First post. opening a discussion into timber frame and culture.

[Myles Franco]

Hello community members!

First time poster here. To start I would like to say that I am very pleased to have found this forum, and the wealth of knowledge, experience, creativity and gumption that has accumulated here. I have already learned a lot from browsing.

I have spent time in cabinetmaking, currently in modern framing and eventually in timber framing (which is an obsession of mine).

What I want to do here is form a discussion that will satisfy my curiosity. I have much more research to do still but there is a topic I have in mind. I hope all will be pleased to join in and I will do my best to add what I can.

I have a passion for quality craftsmanship, particularly the kind that shows natural/hand worked attributes. I also love history and anthropology, and how cultural and environmental factors play a role in craft design. I would like to ask the community what they know about the differences/similarities between timber frame cultures, whether they are neighboring regions or completely separate.
What design features do you know of that Are:

completely distinct to one culture or a few related cultures? ie Asian truss design.

wide spread but of a traceable origin?

designed not based of structural purposes but off folklore or ritual purposes?

non-sense or unexplainable but still present? 

(in your opinion) clearly superior to alternate options?

Designed specifically for a regional environment?

overly complex or over designed for prestige?


             Please comment on personal favorite designs and techniques. Speaking of ascetics, or structural/functional  purpose and any historical origin of these techniques and designs.. Do you have a favorite style? do you have certain tried and true methods that never let you down? Do you think you can personally claim one timber framing style to be superior? I am looking for opinions as well as facts.

I will edit or add to the discussion later on, maybe this is enough to get the ball rolling.

Thank you everyone for your consideration.

[Dave Shepard]

Welcome to the Forum!

I don't have time to address every point in your question, but can hit on a few of them. I have worked in a few different styles. Most of my work has been with New World Dutch Barns. They have a fairly specific regional heritage, i.e. lowland Europe, as my architect calls it, or the Netherlands,  parts of Germany etc. I have also done some cruck framing, which is from England. In my area, New England, English three bay barns are probably the most common. I don't know that any style is universally superior, as each was developed based on regional influences. The Dutch barns used massive, long timbers, most often of white of hard pine. The cruck frames used crooked timbers because that was all that was available there.

[Magicman]

Welcome to the Forestry Forum, Myles Franco.   8)

[D L Bahler]

This is a very broad question. That is a good thing, just maybe difficult to address everything.

Any know my specialty is Swiss building -timber and log building. If you want to study regional diversity no other place on earth compares to Switzerland, with its isolationist culture and thousands of years of history -local history- One could spend a life time studying the building culture in this small country and not even scratch the surface. It's so complex that in order to really communicate anything you must either be incredibly vague or focus on a very small region. I have made my study of the Canton of Bern, but even within this area about twice the size of Rhode Island there is such intense variation that it very hard to be very conclusive at all. Then add to that the time factor -the existing timber frames represent over 700 years of development.

But I'll be broad, and point out some characteristics that I hope add to your study

First of all, you are not going to find anything anywhere that is not originally designed for practical purposes. Even if it is highly ritualized today and has lost its original purpose it comes out of some solution to a problem long ago. A good example is the complex bracket work in Chinese architecture. This is ritualistic today, and doesn't do anything. But originally it served a function. It's just lost that since the original reason for doing it no longer exists.

The tie frame style of timber framing is a good example of a broad yet traceable system of building. Most of Northern and Western Europe -and by extension North America- builds timber frames that rely on heavy tie beams to hold the walls from spreading. This is because roofs are built either as trusses or with standing rafters that naturally will flatten, so a tie beam is needed to counteract this nature. The entire frame is designed around the tie beam.
We are so accustomed to tie beams in America, that our primary method of classifying frames is usually according to what type of tie beam -English, Dutch Anchor, Dropped tie. But these methods all trace back to a common source -the Germanic standing roof. This is a building style that was dispersed across most of Europe in the early Middle Ages by the Germanic migrations. Almost every timber framing tradition in Europe (outside of Italy and Greece) descends from it. This includes a great many regions you might not think of as being 'Germanic' such as France, Poland, Hungary, Spain, and northern Italy but were, nonetheless, overtaken by Germanic migrations (also, Slavs seem to have borrwed very heavily from Germanic and Scandinavian culture at an early point, and were greatly influenced by the Goths)

Swiss timber framing is an example of a style, however, that does not descend from this widely dispersed tradition.
Swiss timber framing lacks any sort of tie or anchor beam. This is possible because rather than utilizing the Germanic standing roof, Swiss frames use the more ancient Celtic hanging roof. Here the primary support of the roof is a ridge beam supported by tall posts. The rafters are slung over the ridge, and do not thrust out at the walls (they actually press inward). This totally eliminates the most important feature in the familiar forms of timber frame, and with it eliminates all of its problems and difficulties -though it does have difficulties of its own to account for. Personally, I think this is a far superior method. It's the only practical method to frame low pitched roofs. But I know not everyone will agree with my opinions and that's great. If everyone did, architecture would be dull.


