rs191
Member
We just bought a new home, which has a one-year-old 30 x 40 pole barn. The seller did not provide much information about the pole barn. It has a poured concrete floor, which was done after the town inspector signed off on the place. Based on some reading on TBN, this could be an "Alaskan slab", since you can see for a few inches under the edges of the barn from the outside. It is sitting on concrete piers, according to the plan and according to what can be seen from the edges. There are stairs up to a full-sized storage loft. There is no protective railing around opening at the top of those steps and the hand railing on the stairs doesn't even reach the top - like they ran out of wood.
The plan submitted to the town shows a metal roof and stairs in a back corner of the building. They put on asphalt shingles (heavier?) and the stairs are near the middle of the building. Don't know what else they did that didn't follow the engineering design. This is upstate NY, near Saratoga, so 30" snowfalls are possible.
The wall posts have two bolts and nuts near the top. Many of those bolts seem too short, because I can see the ends of the bolts do NOT engage all the threads of the nut.
A locksmith, who said he had been a carpenter for 25 years, pointed out several things about the building yesterday. When two horizontal boards meet over a wall post, having two stacked bolts through the middle of the post won't engage the horizontals properly He recommended adding two more bolts at the top of each post. (The locksmith "retired" from carpentry after a fall and other injuries.)
That retired carpenter also said I shouldn't put too much weight in the loft. Other than 2x4s stabilizing the stairs, there are no supports for the loft in the middle of this building. He can see the two-bys spanning the width are only held together in the middle by "mending plates".
I am looking for a company that builds pole barns and ask for an overall assessment of this giant shed. Besides the construction quality, the seller hadn't put drains or gravel around the building. After less than one year, there are 3"-6" erosion ditches below the roof edges. So drainage and possibly gutters are also going to be looked at.
Opinions on where to start? Yes - it was inspected by the town and an inspector we hired. I want to make this a durable struction, not a temporary one.
The plan submitted to the town shows a metal roof and stairs in a back corner of the building. They put on asphalt shingles (heavier?) and the stairs are near the middle of the building. Don't know what else they did that didn't follow the engineering design. This is upstate NY, near Saratoga, so 30" snowfalls are possible.
The wall posts have two bolts and nuts near the top. Many of those bolts seem too short, because I can see the ends of the bolts do NOT engage all the threads of the nut.
A locksmith, who said he had been a carpenter for 25 years, pointed out several things about the building yesterday. When two horizontal boards meet over a wall post, having two stacked bolts through the middle of the post won't engage the horizontals properly He recommended adding two more bolts at the top of each post. (The locksmith "retired" from carpentry after a fall and other injuries.)
That retired carpenter also said I shouldn't put too much weight in the loft. Other than 2x4s stabilizing the stairs, there are no supports for the loft in the middle of this building. He can see the two-bys spanning the width are only held together in the middle by "mending plates".
I am looking for a company that builds pole barns and ask for an overall assessment of this giant shed. Besides the construction quality, the seller hadn't put drains or gravel around the building. After less than one year, there are 3"-6" erosion ditches below the roof edges. So drainage and possibly gutters are also going to be looked at.
Opinions on where to start? Yes - it was inspected by the town and an inspector we hired. I want to make this a durable struction, not a temporary one.
