Converting to a vaulted ceiling

[Burr]

Greets all. First post so be gentle. :)

I have a tiny little house that I'm tring to make feel bigger. I'm need to redo the ceiling and would like to convert it to a vaulted ceiling.

The roof is an old (1950) ridge/stick construction so I know the ceiling joist hold the walls together.

So... Is it feasible to add the necessary webbing members to the existing roof rafters to form a scissors truss? Then remove the old ceiling joist. The roof was just done last year and I don't want to tear it off.

TIA

[Rich]

I could see it working out. I would first consult with an engineer to give you the size and where the new ceiling joists of the trusses need to terminate. You could probably take off 3 or 4 of the ceiling joists at a time and put on the new ceiling joists.

[Burr]

Thanks for the reply. I was hoping to avoid an engineer as that we had talked to 2 separate Architects and both, without knowing the other, told us to D9 the house. We just can't do that right now so we're tring to make it as livable as possible.

:)

[Rich]

Is what you could do is create a very nice clean drawn drawing of what the situation is and ask around of a couple engineers (not architects - it'll be a million dollar mansion by the time they are done). You should be able to get a design for a 100-200 dollars.

[jjcold]

(not architects - it'll be a million dollar mansion by the time they are done).

hahaha!! Or, it'll look like a squashed shoebox without windows and win a bunch of stupid architect awards.

[Rich]

LOL.. how true it is.