Lincoln and Megan Pasquina took a daring path after they determined so as to add on to their vintage Cape in Harmony, MA. Working with architect Andrew Sidford, they settled on a design for his or her addition that merges fashionable model with the home’s conventional type.
On the coronary heart of the brand new plan is a high-ceilinged, open household room with a view onto the yard. “As you step by from the kitchen into the brand new household room, you’ll have vaulted ceilings and a wall of glass,” says TOH host Kevin O’Connor. “That’s the transition between outdated and new.” That wall of glass is greater than a visible deal with, nevertheless. It additionally does vital structural work. “It’s attempting to carry all that tumbler, nevertheless it additionally has to carry up the roofline above it,” says Kevin. TOH common contractor Tom Silva provides, “It’s important to take into consideration the burden, clearly, however you even have to consider the lateral power of the wind towards it. So it must be actually stiff.”
The dramatic fashionable addition additionally means giving the outdated home a brand new ridge beam. “We’re altering the pitch of the unique roof, and lengthening its size to seize that new addition.
So we’re placing a brand new backbone into the outdated home,” says Kevin. Key to each structural components is using engineered lumber: manufactured beams and posts that supply power and stiffness that’s more durable to get from common sawn wooden.
Up forward: See how the high-capacity new constructions come collectively.
Making the Many of the View
Engineered posts and beams create a powerful wall to assist massive window openings. To satisfy the window wall’s structural necessities, Tom and Kevin used laminated veneer lumber (LVL) for the highest beam and headers, and parallel strand lumber (PSL) for the posts.
They fixed the posts to the beam with hardened structural metal screws, and hung the decrease window headers from the posts utilizing blind-nailed metal connectors. Sheathing the wall with structural panels ensured the required shear power.
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Tom lays out the highest and backside wall plates. These pencil strains on the horizontal members will present him and Kevin the place to nail the studs, cripples, and posts that assist the heavy home windows and the roof load.
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Utilizing a battery-powered affect driver, Kevin screws by the 5.-inch-thick LVL beam to connect a supporting PSL publish. The self-tapping hardened metal screws want no predrilling.
Anthony Tieuli
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Heavy 3-by-6-foot decrease home windows can be held up by windowsills supported by cripple studs. Right here, Tom and Kevin faucet a sill into place, to be hooked up with framing nails. Extraordinary 2X6 lumber suffices to border this a part of the wall.
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Tom units a metal hanger for a window header. Just like the engineered header itself, this metal connector has a lab-tested carrying capability; this helps an engineer design the wall to hold the required masses whereas permitting large window openings within the construction.
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Kevin and Tom faucet an LVL header into place above one of many decrease window openings (the smaller higher openings will maintain 3-by-3-foot home windows). Straight, stiff, and powerful, LVL members don’t have the potential for crowning, bowing, or twisting that typically exhibits up in sawn wooden.
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Kevin nails a sheathing panel into place over the framed-up wall. Wall sheathing like this helps to stiffen the wall towards racking, contributes to an hermetic and waterproof enclosure, and gives a superb substrate for nailing on siding.
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The crew groups as much as stand the wall. “We may have used heavy gear,” says Kevin, “however when you have got the our bodies on-site, typically that’s simply simpler.” Push-pull poles on the corners of the wall assist maintain it from toppling after it reaches the vertical place.
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“That is in all probability probably the most vital wall in the home,” says architect Sidford of the brand new window wall. When accomplished, it’ll supply large, open views over the brand new deck out to the sphere and woods behind the property. It’s going to additionally usher loads of pure gentle into the high-ceilinged household room and kitchen.
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Marrying Previous Construction with New
Rather than the home’s authentic 2X10 ridge beam, Tom and Kevin put in a built-up beam utilizing three LVLs. Constructing the beam on the bottom would have been simpler, however the hefty meeting would have been an excessive amount of for the telehandler to elevate on the finish of its growth extension.
So Tom and Kevin pieced the beam collectively in place. To account for the roof pitch, they offset the middle piece above the others. “When you observe the pitch of the rafters, the middle LVL pushes as much as keep within the aircraft of the roof,” Tom explains. “So whenever you lay the sheathing on the roof, you have got nailing on the prime, and your sheathing isn’t floating within the air.”