That was an ambitious project. We (my family) built a house with manufactured trusses like that in 79. Before that in 75, I built a garage with a gambrel roof. We did it in a similar fashion where all the components were precut and stacked, but that's much simpler as there were only 4 main pieces for the rafters and plywood gussets at 3 locations. We built a jig on the deck of the roof and assembled the truasses and stacked them at one end until all were assembled and then spread them out. At that time, nail guns were out of the reach of the average home builder so it was all hand nailed.
I find it amusing how many people comment on why things won't work or make them out to be more complex than they really are. Most of the naysayers are people that don't want you to build things yourself because it affects their bottom line and profit margin. I also will be building my own floor trusses....despite all the hoops and barriers they want you to jump through.
yeah! i had a guy at hancock lumber laugh at me when i said id buid them myself. guess what garage is build and ive been working out of here for a year and its great. no roof sag, minimum floor bounce. its great. also a few local builders are my customers and they all have said theres nothing wrong with that idea and they will hold better then manufactured trusses!
I know right. I have several homes 100+ years old, and If you saw some of the things you'd scratch your head. There is one beam, which is a 2x4, on it's side. How did this last 100 years? Because the sheathing is real boards, and they are likely structrual. But, it gets worse for todays code compliance checkers...the ridge beam, is a 1x4. yet, it's been there 100 years. the rafters are 2x4's, the ceiling joists are 2x4, etc, etc.
A guy replaced a stairway, with one slightly longer, then the code guy, came and said, you changed it, now comply, it's got to be much longer. The guy sold the house. What are you doing looking in windows?
Nails have more shear strength than screws, and screws have more pull out strength. They used nails on the gusset plates, so I believe their methods are good.
great video, you guys were pretty clever in the construction of these trusses! I'm currently designing myself a 36' x 56' two story garage and I want an open floor plan on the bottom floor and those trusses are the way to go but as you know $$$$. so of course I searched "DIY Floor trusses" word for word and found your video...I am pretty confident I can do what you did thanks to your efforts. only difference is I'm going to mill the lumber from my sugarbush using a new woodmizer, I'd better get started lol
@@normbograham ;Negative. I have projects that I glued up over twenty years ago. If you tried to break them apart they are just as strong as the day they set. However, there is one thing crucial. The type of glue and how it is applied.
My experience dates to 1987, truss repair, and otherthings "glued" to the ceiling. There WAS a black goo glue, which was popular, and failing around 87. the glue got brittle. It also delaminated as it got brittle. Roofs have to bounce if a branch hits them, and/or bounce back, if a huge load is on the roof, and then taken off. The truss repair was recertified. Basically, the company puts up a bond, and the bond company never wants to pay a claim. So, they did not include any glue in the truss repair. There was a yellow glue used for rubber roofs, that's the only glue we used. Your 20 years, experience, is after my experience, but the bond company would NOT insure if your glue was part of the structure, becasue we were repairing and recertifying failures from bad glue. In my experience, I never saw Elmer's fail....(lol). It was the early epoxi's that were failing.
Yeah we were right there weather wise on the limit of chaulking. It did hold. We made a few test boards to make sure the glue would be fine at that temp. Tightbond can go to 32°f
Thats so cool. Trusses 16" on center? Negative comments are just jealous plywood glued and nailed i would think is stonger than the steel mending plates used in normal truss manufacturing
Yes! People think that you can't do anything on your own now a days. Their still standing. No sag. I use that garage everyday. Someone put the peaches in the can
@tylercox4216 thanks for the reply. Awesome work. Your video is an inspiration!! I'm glad you enjoy the fruit of your labor! I've heard stories about manufactured trusses falling apart while racking them.....those look like they would hold up to a hurricane.
FOR THOSE WHO HAVE NEVER WORKED WITH WOOD.. END GRAIN HAS ZERO HOLDING CAPACITY.. SO THAT IS A TOTAL WASTE OF TIME. the gusets nails and the screws will do all of the holding work forget gluing end grain make sure you get plenty of glu on the gusets
100%. This would not only fail here in Canada but it would have to be replaced. Lumber must be “on end” and screws are not allowed (10d 3.5” clear shank nails) . Would also require truss plates.