Now I could go on if you wish, and narrow my focus greatly to point out how even this unique Swiss form of building adapted to different environments. One quick example is the fact that Alpine log building evolved out of the timber framing on the Swiss Plateau in distant antiquity (like, by 2000 BC) to adapt to the local conditions. (It's likely more accurate to say, Swiss Plateau timber framing originated in the mountains and spread north onto the Plateau, but in the place of its origin evolved into something totally different)

[Myles Franco]

Thank you for the replys Dave and D L Bahler.

That is a very good read D L Bahler, and I think it will be more worth my while to browse your website and any previous posts you have made about swiss timber framing. I have some questions about the hanging roof you mentioned. The ridge beam is supported by posts, does that mean they are full height from the ground? And do you think the swiss style roof may be designed to deal with the weight of snow? And do you think Germanic/European designed frames may be better at supporting snow than a Japanese type?

[D L Bahler]

In its simplest form, the ridge post goes to the ground. Some buildings have ridge posts 12 meters tall (that's nearly 40 feet) But it is not to difficult to redesign the structure to have a ridge post land on a cross beam or collar beam and redistribute its weight onto other posts. Or even have the ridge post interrupted at a cross beam, but supported directly underneath by another post.

Both of these roof systems descend from simple post buildings. Presumably the Swiss hanging roof descends from a pavilion type structure, with heavy center posts seated in the ground to hold up the peak. The Germanic roof, in contrast, likely descends from a more tent-like structure, with supports propped up against each other.

[D L Bahler]

Regarding snow loads....

That is a good point to look at. I can't speak for Japanese framing, I've never really studied it. But I do know the Swiss methods can handle tremendous loads. If fact, people often intentionally add snow catchers to the slippery modern tiles used (the old thatch roofs held snow quite well) so that snow will stay put.

Also where they used to be thatched, they are now covered with clay tiles. But the old roof systems are still in place, unmodified, and bear the extra weight with no trouble.

Then move to Wallis and Ticino in the southern Alps, where often you find roofs covered with stone plates. There a roof can weight 20 tons. That's right, 20 tons. That's without snow.

I personally like the aesthetic of a shallow roof. And that's not even remotely practical with a standing timber roof -which by good design must be at least a 10/12.  Any shallower, you have tremendous thrust.

I also am very fond of wide overhangs (because I am Swiss, you know) which is a challenge with standing roofs. That is because in a Standing roof, your rafters are seated into the plate and you do not have the strength to go very much past the walls at all. With a hanging roof, the full thickness of the rafter sticks out over the walls. So we just extend them out and make nice overhangs -like 10 foot overhangs-
Oh and since the rafters are laying on top of beams, it is easy to just stick those beams past the gables and make nice overhangs.

[Myles Franco]

To  D L Bahler.

That's very interesting, thank you for your replys. I think you have almost sold me on the hanging roof! Good design! I also like the long overhangs, I will have to do some more reading on swiss designs. Thank you.

[D L Bahler]

Then I need to tell you, these frames do not have tie beams. That means the commonly available literature on timber framing is useless, because the frame designs given are incompatible (or at best, feature complicated parts that here serve no purpose)

But I'd live to teach you about Swiss Ständerbau! (don't bother to google it, you'll get results for a German technique that is something unrelated)

Unfortunately you are not going to find very much of anything on Swiss design of any real value in English. All the material is in German and French (I'm actually just assuming there is even anything in French)
To the best of my knowledge (and I don't say this to be self-important, I say this wishing it were different) I am pretty much the English language source for this stuff. I'd love to change that.

[timberwrestler]

Myles,

Those are some serious and interesting questions.  You might want to take a look at the book Wood and Wood Joints by Zwerger for some perspective on just some of that. 

