Posted by Snow in 
Truss Built Home
You may have trussed a chicken in your time but have you ever trussed a roof? Trusses are hot right now in the sustainable building design world. Using non chemically treated wood for the trusses or bamboo in your flooring, or partially recycled glass in your kitchen flooring combines nicely with the new organic way of building. Small home design that maximizes heating and cooling efficiencies and gray water re-use makes the best use of wood constructed in truss structure.
When you frame a roof with all individual frames it is not as strong as the combined truss combination modern builders now use. But for remodeling your home using this structure of building can be a challenge. The building codes in your area may need to be massaged to accept more green friendly alternatives. Most mass home building companies use trusses because the weight the trusses carry reduces overall foundation and stress tolerance buildup needed in other areas of the home building construction.
Many recycled materials can form the wood to form trusses. Trussing is the triangular support for the roof. Usually conventional construction uses framing, 2 by 4’s held by together metal straps. Trusses provide very strong support because the geometric form strengthens it. Stick building might cost $4,000, and is the type of home building many craftsmen grew up using.
But eco-friendly building enthusiasts praise trussing as the small-home equivalent of the Rosetta Stone. Trussing costs about a quarter of conventional wood frame building. So a truss for the $4,000 project would project a quarter of that expense to truss it. Combined with straw bale wall construction, the heat envelope of the home is contained in an organic manner. Using earth based plasters to finish wall surfaces just polishes the entire home building effort to its completion in a perfectly green manner.
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