Lets Build a Porch

So I got the first wall of the screened in porch built and standing during the July 4th building vacation. That meant any further progress would be nights and weekends after work, but there was still plenty to go until we finished this build.

Got the other two walls built

The top sill plate extends a foot over the sides to support the roof

Not much room left for roof joists

The next weekend I finished off the other two walls. The outside sill plate extends for a foot on each side to support the roof. I cut the walls to finish at only 94" high. We want to put up a ceiling fan inside, so any shorter than that and I wouldn't have enough clearance for the fan. The problem occurs a couple of pictures up. The existing roofline comes down to some gnarly bend where I had to remove a gutter. Creating this shed-style roof over the porch is the kind of problem that kept me up at night trying to figure out. There wasn't much slope to begin with, how in the world can I figure this out?

Kelley moved this concrete guy next to the stairs and put a fern on him! Looks like sideshow bob

Rafters and center support

First section of handrail

Some rafters are up

Rafters and handrail are done!

I added a 1x10x12' center support for the rafters and a ledger board where the gutter was removed and on the side of the house. This is the only place in the entire build where I didn't hold up to normal building code. The low slope of the roof only left me space to use 2x4x12' rafters. Since I put up a tin roof they are spaced 2' apart. Code says use 2x6's for a 12' span, spaced 18" apart. But my architect cousin told me that tin was lightweight enough for the 2x4's to hold up.

In hindsight, I should have built the deck about 6" lower to the ground. I wanted it level with the bottom of the door & interior floor, but there is no way I could have known there would be a roof slope problem before the floor was up. I mean, unless I actually used drawings or plans and the architect would have seen that and solved the problem before I started. Originally we wanted to shingle the roof and tie it in with the existing shingles. We also wanted to extend the roof over part of level 2 as well. Once we decided to go tin the extension was gone.

This really goes to show the lesson in planning. I'm a builder. I sketched out the basic outline of the rims of the deck on the back on an envelope to get the 3 tier design, then started buying lumber. There were no other plans or outside input. Now I've got a flat roof. Well, it's not really flat water does run off fine. But the rafters are not up to code.

Trimmed rafters and added end cap

furring strips are up

Added tin roof & screen with 1x2 furring strips on the outside

family is assembling furniture inside our new porch!

Don't notice the 1 missing furring strip all the way on the left

better view of the whole deck from the left side

I still have to install the screen door

Overall, yes, we are thrilled with the way the porch came out. We still (as of 8/10/17) have not gotten electrical run out there. But it's going to happen eventually. This porch is 10' x 10' square with a 36" door. I used 2x4's for all of the framing even the roof, and 12' x 26" tin pieces made the roof. I added flashing where it hit the side of the house and more flashing where it hit the existing shingle roof. Used a special gray caulk made for bonding to metal I caulked between each sheet of the tin and went heavy where the tin hits the house. This roof is 12' wide so it took 6 pieces of tin and 2 tubes of that caulk. But it is watertight! Overall, we love it.