HOW TO BUILD TIMBER FRAME RAFTERS for a Cupola Roof

Hi gang, welcome back to Timber Town. Hey today Jason and I are actually assembling some parts for the sugar shack that we're building for the charity giveaway for the Paul Bunyan show and we've actually already assembled the bents for the top of the cupola and today we're going to show you how to make the roof structure that's going to happen. So really guys I just came over gave myself a test and I always always always make a template fellas a little bit to make sure that this thing is going to fit perfect. So that's how this actually roof structure is going to fit naturally it's going to be like this but it's the same scenario here. So now I've made this into two pieces now and this is actually the material that we have up on our sawmill today of what we're going to actually make these rafters out. So you see these are a lot thicker this is a lot easier to work with. So now really what we have to do is just make the pieces. Now I have one here this is the piece that's actually going to get the tenon put in where this is going to get the mortise to it. So this whole thing should fit together like that and that's what we're doing. So now I'm actually looking at my stock material that I have going on here and I'm always going to use this the same way and I'm going to go down and I'm going to cut my pieces out. I'm going to try to place any knots where they're not going to be in any joints or if we could just cut them out. So that's really all we have to do is really get our pieces centered scribe everything we'll cut them into the little bit of pieces that we have we'll show you how we make the tenons we'll show you how we make the mortise and I'll show you how that we actually join everything and assemble it. So that's what we have for you guys today we're going to get Okay guys as we've been cutting the pieces and stuff like that I've lined them up Jason's been over here taking care of them putting in all of our mortise cuts that need to be done here. So as we're making pieces one by one we're actually also fitting the rafters together before we drill. So that's how that whole system is going to look we're going to put a couple pegs in there but you see we've got using our sawmill as our workbench. So it's not just a sawmill it's a workbench. We've got pieces ready to be cut to make the mortises and then Jay can do all the finishing while I'm actually cutting and sizing the last pieces. So with this giant work table that we get to work with and we're building such small pieces this kind of makes it easy put some blocks under here to hold everything and really I'm just going to rizz down here and you're able to cut multiple cuts with just one board. Get it individually. Makes a great work table. It does so I'm even cutting getting prepped to have the bird's mouth where the rafters are going to sit. So while everything's up here nice and stable it's easy for me to make all my cuts all my pieces. Pinch it low and another bird's mouth guys. So really that's how simple that'll help you make a bunch of joints here all at once and then we'll get to cutting fitting them and we're done. It looks good. Let's cut some stuff Jay. Okay guys so now we're actually making our tenons using the sawmill here and our laser and all I had to do was actually just modify because this is a different pitch than what I normally use for my knee braces. Piece of cake lined it up screwed in a board you can do any angle you want. So Jay I need you to come up two clicks buddy. Give me one more. There it is. Let's have it. Let's do it. You can come on down buddy. You can come on down. One down, two down. Right there buddy. That was a hard line up fellas. You got the Japanese saw Jay? Yeah knock it off. That's it guys. You see how the tenon's made. Quick love, quick love. It's actually right here. Go ahead. There it is fellas. Let's pop this off. We have one more we can do Jay. That's it guys. One off, one on. You're pretty aggressive throwing that piece Jay. A little to me. A little bit to you. A little bit to me. All right there you go. I like the modification. I didn't even see that. You see the modification? Different angle. Actually down. Right there. Nope. One click up. There you go. There's the end of our pieces fellas. You see how tight that is. Perfect. Perfect Jay. All right so that was the last pieces we need to saw. We're going to be just sanding. Getting all the ends ready. Fitting. Pegging. Done. So we'll catch back up with you guys. We good Jason? All good man. This looks pretty smooth. That's pretty smooth. It does look pretty smooth. Okay guys. Here is actually the assembled rafter and we've actually already pinned these. I actually apologize that we didn't get to show you us drilling these particular beams. But it was 94 degrees yesterday. 110 percent humidity and a storm was bearing down on us. So Jason and I just got this done. So after you got your joints together. Guys we really just put a clamp here. Hold everything tight. Check our measurements. Drill our holes. That's it. Assembled. You see we've got them all. So that's for the cupola. The rafters for all of the cupola that we have. Which is actually going to be 14 foot long. So if you want to see how we actually join these. Join us over at the Paul Bunyan Show. We'll go live and I'll actually cut and assemble those joints for the big daddy rafters. Not just these little ones. We got some bigger ones going on. So guys thanks for watching. I really really appreciate it. Check this out. Check this out. These are beefy. These are six by eights right? Yeah. They are six by eight Jay. They definitely look chunky. These are beefy rafters. They are beefy little rafters.