We installed the new beam today. Vertical 4 x 4 to a horizontal 4 x 6 – it’s kind of an odd connection. I was originally going to go with an HUC bracket but after laying eyes on it in place the nailing didn’t look very reassuring so I decided to use a header hanger instead. The HH4 shown here looks a bit flimsy but it’s rated at 1000 lbs which should be plenty in this application even with snow load. I backed it up from the outside with an 8 inch structural screw and there will eventually be interior vertical members supporting at the ends, so overall I feel pretty good about it.
We wanted to have a variety of options for suspending hanging chairs from this beam so I decided on holes drilled straight through into nut plates, giving us options to thread a variety of different bolts and eyes, or nothing at all. To be perfectly honest this is probably a pointless amount of overkill. A quick glance at the NDS lag screw reference withdrawal design values table clearly illustrates that even with moderate lag screws the hangers would fail before lag bolts pulled out. But, you know, why do things the easy way when you can blow 3 hours setting special hardware?
Got started on notching and setting the rafters. Feels like we’re getting back on track with the build after almost a week of delays.
– Brian