I don't know where DL got that Chinese brackets don't do anything anymore.  I disagree on that from many standpoints.  He's also (and very obviously) pretty gung ho on Swiss framing.  You can put a structural ridge beam into all sorts of styles and accomplish the same thing.  It also doesn't need to a be ridge, it could purlin plates, a truss, or various strut arrangements.  They all transfer the roof load to the ground, irrespective of the roof pitch (if it's well designed).  The line between fact and opinion (which is what you asked for) is pretty fuzzy on the Internet.

On the cultural/anthropological questions--I think you could spend the rest of your life studying the answers within just one culture/region.  So we should all keep asking questions, studying, and critiquing what we find.

[D L Bahler]

It doesn't matter what you can accomplish by borrowing one technique and applying it to another.
The question was about ethnic and cultural traditions that are different, so I provided him with one that I am familiar with.

When discussing basic roof designs, there are inescapable facts:
A roof with rafters seated into the plate, unsupported by posted purlins or ridge is not suited to shallow pitch. This is not opinion. The fact that you can hybridize this design with the addition of purlins or a ridge (yes, historically this is a hybridization. It just happens to have happened far enough in the past that most timber framers don't know anything about it)

My aim was to point to the archetypal building forms important in European carpentry. Also my 'opinions' are not my own, but drawn from credible sources in Europe who present this is the way it happened.

Please refrain from attempting to discredit years of research by suggesting I am 'gung ho' and basing my statements on opinion. This is a highly personal attack on a subject I have invested a great deal of time, money, and effort into studying in as great of detail as I am able.

For the record, roof framing is my specialty. It is the area of have focussed my attention the most because it is fascinating to me, and also not nearly as straightforward as people tend to think it is. That was the point for my statements, is to point out that the way carpenters in North America are accustomed to viewing roof framing is not the ONLY way it works, and sometimes our quick assumptions based on what we are familiar with leads us to come to false conclusions, or to fundamentally misunderstand what we are looking at.
Many have seen my confusion in the past in assessing English style roof framing, because I am coming from a different perspective on the issue. This confusion, and the realization that here was something much different than what I was accustomed to, is a big part of why I pay so much attention to roof framing now.
For example, I once misunderstood the nature of a kingpost roof thinking it to be essentially the same as 'Hängewerk'. It is not. Learning about English/Scandinavian truss roofs broadened my perspective a great deal (even truss framing in Swiss carpentry follows radically different principles) And I want to do the same for others. I think roof framing specifically is something we all ought to pay more attention to. If I can expose people to something that is very different, then I feel like I am doing my job.

You said one thing here -'They all transfer the roof load to the ground, irrespective of the roof pitch (if it's well designed)' this of course is true, so let me restate my point with this in mind: The advantage of the hung roof is the ease of framing a variety of roof pitches without having to complicate the design. That is, you can use the exact same (very simple) support structure on a steep roof and a shallow roof.

And a wholeheartedly agree on your last statement. We could spend the rest of our lives studying this topic and I intend to. I also feel the responsibility to share my findings with others.
After all, what is more useful, if we all try to study everything or if a few of us make our focus specific and share our findings with others? Think of what good things happened when a few Americans decided to learn about Japanese carpentry. Why can't we do this for other traditions? Let's get people to bring us details regarding German, French, Norwegian, Chinese, Tibetan, Greek (and yes, Swiss) etc. traditions to generally broaden our understanding of the craft.
After all, in my own tradition the greatest advancements came when carpenters ended their very very long cultural isolation and looked outward to be inspired first by neighboring regions, then neighboring countries.

[Myles Franco]

Thanks for the replies guys. I will consider the book you recommended timberwrestler.

Regarding the slight argument/disagreement. I think it is safe to say that opinions can also be facts. And sometimes "facts" can be nothing more than an opinion that has been passed down as tradition. That is one of the curiosities I have and reason for this OP, I would like to see what type of a discussion we can create where "facts" and opinions (that are derived from studying the past, and working in the present) can contradict or correlate with each other. Basically for me it comes down to sensibility and reason, does it make sense, and does it actually work when tested. Since I have no working experience in timber framing I can say i have not tested anything myself, but i know many of you have. So timberwrestler, It is apparent that you believe DL to be opinionated and his method does not entirely correspond with yours. How can you disprove his statement on Chinese brackets? I know nothing on the subject, but would be glad to read about what you think.

Timberwrestler,

You said "You can put a structural ridge beam into all sorts of styles and accomplish the same thing.  It also doesn't need to a be ridge, it could purlin plates, a truss, or various strut arrangements."