Nice job! I am working on similar design: 13" high truss with Pratt Truss design (vertical members in compression, diagonal members in tension), but am concerned about diagonals. With 24 foot span, and loading (40 psf plus dead weight of materials = 60 lb/ft over the truss), I get 720 lbf at the ends. That puts a tension load of 1018 lb on the outermost diagonals. In your design, that would put 500 lb load per screw (looks like you put 2 per diagonal) but then you have the gussets as well. I intend to use hurricane straps on the diagonals instead. This will put 6 #10 screws in shear, and they pass. It's just a PITA to get the straps in, so might go with your method instead. Just need to make sure those nails/screws are sufficient when they go into the diagonal.
If you see factory built trusses, they only have nail plates to hold the truss together. My screws were more or less to hold the boards in place while the glue cures. I don't think the screws are moving enough to sheer especially after the gussest were in place and glued together. I made a small joint with gussets. Tried to break it apart and the wood broke in many places but the joint wouldn't let go. I believe the gusses and glue joints are the strength
bomber, nice vid thanks for sharing. curious, how did you control lateral forces from the roof rafters pushing perpendicular to the floor truss direction, to prevent pushing your 2 outside floor trusses over? Just the floor sheathing tying a few sets of trusses together? Collar ties, sure, but if the ties are high enough to keep that space usable (i'm not sure where you ended up putting them), they would need to be crazy strong and rafters stiffened at the CT to Rafter join... looking to do similar and keep structure open like this so appreciate your sharing!
You should have use nails or staples one. Screws are to rigid and brittle for this job. The fastener need to be able to flex with the wood and load placed on it, if not screws could snap.
Wouldnt the seams that are glued be even more rigid and not allow enough flex to even let the screw sheer off? In my limited experience glued seams hold stronger than wood without any seams.
Did you literally not see that they nailed in the truss plates? The screws were just to hold the studs securely in place while they get nailed. They are not and don't need to be load bearing in any way.
Screw are are meant to pull the boards tight together and not to hold for sheer. Once the wood is in place the angles, pressure and then the plates plus the glue create a solid, single unit. The current IBC (International Building Code) covers this. The building inspector is out of date. About 5 years.
I'm going to take it a step further and mill my own lumber to build these. I wonder why you picked that specific design with a majority of the angles going one direction?
Hi Guys... I'm about to embark on a self build in the UK.. I've made suggestions on various self build forums about building my own roof trusses, built in just the same manner that you've built your floor trusses... The resistance to it is quite overwhelming... I would have thought more people would self fabricate on site, but it seem that the very notion of it is meet with horror 🤷🏼♂️ I'm a very experienced joiner and have hand cut many hipped roofs over the years, but everything in this modern age is factory fabricated and certificated... Did you have to get your plans approved by a structural engineer... Was it a struggle to get your building authority to approve them? My rafters (roof rather not a floor) would be 27ft and be on a Mono pitch of 15' so really wouldn't be dissimilar to yours... I found your videos very inspirational and insightful... Nice work. 👍🏼
The trusses I made in this video are modified from a engineered plan. The engineers wanted waren style trusses with hvac box in center. My trusses are Pratt style. It's the type of trusses you'll see for train bridges. Very strong. There a 1/3 more material involved and that's why they don't build them that way. They produce the minimum to save money. My garage has been standing for 2 years now. No sag, no problems. Yes, everyone will tell you you can't bit you gotta remember. Before they were mass produced, somone came up with and built these by hand. So they are just afraid. Also builders worry about labor. They buybthe trusses and pass the cost onto customers. That's why they are rarely built. There's another triss video on here where a guy built roof trusses. Same idea. If you go look/ dismantle a mass produced truss you'll see there's nothing to it. If anything I've done extensively more work to keep them stronger. There's no building inspection here where I'm at. I dint think there would be a problem to be honest. Alot of people just loose the thought process on how stuff actually works. You can do anything if you set your mind to it. People are just lazy and do what the masses of others do. Simple minded. I got ostracized for doing it myself in my small town untill it was done. Now everyone thinks it's the coolest thing and tells my how great of a job I did.
