Looking for truss info

[pumkindrvr]

Hello,
I just found this site and there looks to be a lot of helpfull folks here.
I am building a completely DIY home out in the South West Texas desert.
The land is only accessable by 4wd. I am using 8x8x16 blocks as I can buy a few as money permits. I would like to make a flat roof using on-site built trusses. I have done google scearches, but mostly I get places that sell truss. I have not come across to much info on building your own trusses. If anyone has any links to informative sites on truss building, it would be a great help. Thank you.
Rob

[doyle]

Building my own trusses is one thing I would never even consider. I'll leave that up to the people who do it for a living. Why the flat roof idea? If the house isn't too terribly big, why not just stick-build a standard pitched roof?

[mjpliv]

It might be a bit of a tradeoff but you may be able to get a local truss manufacturer design the roof trusses and cut all of the components for you. The secret to any truss is the fit of the components anyway and some of these guys use computer controlled saws that are amazingly accurate. They may also be able to provide you with the proper sized nail-on truss plates. Or they may be able to offer recommendations on the proper thickness, size and shape plywood gusset to use as well as the proper size and spacing of nails.

If they design it they can provide you with the drawings to assemble the pieces that are labelled to match the numbers written on the components that come from the cutting process.

I know the concept of designing/building your own roof trusses sounds simple enough but it is actually quite complex. The tension loads on a 30' truss bottom cord can easily exceed 1500 pounds.

[bkrahmer]

I also thought I was going to build my own trusses at first. When I called the lumberyard to get a ballpark quote, I was surprised to learn that getting prebuilt trusses are actually cheaper than putting them together from scratch using dimensional lumber designed by guesswork. That means saving a lot of time for the same or less cost. This is a gambrel roof, but I think the same would apply.

[mjpliv]

I can see the need to take these trusses to your job site in pieces. If you can only get there with a 4WD then you won't be shipping 30' roof trusses. Here is a possible option. See if the truss manufacturer can build "folding" trusses for you. I do know that there is a truss plate manufactered with a hinge in it that could be installed on the bottom cord of your truss that would allow the truss to be "unfolded" at the job site and install a nail-on plate on the top cord (under compression loads which are much easier to deal with) to complete them. That way a 30' truss would be 15' in length when folded and reasonably easy to transport with a 4WD pickup.