1.5 storey

[Thedreamer]

Hi,

 

Has anybody completed or in the process of building a 1.5 storey property? I just wondered if the costs per square meter of the building, can be reduced slightly, as the attic trusses basically form the structure of the first floor?

 

Thanks

 

Kerry

[ProDave]

I am in the process of doing this. This is pretty much the standard house here in the Highlands.  I can't compare costs though as I have not finished.

 

Rather than using attic trusses this time, I have a warm roof supported on a big ridge beam, meaning all the internal space of the loft is warm and unobstructed. This is enabling us to have one of the bedrooms open right to the ridge and then a mezanine floor above the adjacent small bedroom.

 

With standard attic trusses, you usually end up with less floor area upstairs. But our cut roof and ridge beam, together with using large "gable ends" instead of dormers, means the floor area upstairs is the same as downstairs, and most of it, all bar a couple of corners gives standing headroom.

 

[Thedreamer]

That sounds an interesting way to gain that extra bit of height. So your house has a large beam of wood/steel running across the top, as opposed to the little triangle (not sure of the technical term) that you get at the top of the trusses. I always had in my head that the ducting for heat ventilation system would always run in the small loft space, do you have a system like this in your build and do you presumably just have this in the coombs instead?

 

 

[Jeremy Harris]

Our 1 1/2 storey house has the same, a large ridge beam with the deep rafters hung from it.  There are some photos here of the frame: http://www.mayfly.eu/2013/10/part-eighteen-a-house-in-4-12-days/

[ProDave]

Go and have a look at my blog, link at the bottom of the post. Some of the early entries are not there as I had to move the blog and haven't got round to reloading the early entries, but there are plenty of photos.

 

Once you have a warm roof supported by a ridge beam, you can do what you like with the roof space. The largest bedroom (for our daughter) has the ceiling left open right to the ridge and the mezanine. The landing and bathrooms have a normal 2.4 metre ceiling and a loft space above them. The master bedroom gets a 3 metre ceiling and a smaller loft space above it.

 

In our case it was a Kurto (sp?) bean used for the ridge which gives the same strength in a smaller size than say a GluLam beam. Steel can also be used.

 

The MVHR ducting runs through the loft spaces. For the room with the vaulted ceiling, the mvhr ducts run around the edge of the mezanine where they will be boxed in.

 

EDIT: Here's a picture of that room with the full height ceiling and mezanine. This one is not on the blog yet as it's still work in progress.

 

 

[Thedreamer]

Thanks JSHarris and Pro Dave, I'll have a good scroll through your blogs. I find the blogs to be a great way to see a breakdown of a self build. I hope to start a blog soon for my own build.  

 

Just seen the mezanine floor on your house Dave, looks good and I would imagine it will be a great place for kids to play. 

 

Cheers 

 

Kerry

[Gone West]

Hi Kerry, there are alternative means of construction which will give you uncluttered attic space or vaulted ceilings as we have in our house. Ours has been built using a portal timber I-beam frame. This is a picture of our landing:-

 

 

Here's a link to my blog which shows how the frame is constructed.

 

http://forum.buildhub.org.uk/ipb/blogs/entry/74-the-timber-frame-goes-up/

 

 

[Thedreamer]

Thanks Peter.