I've been looking into it too and it's weird how people are almost secretive about it and don't want to share info and just say to get an engineer. Is this some weird thing they teach in engineering school where you're not allowed to teach knowledge? It can't really be THAT complicated, it's just the thing of knowing how to do it properly.
b.t.w. The larger the gusset plates, the stronger it is. We fixed, ~6 metal gusset plates, using engineers and they put giant plywood gusset plates, where the prior ones failed. Our plywood gussets, were 2' as a minimum (but we repaired broken gussets). We repaired about 6 broken trusses, which were broken usually when shingles were put on the roof, in a pile by construction equipment, as we used real plywood, not waferboard. 3/4". real engineers. real plywood.
@@TYGIXXER60 Broken trusses, can get recertified, and in this process, an engineering company puts money on the line. In that case, when I did some work for the company, 20+ years ago, typically, a homeowner repair, was a 2' long 3/4" sandwich. I agree. It's a duh. This is the simplest repair, simplest usage, sometimes a "how the heck did that break", repair, in a residential setting, (ie: no equipment on the roof). But, the company did not want to pay , and they overkilled it, and that was their go-to-size for a patch. if there was factory equipment on the roof, or thru wall scuppers that failed, then that changes things, and the trusses, were beefed up, sometimes even with 2x lumber, and sistering.. The enginnering report could be 10 pages long.
I watched another video of a professional builder talking about the pros and cons of his manufactured floor trusses after living in his new home for a year, and would he do it again; trusses span the basement rim. He said his floor feels a bit more 'bouncy' than closed-web i-beam floors do. That would bug me.
It took a totaly of 40 hours. What the video doesn't show is me alone pre cutting everything. Also when it was time to assemble there was quite a few of them just me amd my wife made. Considering I dont make 8k a week and the materials at this rime was only 1600, I'd say I did save alot. I didn't have to pay anyone. Everyone was happy to help out. Good friends and family go a long way
Thanks for a super video :-) I have a little DIY building experience with wood. Is it relatively easy to make the trusses as straight as needed? I'm familiar with the techniques for leveling a table. Did that when I built the wings and fuselage of my plane so assume it'd be similar with wood.
SO WHAT WAS YOUR SPAN 24 FT OR MORE AND YOU USED 14 OR BIG TRUESS IM BUILING 8 INCH FOR MY WOOD SHOP CIELING SINCE IT HAS MY GYM ON THE TOP ON MY HOUSE I WIL BE USING 9 1/2 ONES
I would be concerned about how well the glue filled the space between boards. It didn't seem like you were putting that much glue on. Does the strength depend on good glue bonds?
We did a few test prices, broke them apart to see how much you really need. Theres plenty of glue in there! All together we used about 6 gallons on 30 trusses. Also glue isn't suspose to fill gaps, onluly bond two surface areas that contact eachother.
@@TYGIXXER60 thanks. You are right of course about the gaps. What matters is the test that you did. There can be a little bit of cupping etc. I don't know if you said but what grade of 2x4 did you buy and did you discard any pieces. Finally are 2x4 SPF where you live?
@@GeorgeAlbercook spf number 2. Yeah depending on what they looked like. It took me hours at the lumber yard to pick out my stringers. Its about 50 50 shot of getting straight ones. Yes. Glue wise I watched a few videos of strenght. What sold me on this glue was I could use it in the cold weather I was working with. Glue will crystallize and not cure right if too cold. So this one had the lowest working temp
Great video.......I am working on building some now.......I was thinking of building mine with the 2x4 turned the other way......up on it's side......instead of flat.......will that be ok.....or do I need to build them like you did? I need mine to be 32' long......was thinking of making the depth 20 inches.
I wonder if the Titebond III doesn't 'creep'. The regular wood glue, while very strong, (Titebond I) is known to creep and ooze a little bit in the sheer direction or plane even after it's dry. I've seen other people use gorilla glue. Maybe that is more unyielding? I will have to research the different glues before doing this. Maybe with all the screws and nails, it doesn't matter.
@@TYGIXXER60 Yeah, commercial stuff. They would probably say it doesn't add much. But I'm kinda crazy when I build stuff. I'm wondering too if instead of those little plywood gussets, you covered the entire truss with plywood- all glued on. It would then be like a torsion box and probably crazy strong but with prices now, probably crazy expensive! But then also if you used traditional 2x4 cross bracing you could basically turn the entire floor (and/or ceiling) into a single monolithic unit that wouldn't move for nuthin'... :)
I'm sure these are great but why not just use the metal plates that you hammer on the sides like a commercial truss you would buy? I have been in 50 year old attics that had the plates tacked in place and they were holding up fine.
