Shipping container side wall loading

[Dugulater]

I am being asked by the building department in my county to prove trusses laid across two 40' shipping containers (20' apart) can hold the load of the trusses and roofing material. How would I obtain the loading limits for the top rail of a 40' side wall. The containers are supported with footing at the mid-point just to prevent long term sagging.

 

[driftLimiter]

Have you looked at these IBC provisions? [URL unfurl="true"]https://codes.iccsafe.org/content/ICCG52019/appendix-3-new-provisions-for-shipping-containers-in-the-2021-ibc-to-be-published-in-2020-[/url]

I don't know that it covers vertical loads. Typically I have seen people use HSS posts where there are concentrated loads.

 

[AskTooMuch]

I'm sure it can hold because we have several of those in our plant, 2 containers with truss/roof in between.

 

[driftLimiter]

Well how can you be sure without knowing the spans and loads? If it is point loading perhaps there is effective width of the wall that will resist the point load like a column.

 

[AskTooMuch]

OP said 20' span truss/roof on top of 2 containers.

 

[JStephen]

They are made to be stacked, which implies a good bit of strength, but that strength is also intended to be at certain specific points only, so if you load them in some other way, you're on your own.
For example- in the past, we found the floor is adequate for umpty thousand pounds (basically a truckload), but it also assumes that load is a uniform load over the entire bottom- so if you start wondering about point loads inside, you don't have much guidance.