High Snow Load Building

[EddieWalker]

Backstory: Im wanting to build a 20' wide by 24' deep with bottom of trusses at 14' rv/truck storage cover. No walls, no doors, no siding(for now), just a roof over a gravel floor. We live in an area that gets quite bit of snow. Our Ground snow load is 108 psf, unheated roof snow loaded is 82 psf.

I'm not an engineer, so I'm just sharing what I know.

The biggest challenge that you are goin to face is racking. A building that tall, without walls, is going to move on you. Diagonal bracing helps with this, but if you build with wood, it's going to move. And probably move A LOT!!!!

All the strength in a stick frame house, that keeps the house standing, is in the corners. Sheathing locks the corners together, and stops the house from falling over.

In open wall structures, they do different things to deal with racking to minimize movement. The taller the building, the more it will move.

If you are going to build with wood posts, you are going to need a massive amount of bracing, or solid walls to lock it all together. There are several options on the walls, and it's best to have an engineer design them for you.

The other option is to build with metal. Properly sized metal posts can withstand racking. But that's going to be some huge posts for a building that tall.

The snow load shouldn't be that difficult to deal with. Probably just add more trusses, closer together, and cover with thicker decking, with a closer nail pattern then normal.

 

[Egon]

Best be getting some certified advice.

Racking, vertical loading, post bucking, roof tie downs, even foundation supports

Your lumber supplier may have certified plans available or may design to your specifications.

 

[ArlyA]

Snow load code here is 140 ppsf. What is it there?