New guy intro

[zato_ichi]

Hi, Rob here from Nashville, my wife and I are really enjoying the site and the forums, been lurkin and reading everything for about a week now.
I am really impressed with the photos of the student log homes and with knowledge and community shown on the public forums, we hopefully will be able to take one of the next offered classes as we are excited about finally seeing our dream within our grasp! We thought Log homes were only for millionaires looking at the cost of some "Shells"!

I had a question or two about the B & P method, I noticed that on some forums they call it a suspended design...what does that mean exactly?

Next, on another forum I read that the chinking at the log ends where they butt together was not desirable, is this actually a problem or is it a case of preference? while considering this I had an idea about the butting of the logs and made a quick mspaint drawing to illustrate the idea

http://i139.photobucket.com/albums/q292/Ichi_Da_Killer/bnplogend.gif

would fitting the log ends like this be a waste of time?


One last ? I think I saw a thread posted on here about a celestory log home...I like celestories but wonder how that affects the stability of the structure with regards to the ridgepole would a design like that require two ridgepoles like below?
http://i139.photobucket.com/albums/q292/Ichi_Da_Killer/celestory2rplog.jpg

I don't intend to get into anything that complicated, at least certainly not first try, but i think it would make an interesting studio space with lots of natural light for the expert builder. Would the additional RP weight be a problem for the foundations?

If all of this is covered in another thread I apologize for the rehash : )

Thanks

[ponyboy]

It might be a little bit harder for a blind Japanese masseur, master swordsman to build a log cabin. :shock: :D

I think one of the main points of this style of building is to keep it simple. All that scribing is a bunch of extra work you don't need to do. If you look at all the pictures on this site you'll notice that they all just butt one end of the log up against the other with out any scribing. If you wanted to you could, but you definitely don't need to.


Jeff

[hawkiye]

Welcome to the forums. What you describe could be done as for it being a waste of time I don't think so. It will certianly take more time but if iy something you really want to do then why not?

As for chinking the ends being bad I would be curious as to specfically what they think is bad about it. LHBA has been teaching and building these types of homes for 35+ years and they have withstood the test of time. It really is preference.

LHBA method is not the only way to build a log home but it is the best or at least one of the best in many of our opinions. I don't know about you but I have a problem with any house let alone a log home that needs to have gaps built into the doors and window jams or even screw jack to lower the roof to accomadate basic flaws in many modern loghome designs.

Having two ridge poles is doable if thats what you want. You might be able to split the roof level by buiding some kind of truss on top of the ridge pole eliminating the need for two ridgpoles but you'd propbaly need to talk to an engineer about that.

You'll come away with a whole new perspective after taking the class and chances are good yuor ideas will change with your new found knowledge.

Blayne

[Basil]

The weight for an extra ridgepole system would be lost when the overall weight of the structure is considered. It's only four or five additional logs added to sixty or so already on the structure.

[silversalmonscott]

One other point is that when you scribe the logs to touch like this you will have a large wood to wood seam which will cause a capillary action and pull water into the seam. You will not be able to seal this seam completly forever no matter how you try to do it. In IMHO it will always be susceptible to rot. That is a bad thing to have happen.

Just my 2 cents. :)

Scott