floor joists. I'm considering extending this beam...
I'll quote this part again: "My client thinks that this person would really only be busy on the project 10-15% of the time and could work on other billable work while on site and not busy with site work."
The feels like the classic disconnect between "managers" and "makers": Maker's Schedule...
Those numbers seem fine to me. Maybe some diagrams and example calculations will help.
There are different ways to determine yield strength and elastic modulus (see various ASTM standards).
Yield strength is commonly determined as the stress at which a 0.2% strain offset line intersects the...
Eng16080, thank you. I live in a rural area with minimal permit requirements and no residential engineering requirements. This makes it difficult to find structural engineers who are well versed in residential work, since there's not much of a market for it. The net result is that I learned a...
I'm not a structural engineer, but I'm in the middle of a home build now. Although I have a builder and I hired an engineer for key structural aspects, I ended up doing a lot of the design work myself based on the IRC and other resources, so I have some opinions and experiences to share.
The...
Thank you for confirming that undersizing them is preferred for installation purposes.
Great idea to make them symmetric to prevent installation errors! I'll do that. The truss plates on the bottom two corners are currently larger than the top two corners, so the upper two plates will need to...
I have a couple of questions about truss blocks (aka drag blocks or shear blocks). This is my first time doing them, and they are uncommon in my area. The blocks will go between roof trusses above the exterior wall of a single-family home, adjacent to a porch overhang.
1) Is it advisable to...
Thank you, that's what I'll do.
I'm still unsure of the code requirements though, if any, for interior braced wall panel connections to other parts of the building.
My reading of the code is that interior braced wall panels need not be connected to roof framing or foundations, except for...
Does anyone know whether interior braced wall panels should be connected to roof framing or roof trusses?
IRC R602.10.8 and R602.10.8.2 suggest that the answer is "no", but this doesn't make sense to me. How else will the load from the roof diaphragm, roof framing, and ceiling be transferred...
Are there any required (or recommended) connections between interior braced wall panels and roof framing? This is for a single story, detached, one-family home in Seismic Design Category B.
R601.10.8 says braced wall panels shall be connected to floor framing or foundations. I assume this...
Any updates on this lateral bracing issue?
I think that XR250 is correct. For continuous spans, ForteWeb calls for additional bottom edge bracing. I assume because, under unbalanced loading conditions (e.g., one span heavily loaded, and the adjacent span lightly loaded), the bottom flange of...
Thank you all for the replies.
The backstory is that the house is under construction (foundation has been poured, framing starts soon), but I'm making some on-the-fly changes because the 24" deep floor trusses that were delivered last week were mismanufactured. To stay on schedule, we're...
The slab only needs to be 12" where it meets the house. The rest could be thinner, especially if the porch stem walls are taller than the basement walls (which they currently are -- the house is under construction).
The two-way slabs are my main structural concern, because there will be rooms...
Can a suspended structural concrete slab be too thick?
I am doing a preliminary "design" of structural cast-in-place concrete porch slabs on my new home, before I find a local structural engineer to do the real design.
The two-way slabs might be 12" thick, and the one-way slabs might be 8"...
Here are some more figures illustrating cracks in improperly finished grout shoulders:
https://www.uk.weber/technical-mortars/grouting-steel-baseplates
That's a great reference. Page 36 shows the exact situation -- grout poured above the bottom of the baseplate and left unchamfered ("Unsatisfactory"). It says this configuration will lead to cracks in the shoulders of the grout, which is what occurred in my baseplates.
Pages 35-36 also...
Thank you both.
Maybe the installer didn't finish the edges well because the baseplates are getting buried under a concrete slab anyway?
Slab has been poured, so I would only change something at this point it's a structural concern.