They aren't as strong as glue and wood. If you don't belive me, price together two pieces of wood and do two the way I did they try to disassemble them. You will find my way is much more stronger. Altho more time it's worth it. As far as cost it actually would cost more to buy the tac plates then the amount of plywood glue and screws
Ok wondering why all the wood. Angle to angle without the blocking is what I've seen. 26'. Now I'm going to read and find out why. I'll point out that steel instead plywood connectors is cheaper. Might be scrap from work or another job. Looks like it might be a worker doing their own house.
Ok wow they didn't know what their doing. Got to the acres in angles and it pulled a quarter from the vertical. Look at fab shops, they press these together because the load going to each member is why trusses are so strong with so little material. Computers make the designs for a reason. I'm a contractor that wears a belt with 25 years. This will hold but there wouldn't be squares and crXks if they would have tighten things up.
I appreciate the work and effort that went into this, however I would be very surprised that these trusses are properly designed and manufactured. Looking quickly at your process I believe that your gussets are likely undersized in many of the joints. Additionally, the amount of nails used at the joint is likely not enough for the forces at many of the locations. Did you design any camber into your jig? If you used 2 x 4 #2 lumber, it is probably not high enough of a grade for a truss of this span. A truss built like this at a truss manufacturing company would have used primarily machine stress rated lumber for the top and bottom chords. I am not saying any of this to be mean or "troll" your project. Rather, to help educate anyone considering doing something like this on their own. In case you are wondering, I have nearly 30 years truss manufacturing experience.
Did you see the design from the truss company? Way less of a truss then the one I built in everyday. Also, building has been up for quite some time with no issues, no bounce in the floor, no sagging. And there's a office above. Ive done some extensive research on truff manufacturing and alot of them use number two lumber for cords of this span. I took alot into consideration and then still built them past spec and more rugged then the design. There isn't any camber on the truss, and neither was there any in the engineered design also. When building house you dont typically see anything about accommodation for truss camber. Not saying there isn't trusses with camber but I dont think its nessasary for my application
@@TYGIXXER60 Yes, I looked at their drawing. The bottom chord is machine stress rated lumber, that has higher design values than standard, visually graded #2 lumber. The camber would not show on the drawing that you have, it is shown on the drawing that is used in fabrication. A truss of that length would be built with about 5/16" of camber. Nearly all floor truss tables used in the industry have the camber built into the table, so camber is always used in the fabrication of floor trusses. Again, not trying to be negative here, just trying to help give all the information.
This comment made it apparent that a lot of work goes into truss design. I've been trying to figure out if you can make the edges shallow to fit under an existing roof if we went with trusses assembled on site, or if it's better to just go with a 2"x12"x18' board and possibly just widen the contact points with OSB to make up for the beveling. Since it would only be like a 3" bevel, I'm not even sure it matters.
Thanks for the videos. I am planning on building these for my shop in Northern NH what size material did you buy for the least amount of waste? I have about 50 of these to build and with prices of lumber now justbtrying to get the most out of it. Thanks
All depends on your sizes. I basically did the math out and found out which sizes to buy with the smallest waste. Took me a few min on a peice of paper.
has anyone tried making these for boat dock? think about making some out of pressure treated wood 32ft long. how many 2x4x16's does it take to make one truss if i was to make them out of all 16ft 2x4's?
I am building a 32x76 gambrel barn and want to do a clear span floor. How did you get your truss design approved by by building inspection. How long was your truss and what was its floor load capacity.
theres no building inspectors out here, but this is a modified truss design off of a engineered design. its for a live load, 90lbs per square i belive it was, id have to douple check to be sure.
Hey guys, ive had alot of interest in the design. Im in the process of marking another video explaining the design. Ill upload it soon! Thanks, and remember to hit the like and subscribe for more diy!
Loved watching the video! My wife and I are going to have to make our own trusses for our off grid home...to far up in the mountain to deliver trusses! Thanks for posting!!
