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Have I made a massive booboo...??


Omnibuswoman

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I have reached the point of ordering the fascias and soffits (again!) ready for our next stint of work on the workshop, but have run into a problem that I'm not sure how to solve, and I'm concerned it's because we (I) have made a mistake...

 

The roof is a pent roof with the highest edge on the north side of the workshop. On the north side we put four top plates instead of two (which is what the other three sides have). The rafters run north-south fixed to the top plates, so there is a 9cm height difference between the two sides, creating the slope to get the rain to run off.

 

On the east and west sides we fixed noggins on top of the top plates, abutting the side of the last rafter, to provide an overhang of about 20cm.

 

Now that I'm looking at fascias and soffits, i've realised that the soffit will be sitting 9cm higher on the north side than on the other three sides (see attached drawing) because the rafters are sitting on the extra two top plates. So I'm wondering whether I should run the fascia 9cm beyond (below) the bottom of the rafters on the north side, so that where it abuts the east and west corners there will not be a difference in the level of the soffit. The question is, if I do that, what do I fit the soffit to?? Have I made a massive boo boo??

 

All advice very much appreciated.

Cheers, M

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Run the soft parallel to the roof line … like an gable end would be.

of wait, just re looked at your sketch … hmmm, so the end soffits will be level, not following the roofline, and I feel the extra deep facia at the front may look out of place.

not helping much here am I. ?

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Two ideas, just to throw them out.

 

1st is to modify your noggings for the overhang by ripping a firring strip at the same angle as the rafters and then you frame what are called gable ladders which provide you with the overhang - the gable ladder rests on the firring and is fixed to the rafter. With only 200mm overhang you might actually get away with it simply screwed or bolted to your final rafter and cantilevered without support if you're using 18mm plywood or osb roof deck.

 

2nd is to make the asymmetry a feature by create some boxing at the corner so the low soffit extends out beyond the wall to the same extent as the high soffit and then you have a box that brings the soffit round the corner and then up vertically to meet the higher soffit. Hope that makes sense.

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On 13/10/2021 at 09:49, SimonD said:

Two ideas, just to throw them out.

 

1st is to modify your noggings for the overhang by ripping a firring strip at the same angle as the rafters and then you frame what are called gable ladders which provide you with the overhang - the gable ladder rests on the firring and is fixed to the rafter. With only 200mm overhang you might actually get away with it simply screwed or bolted to your final rafter and cantilevered without support if you're using 18mm plywood or osb roof deck.

 

2nd is to make the asymmetry a feature by create some boxing at the corner so the low soffit extends out beyond the wall to the same extent as the high soffit and then you have a box that brings the soffit round the corner and then up vertically to meet the higher soffit. Hope that makes sense.

 

Thanks @SimonD Are you able to draw a rough picture of what you're describing in the first paragraph please? I am struggling to picture what this looks like.

 

We were going to order upvc soffits and fascia, so I'm wondering if what you describe in para 2 might be possible using the pre-fabricated corner joints that they sell.

 

 

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On 13/10/2021 at 09:08, Dave Jones said:

can you not continue the wall/cladding up higher to make a gable out of it so you can use the same size soffetts ?

 

Sadly not - the noggins that rest on the top plate of the east facing wall mean that the cladding can only go up as far as the bottom of the noggins (which overhang the wall by about 20cm), whereas the bottom of the rafters on the north side sit 9cm higher up. I did wonder if I could run the fascia on the north side 9cm below the bottom of the rafters to sit level with the bottom of the fascia on the east wall, but I'm wondering what I would fit the soffit to in that case as it would be hanging 9cm below the bottom of the rafters.

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3 minutes ago, BotusBuild said:

How about add pieces of wood below the rafters on the North side, the bottom of which come to the same level as the noggins on the E & W sides - see edited drawing.1388449117_Screenshot2021-10-15at08_42_18.png.bb56e993f46399d53785bd5fd07c7cea.png

 

yes this is probably easiest way nail to the side of the noggins to bring it down to all the same height.

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2 hours ago, Omnibuswoman said:

 

Thanks @SimonD Are you able to draw a rough picture of what you're describing in the first paragraph please? I am struggling to picture what this looks like.

 

Even better I hope is a picture I found using the same solution to a roof almost identical in design to yours. In this one, they've decided to simply cantilever the ladder to be held by the roof deck.

full

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6 hours ago, Omnibuswoman said:

I'm feeling rather "doh!" for not having already thought of it!!

 

M - we all have those "wood for the trees" moments (pun intended!!) ?

 

Hope it works

Edited by BotusBuild
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  • 2 weeks later...

Update: we had a neighbour pop round yesterday who is a joiner. He took one look at our external noggins, and started into one of those Harry Enfield sketches "You don't wanna do it like THAT: You wanna do it like THIS". He pointed to one of the noggins, declaring it cracked, and wacked the thing right off! Then walked around the building questioning my building choices in a way that was probably enormously helpful, but given that we have almost finished, didn't feel all that helpful.....

 

The upshot of that rather dispiriting lecture on my half-arsed building skills was that he explained that we should cut off our external noggins (can't remove them as they are well and truly fixed on), and replace them with a gable ladder at the front and back, as suggested by @SimonD above. This actually solves the issue of the asymmetric soffit level, and in turn the difficulty of sourcing 350mm fascia (which has been unavailable at most suppliers). He also pointed us towards a local plastics company that does all of the roofing products we were looking for, available for delivery tomorrow, and at about 60% of the price we were being quoted online, so that was a massive win. Every cloud...

 

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On 25/10/2021 at 20:28, Omnibuswoman said:

didn't feel all that helpful.....

 

Those are the kind of moments you want to shrink into the ground ?

 

On 25/10/2021 at 20:28, Omnibuswoman said:

Every cloud...

 

Absolutely, definitely the best approach IMHO and glad you got it sorted, plus you've got someone to help you going forwards!

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