Barn like roof

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swimmer_spe

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I saw a gazebo once that looked like a barn with the way the roof was. How do I figure out the angles to cut the rafters to make a gazebo with it?
 
I think you are talking about a Gambrel or a Mansard roof and living in Farm country and Amish country I’m surrounded by many of both. The Gambrel being the most common, but the Mansard might lend itself to a gazebo better.


Around here they don’t seem to follow a standard design in terms of angles or how long each slope is, and many have a third pitch right before the bottom edge for a few feet that closer matches the upper pitch.


About 25 years ago I had a guy at work building a barn and he was going to have the Amish help erect it. He asked me to design the roof line on my computer and we went back and forth on what looked best to him and ended up with the angles being 30 and 60 degrees and both flats being the same length.


He wanted a center supported ridge beam and I suggested he build bent rafters of sort with a little truss piece at the mid joint. So I went as far as designing the rafter truss. He built a slew of these rafters and had the Amish come to set the ridge beam and rafters and they were not happy telling him it was not the way it was done and he needed long collar ties. His kid wanted to play basketball up there and he talked them reluctantly into building it. The deal was if when they got going it didn’t seem sound they would add the collar ties.


Half way thru the job the head Amish guy came to him and asked how he had this idea about the roof. He told him I came up with it. The Amish guy told him it didn’t need the ties and that was how he was going to start making them in the future.


Every time I drive by in the winter I look to see if it’s standing still with snow on it so far so good.


I like the 30/60 angles. I’m sure there is a lot of info on line now if you start looking.
 
You can lay the roof members out with a protractor, or a framing square.

60 & 1/4 degrees is a 21 & 12 roof pitch
30 & 1/4 degrees is a 7 & 12 roof pitch.

The trick is where the two members meet, IE the plumb cuts.
 

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