Vaulted Ceiling Roof Truss Design

Parallel chord trusses allow for greater interior clearance in buildings.

Vaulted ceiling roof truss design.

In a common truss design sloping top chords function just like rafters in conventional framing and horizontal bottom chords fill the role of ceiling joists. Engineered roof trusses may be designed to create a vaulted ceiling while still providing sufficient support for the roof s weight. A scissors truss creates a vaulted ceiling in the same framing time as standard roof trusses that produces a bland flat ceiling. This house will have a gable roof and a 16 center area with a cathedral ceiling over the living and dining room areas the roof pitch will be 5 12 with a cathedral ceiling at a 2 5 12 slope the overhang will be 2 around the whole house the trusses on the ends of the house will be drop top gable trusses.

This design element makes a room appear larger and provides more natural light. To build the roof. Trusses consist of triangular shaped components that hold up the roof and keep the wall sections in alignment. This works particularly well beneath lofty double height vaulted ceilings but can also work beneath in single height rooms as this example goes to show.

There are variations of this design to create numerous unique ceilings. A scissors truss provides for a vaulted ceiling in the same time frame as standard trusses. Roof trusses are built in a truss manufacturing warehouse and delivered preassembled to the jobsite. Naturally this truss is used in buildings for creating a pitched roof.

The partial scissor truss is similar except that the bottom chord slopes up in one direction and then straight down while the remaining portion is flat. In this example a simple 20 x 30 rectangular plan is used. Its bottom chords join together at the apex creating a pitched or vaulted ceiling. Explore all truss options with your builder.

The offset scissor truss has a bottom chord that is flat for a distance and then is vaulted up and back down. When a vaulted ceiling has a different pitch than the roof planes above scissor trusses are produced. Launch chief architect and use open planto open the chief architect plan in which you would like to create scissor trusses. Using the select objectstool select the walls to make gable ends then click the open objectedit button.

A howe scissors truss is so called because its appearance resembles that of an opened pair of scissors. Vaulted trusses the simplest way to get a vaulted ceiling is by setting vaulted roof trusses.