Assembling the Wall Frames

Now that all the studs are cut, it is time to assemble the frames.

I began by laying the frames on the grass and nailing them together based on the design plans.

The plans originally started out as the "Moschata Rolling Bungalow" from The Small House Catalog. Then Maddie wanted to change everything around to the point where I decided to draft my own set of plans.

The assembly progressed quickly since all the wood was cut to length.

I did have to make a new tool to help twist the studs into position. Twist is a common form of warping that happens in lumber. The goal is to remove this twist before nailing the studs so that they remain straight in the wall. Simply twisting the board is too difficult, but with this board twister, it is almost effortless.

The tool simply slips over the twisted stud and provides a firm grasp on the lumber while offering a long lever arm to apply torque to the wood. With the board twisted into place, simply nail it to the correct location and release the tool. The nails will hold the board in place and in its appropriate orientation.

After a days work, all the frames were completed!

I coated the wood in tung oil to help protect them from moisture until the walls go up and the sheathing protects them from moisture issues. 

I then moved the frames under the carport to store them out of the elements until we are ready to set them up.

Building the Trusses

The roof line on the tiny house will have two different roof sections. The "Great Room" will have short walls and a steep roof pitch to help shed snow weight. The lofted bed section will pop up and the roof will have less of a pitch as a result. This means that the end trusses will have different different pitches. The great room will have short walls (5'4" or 64") while the lofted bed section will have much taller walls (7'4" or 88"). The roof will be pitched at the necessary angle to bring the peak up to 13'. 

I could have done the math to calculate the pitch of the roof, but instead I simply assembled the main support, and then set a beam on the section to spile the angle onto the beam. The angle was then cut with a saw and finished with hand tools. 

The main beam was set to the proper length and attached to the top of the walls frame. Then a board was set on the top of the frame and the edge of the wall. The angle was copied onto the beam and then cut off accordingly. The frame was then finished off with hand tools.

The beams between the middle and end were measured and cut in place. After everything was fitted, all the boards were nailed together. The difference between the two pitches is grossly apparent. The short roof will sit over the lofted bed, while the steeper pitch will sit over the rest of the house.

The rest of the trusses will be built and cut in place once the walls are up. The trusses will be attached to the ridge beam and rest on the tops of the walls. They will be held in place by hurricane anchors and nails.

Wall Frames

The wall frames are going to be taller than the car port roof that I'm building under. This means that I need to get everything completed before the walls go up. Once the walls are up, I have to work very quickly to complete the exterior to avoid water damage to the tiny house.

All the studs for the walls have been cut to length, so when assembly time comes, I can just nail it all together without much thought or calculation. To further the assembly process, I have assembled as much as I can of the wall frames under the car port (pretty much all the horizontal pieces).

The bottom piece of the wall frame is 18 feet long, the length of the house. The problem is the 2x4's only come in 8 and 12 foot lengths. I didn't want to butt joint the bottom, because the butt blocks would be bulky and unsightly. I decided to scarf a 12 foot and an off cut together to give me the desired and required length.

Scarf joints are very strong way to connect two pieces of wood. They also come in varoius shapes and styles. The most simple method is called a "Plain Scarf", which is simply a diagonal cut on the two pieces. This gives a very long faying surface for the glue and screws to hold it all together.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarf_joint#/media/File:Woodworking-joint-scarf.gif

The disadvantages of this scarf are the pieces can slide past each other, stressing the joint. The answer to these problems is called a "Nibbed Scarf". This is the same as the plain scarf, but the ends are nibbed vertical. When the board is compressed, the nibbed ends hit a vertical and positive stop, preventing the edges from sliding.

To perfectly execute a nibbed scarf, you need to cut and then plane the faying surfaces to make them absolutely perfect! This takes a lot of time, and the frame bottoms are going to sit flat and flush on the subfloor. Because of this, I did not properly finish the scarf joints, and instead just stopped when it was "good enough". 

The joint was glued using Titebond III, a waterproof wood glue which is the next best thing to Resorcinol glue and much easier to find in the Untied States. Titebond III also has gap filling properties, which mean that a poorly mated surface will still hold very well. These joints were secured with nails while they dried into their final long lengths. The ends of the boards will be cut once the framing begins and I can set the joint in a hidden area that is not directly under a stud.

On the other extreme, the tops of the wall frames needed to be assembled as well. The boards were glued and then nailed, holding them secure.

The ends of the top two pieces have staggered ends, this will allows the corners to overlap and be nailed together, making the corners much stronger. This will help tie the whole structure together.

Now the bottoms and the tops of the wall frames are completed and all the studs are cut. The next step will be to build the end trusses to set the pitch of the roof and then begin assembling the studs between the top and bottom of the frames.

Cutting the Studs

Assembling the subfloor went rather quickly because all the wood was cut at the same time. There wasn't much measuring to do, so assembly quickly proceeded the cutting. The walls on the other hand have many more studs at various lengths.

In order to keep construction moving along quickly, I decided to cut all the studs for the entire structure before beginning the assembly process. The assembled walls will not fit under my parents car port, so once the first wall goes up, the trailer will be exposed to the elements. This means that I need to work fast to get it water-resistant as soon as the first wall goes up.

By cutting all the studs to length and organizing them in the trailer by wall, assembly should progress very quickly. The downside to this concept is that I will spend a few days cutting lumber and not seeing any progress happen.

When friends ask to see a picture of the construction, it looks like a trailer with a pile of lumber on it. Not really what they were expecting when they ask to see a picture of the tiny house under construction.

An important trick that I have done which avoids any confusion with the cut lumber and off-cuts of lumber is I write the measured length of the stud on the end grain. Before I cut a piece of wood, I make sure there is no writing on it. This will also make assembly go faster. I will not need to measure anything as the plans tell me what length of board goes where, and the number on the end grain is the length identifying that board.

This actually saved me from re-cutting a long piece of wood into something smaller. I grabbed a rather long piece of wood thinking it was a long off-cut, and before I cut it smaller, I noticed it said 69.5 on the end, signifying that I don't want to cut that board! When assembly time had come, I would have been very frustrated trying to find this missing cut piece; thus slowing down the assembly process.

Window Shopping

The subfloor for the tiny house is complete and attached to the trailer base. The next phase will be to build the frames for the walls. In order to do this, we need to know which windows and where they will be placed. 

Every time I ask Maddie what she wants, I hear something completely different! This has been very frustrating to be since it mean's I can't continue building. The general premise of what she wants is the door located between the tires and the tongue, and many windows!

How big and where these windows will go is an ever changing story, so I decided it would be best to head to Home Depot and have Maddie pick out the windows she likes and evaluate the prices.

We were pleasantly surprised by the prices of the large sliding windows. Small single hung windows were over $200 per window and wouldn't let in that much light. I expected the price of the larger windows to be proportionally higher as well. We were very excited to see that huge sliding windows were only around $155 and would let in tons of light!

Once again, we began deciding on how many and where the windows would be placed. The final (as of this moment) decision is two massive windows on the sides, a smaller massive window on the back, and three small windows up in the lofted bed. No windows in the bathroom or kitchen.

Maddie has some time to change her mind yet. I told her the decision is not final until I cut the wood. Once I cut though, no more changes are allowed!