Even if the over all design is not "Swiss", if you put in a structural ridge beam or support the roof from below in a way that prevents outward thrust, IE.Purlin plates. Are you not still using a similar method to the Swiss style? The theory is the same, to attempt to "hang" the roof from a mid or center point rather than allow all the thrust outward. You may not call it the same, and it may be an adapted or modified design that is developed separately but I think that the theory still correlates with what D L Bahler is saying when he talks about how to omit the cross beam in Swiss style. Perhaps D L Bahler is a little to absolute in his wording but I believe he is speaking very specifically on purpose.

[timberwrestler]

David and Myles,

Yes, my point was that you can put a ridge beam (that is posted to the ground) or a few other things (like purlin plates) in any building and it will reduce the thrust of the roof.  It's pretty handy.  Interestingly, you really don't see many style of timber framing in Europe that employ ridge beams, outside of the Swiss.  Although, from David's very specific use of the term 'hanging roof,' it almost implies that the rafters are not attached at the outside walls.  I'm not sure if that's the case, and I think you'd have a hard time convincing an engineer that was OK for a modern building (and they don't need to be floating to do the work).  I do think that my characterization of your pro-Swiss enthusiasm as gung ho was actually on the light side--it borders on fanaticism at times.  Believe me, I'm all for people being excited and digging deep into things that interest them--I admire that a lot in people.  On the other hand, if someone is telling me that there's really only one way to build (or vote, or think, or believe...), then I get pretty skeptical.  It's great that you're all about Swiss framing, and you've certainly been getting the word out.

What I meant by the opinion vs fact comment is that this is the Internet, and you should read everything critically, including what I'm writing here. 

I'm pretty limited in my knowledge on Chinese brackets, but I believe that their primary purpose is to allow for long cantilevers of the roof.  I've seen some Japanese and Chinese brackets up close at Timber Framers Guild conferences, and they're pretty amazing little structures in and of themselves. 





From a practical standpoint, the large roof overhangs (which the Swiss also employ quite a bit) shelter the lower framing from the weather.  I believe that there's also some benefit when earthquakes strike.  I'm sure that there's a long cultural evolution of Chinese brackets (and I have some books and papers, but don't have time now to look).  Japan (which has it's own, but similar brackets) has both the largest wood framed building in the world, and the oldest.  I've always found that pretty remarkable, for such a wet, earth-shaking environment.

[D L Bahler]

Thanks for the well thought out reply

It's not my intention to say there is only one way to do things. Yes I am inclined to think the way I learned is superior. Most of us are (and I am actually skeptical of the individual that doesn't) But I don't hope to suggest that my way is the way it has to be. I would be deeply saddened if everyone did things my way, because that would be the loss of so much else.

One person I speak to often and seek his opinion on matters is deeply into Asian and in general non-European forms of timber framing. The reason I like to talk to him, is his background and experience means he can see things in a way that I cannot. We frequently disagree, and I suppose that's why I like to talk to him. He forces me to question every assumption I make, and I believe I am better for it. That is what I am hoping to add to the story here, my background means I see things different that you, and I hope that by shedding light on that we can both learn. I'd be happy to build a drop-tie aisled barn for someone, I'm not determined to make everyone do things my way.

In log building, when you have a ridge beam it is in fact imperative that the rafters not be attached to the walls, but be allowed to slide freely. There are a number of metal bracket assemblies you can use if you are concerned about uplift. The people in the Alps instead put boulders on their roofs to hold them down. (no joke) You can't attach the rafters, because the pitch of the roof will change as the logs settle (assuming you have a log gable) and as it does, the rafters will shove the platte off of the wall.
In timber framing, they don't usually attach the rafters either (how do I know? Remember, I learned in Switzerland, my teacher is a Swiss master carpenter. And I asked. Also if you want me to confirm, I can give you some books to read) But if you really want to, you can spike of screw them to the purlins.
However, the use of the term 'Hanging roofs' is borrowed. It's not necessarily that the rafters MUST be attached only to the ridge, but it is to say that the primary theory behind the system is that the rafters are slung over the ridge.

You are correct that ridge beams are not found in most of Europe. To address the OP, this is because timber framing in Western Europe is derived from early Germanic timber frames, which used tent-like roofs. The anthropology of timber framing interests me greatly, and I have studied it quite a bit. This information here I am relating from some information published by German historians that I read some time ago.
You do find the ridge beam more frequently in Eastern Europe, or so I have been told. They are also found in the Black Forest region of Germany, but this isn't really fair because those structures are directly related to the ones on the Swiss Plateau.