We based our truss design off of a engineered design. Talked with various people in the industry of trusses and engineers, the basic premise we got from all of our info was that a right triangle, with 45° cross brace was going to be the strongest. Also there three types of trusses, warren, most comon, because its cheaper to build, more economical for truss companies to build (significantly less material) Howe and pratt, both are very similar. And are most commonly used on bridges for trains. We went with pratt style. Considering how much live load the design we originally got was we consider ours to be much stronger. Therefor yielding a higher load.there was also a hvac box right dead center in the engineering design. Seems like that would be a very week point! I didnt like the design myself so we created our own! Altho we have not tested how much weight one truss can take, based our or researh and advise from various others im sure they will do just fine. We live in nh. Very heavy snow loads. The building size is 32x40 and the roof is 2x12x26fts. Comon rafter. Also a lvl for ridge beam and 2x10 for collar ties. We have 5/8 fully plywooded roof with tin. Knee walls on the comon rafters. The floors above the truss is also 5/8. Roof pitch is a 8. As it is right now there quite a bit of weight up there. Im currently insulting the building and have sighted down each truss bottom. Still straight!
@@TYGIXXER60 Are you an engineer or did you need to have an engineer sign off on the truss design and also the construction? Thx for the video. I am researching ways to build the cheapest and strongest truss for the DIY and your video was a big help.
@@gabrielpadilla6598 I am not bit I am well versed in the subject of loads and spans from just doing my own research. We have heavy snow loads here. Also in my area there is no building codes or inspectors so I did not need a sign off. Thanks 😊
@@TYGIXXER60 Thanks for your prompt reply. I am an electrical/software engineer, but I had a business building homes. I am fascinated with all aspects of building and automating as much as possible, the design, management, fabrication, assembly animations and visualiazation, quality control, real time measurements using lidar and photogrammetry, and implementing the latest technologies for the DIY. I believe a home can be built for 30% less for the same and better quality. I built my own home 3400 sf in California. I did all the engineering calculations, but had to have an engineer stamp the business plans, since I am not a PE.
@@loganeaster8868 We just uploaded a follow up video if you want to check it out for a bit more details on our design. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-nKIK_V12JGs.html
The span is 32ft outside of walls. 6 inch walls. The floor does bounce a lil. But idk if you've walked in houses with store bought trusses but they also bounce. It's very minimal but if your standing still amd someone walks by you Caan feel it
That God-Awful music... had to MUTE IT, so I could concentrate on the visuals at hand. Really, Its just too much. How about something mellow smooth and pleasant.
No lateral bracing, and no effort at anti- parallelogram collapse positive deflection in this span ?? None present ! Finally the chalk point of Titebond 33 I believe is about 45deg f and if your using it and storing externally in what looks like conditions much lower than that you have a(it will fail) problem !! The proof of value is in longevity and safety in adverse conditions .. if I were an insurer I wouldn’t touch it with a barge pole ! Just saying
We never let the glue get to the point of chaulking. Also you can use this glue in cold weather as long as you put it under pressure under 10 min. We actually were concerned about caulking and did some samples. And the wood broke apart while the bond stayed. Also take note that mass production trusses don't use glue and only use nail plates. It's just added security
Also lateral bracing through tge trusses were added when they were all up. This video was just to show the truss itself. We didn't take much pics/video afterwards
What special features do truss manufacturers have to combat anti-parallelogram collapse? These look like standard store-bought trusses albeit with plywood gussets.
The spacing math? Total length minus half the ends, 1 1/2 divided by the number of boxes. That's all sorts of ways to do it esp because I don't do it the conventional way, I put my boards in the center on the mark vs normal people go to the mark. I just preferred it that way
@@TYGIXXER60 Seems to me that some here can't do the simple money/time calculations. It looks like a fun project....trying to be as production-line as possible with not a whole lot of different size parts.
@@samhenryjr1087 this video is exactly why we don't send out our designs without a signed contract or letter of intent. Also, unless you understand how forces transfer thru a truss, it should be left to those that do.
@@hughtaggart565 Don't you send basically the same design to 10,000 customers all of which "pay" you for your engineered design? The whole issue is they saved $5500 by doing the trusses themselves over some company that used the same blueprints thousands of times and having an actual assembly line doing the trusses. Maybe companies shouldn't be raping people for profit. What they did in 1 week could have been done in 2-3 hours at a truss company and I'm sure he paid more for lumber than your company does - isn't that profit? Once a 32 ft span is "engineered", that design is done and shouldn't need done again. Those same plans are just paying for themselves over and over. I applaud this guy for doing what he did.
We just uploaded a follow up video if you want to check it out for a bit more details on our design. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-nKIK_V12JGs.html
