When you decide to build your own home, you need to make sure you have a thorough understanding of the framing process. This is a very critical stage in the construction of your home. Mistakes here can be both detrimental to the schedule as well as costly. Attached with this page is one example of how inspectors will go through the home and do an inspection on the frame and quality. It includes a checklist of the following:
- Complete the entire checklist before proceeding
- Perform the inspection using the checklists provided in other framing sections of this website, a 4-foot or 6-foot level, a framing square, a 25 ft tape measure, spray paint, black permanent marker, a framing plan, and a 6-foot ladder.
LOT
- Ensure, as is, existing grade will provide no more than 8″ of slab exposure in siding areas & 6″ of slab exposure in brick areas.
- Drainage swales contoured to ensure 6″ drop at 10 feet from slab (6″ in 5 foot on restricted side lot lines).
- Driveway barricade, trash barrel, silt control in place, and address posted visibly
- Verify jobsite postings (building permits, address, etc)
- Check slab finish in vinyl floor, ceramic tile areas; as well as exposed garage and porch areas to ensure contractor as left an acceptable finish
- Re-confirm slab is level under bottomplates
- Confirm all wall bottomplates are pressure-treated, secured to slab, and limits lateral movement
- Randomly check plan dimensions (doors & window placements, kitchen window centered on sink, red-lined changes, etc)
- Check walls, corners, and ledges to ensure they are level
- Check for square and plumb in highly visible locations. Check for bowed conditions.
- Review stud spacing, windbrace installation (nailing pattern and saw cuts), furr-out requirements, and wall blockings
- Inspect for shim requirements at plates, headers, and ledges.
- Confirm cutting & notching studs is within acceptable limits
- Check for proper bearing of structural materials.
- Compare actual framing with ceiling joist framing plan and floor joist framing plan (counts and orientation)
- All lumber properly graded, and sized for purpose and span. Bracing and blocking installed, as required.
- Check for proper bearing of all structural materials
- Compare actual framing with rafter framing plan (counts and orientation)
- All lumber properly graded, and sized for purpose and span. Bracing and blocking installed, as required.
- Cutting and notching studs within acceptable limits. Check nailing patterns
- Check for proper bearing of the structural loads
- Check all hip rafter splice configurations. In accordance with local codes. (Skinned both sides)
- Check dimensions and construction methods and materials
- All lumber is properly graded, and sized for purpose and span. Bracing and blocking installed as required
- Cutting and notching within the acceptable standards
While this list is quite basic, and does not go into depth on the items of inspection for framing, it is a good idea of the overview required for the framing inspection. On this website their is a much more in depth inspection checklist, please refer to it if you need more information.
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Remodeled a couple houses and built a 20×25 building from the ground up. One of the keys to building a and efficient building is paying extra attention to the insulating process.The weak points in insulating a house are things like electrical outlets in the exterior walls, plumbing installed in the exterior walls, corners, and windows and doors.Paying attention to little details while insulating will pay big dividends in the future. When I built the 20×25 building I placed small (4″x5″) pieces of rigid foam insulation behind each electrical outlet box to eliminate the cold spots associated with electrical outlets (since the foam would retain a consistent R value throughout the wall). Rigid foam was also used to fill the spaces resulting after building headers, behind the electrical panels, behind plumbing in the wall, spaces in corner posts, etc.Caulk and/or seal the edges of your vapor barrier (around windows and outlets), caulk the base plate of your exterior walls before installing your vapor barrier, make sure that your ceiling insulation extends past your exterior walls, use rigid foam to “beef up” the areas as I just described, and install a properly installed and sealed house wrap on the exterior of your building (not sure if that will be possible with a pole building).Just think of any extra time or spent building your pole barn as learning the skills needed to build a future house even better and more efficient.
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"Floor beam" and "Joist" are the same thing. They are the pieces that the flooring.