I'll be the first to admit my knowledge of Chinese timber framing is limited. I have never studied the subject. I was just relating something told to me by someone who has, though I could be remembering what he said wrong.

[Myles Franco]

Timberwrestler,

Thanks for the reply, and for the photos. Those look like some very complicated brackets. I have purchased two books on Japanese carpentry and hope to learn a thing or two about it. I have been looking at a lot of Asian structures, and i can see that there are posts that carry numerous beams which stack ontop of each other and build up to the ridge beam. The beams carry the downward roof load, and the brackets seem to tie all the beams and crossbeams together on top of the posts. This is basically at a glance.

D L Bahler,
Thank you for your reply as well. I am curious what you mean by built more like a tent. Does this mean it has a main center post that the roof is "draped" down off of?

[TW]

Timberframes are few and far between in Finland and Northern Sweden. Too few to form any kind of tradition and usually a result of influence from abroad. However almost all of them have ridge logs. Most builders went directly from log buildings to nailed post-and-beam buildings or stick framed buildings.

Though in log building we have plenty of local variations from one parish to the next though the basic building method is mostly the same all over Finland and Sweden and Norway. This is turn is very different from Russian log building and from American log building and from Swiss log building methods.

[D L Bahler]

TW,

Thanks for coming on, some valuable insight. The Scandinavian log culture is wonderful, and one I think is often underestimated. You have a very very old tradition (that's often falsely attributed to others, said to have come from elsewhere, but my studies have seemed to suggest you invented it yourselves)

I find it interesting your lack of timber frames, especially since they are so important in southern Sweden and Norway. The Norwegians are remarkable for having developed some ingenious trusswork in their timber frames.

Myles,
it occurs to me I never responded to you,
when I was talking tent-like, this was in reference to rafters that are leaned against each other, supported by the walls and not a ridge. Like a tent, pitched up. Maybe that's a wrong way to talk about it but it helps me sort it out in my own mind.

[TW]

I find it interesting your lack of timber frames, especially since they are so important in southern Sweden and Norway. The Norwegians are remarkable for having developed some ingenious trusswork in their timber frames.

Back in the iron age people lived in large longhouses that were some kind of simple timberframes with posts dug into the earth and lath and daub walls. People loved in one end and their cattle in the other end. In the 9-12 centutries people gradually quit building longhouses and instead started building several smaller buildings on each farms. Probably in order to stay warm as the longhouses must have been very cold and draughty in winter. The newer smaller buildings were all log built. They first filled the gaps with moss and clay but already in the 13th century when the oldest standing log buildings were built the scribe fitted long groove was already common practioce even for simple buildings.

After this there wasn't much need for great rooms or great roof spans. A farm consisted of a great number of small log buildings. There was no need for timberframing except for a few exceptional buildings like church towers and a few great sheds in some harbours.
If a timberframe is going to be viable there has to be something to fill it in with. Burned lime had to be brought from far away and was very expensive. Brickmaking was a speciality trade which had been known since the 15th century but only a few specialists knew how to do it and bricks were too expensive to be used for anything else than the fireplaces and the owen. The local stone is a very hard granite that could not be worked at a reasonable cost until cast steel drills became affordable around 1840. Sawmills were few and far between and pit saw blades were not affordable until the early 1800s so boards had to be split and consequently were expensive because of the sheer amount of labour involved. Nails we expensive too.

Logs were free and plentyful but workers had to be well fed and clothed to survive the climate. Food and clothes were in limited supply. Every farmer had the right to fell enough trees for his own needs on communal land. All forest was communal. Most of the land was covered in forests and nobody wanted to buy the wood so there was no need to economize with the trees that just died and rotted away.

In Norway the situation was totally different. Wood was in limited supply and fish was plentiful and cheap food.

In the mid 19th century most easy accessible forests of Finland and Northern Sweden had been logged and the timber export grew while sawmills multiplied. Suddenly timber had a value. Then people started to test different timber saving building methods including timberframing. Heated buildings were still log built but hay barns and sheds for boats and farm equipment could be framed.

This was the history lesson for today......

[Myles Franco]

Thanks TW for the history, i find it very interesting and enjoyed reading it.

DH Bahler, Thanks for clearing up the tent detail, that makes more sense.