The house raising

Today I learned how not to raise a roof. It is a bad idea to attach a monster beam to the end of 12 foot posts then try to erect the thing by getting underneath and pushing. It is a really bad idea to put your close friends under there with you.


A house raising party lead to this revelation. I invited a bunch of people to come help me put up the roof framing. It was like a barn raising. I assumed that if I had enough man power I could do anything. Unfortunately I learned that I was missing a key ingredient found at a barn raising, experience. No one on the site had any experience working on a project of this scale, and it quite nearly lead to a disaster.

The wood for my frame is truly massive. I was worried about the roof being able to support the weight of the sod which is usually rated around 100 lbs/ft, so I may have gone over board. My posts are 6"x6"s, and my beams are 4"x12".

I think this picture conveys the size, but to try to but it into perspective, it took five people to move the beams and it was still a struggle. The things were really heavy. Because the beams were so heavy we decided that the safest way to lift them would be to attach the beam to the posts on the ground then to push the whole thing up right. It seemed like a good idea; it seemed safe. It turns out that it was neither. The team lifted the beam then started walking forward lifting the posts and once it got to about 45 degrees it started to become unsteady. The bottoms of the posts were slipping forward and the beam wanted to go down. I think that everyone panicked at the same moment and just baled, so it fell, and luckily no one was seriously hurt. A few people got scratches and bruises, but no one took a direct blow. We were incredibly lucky. This is were experience would have been useful. In hindsight it is clear that our methods were not sound. We basically made a big lever that was working against us. At the time though, it seemed like a very good, and pretty safe plan.

Since I have learned that the materials I am working with are potentially very dangerous, I've decided to consult some experts. I imagine that there is some machine that I can rent for relatively little money that will take the danger out of this project. I'm going to talk to my uncle, and some faculty at school and find out a safe way to get that massive beam up in the air, and in the mean time, I'll work on some aspects of the house that I can tackle with out endangering anyone.

On the up side, a lot of work was accomplished the day of the failed house raising. All of the wood I bought was rough cut and untreated, and the team got all of the posts and beams cut to length and painted with some sealant. We also got all of the brackets squared up and attached to the concrete piers, and I think the most impressive undertaking was the amount of brush cleared from the area in between my future house and the neighbor's shed. Since we escaped major injury, I would call the day on the whole, a success.