Wood Roof Truss Failure

Poor roof truss erection construction.

Wood roof truss failure.

Firecompanies february 13 2007 no comments the following happened at a fire i responded to with my volunteer dept. Failure of a single wood truss in the early stages from overload or improper lateral bracing can cause a domino effect of failure across the entire system. We were dispatched to a neighboring fire district as their fast team at 1 30am last thursday morning. Installations by unskilled constructers without proper designs.

Roof truss failures they don t get nailed anymore. The aforementioned conditions indicated the collapse was the result of long term thermal and or moisture related degradation of the wood trusses. Most truss repairs that are generated during the construction phase involve lumber scabs over broken webs and chords or plywood osb gussets over damaged plates or joints. As the starter wood trusses are installed installation tolerances must be strictly followed to ensure that there is no bowing out of plane distortion in excess of the allowable tolerances.

I been in the truss and panel business for about 7 years and live in a town where the plant is and 75 of the houses are trussed from 1970 s and haven t seen the failure you site. The use of inappropriate structural material such as low grade timber. These are generated following the design principles outlined in the american wood council s national design specification for wood construction nds. If a truss buckles or overturns it is usually because of the failure of an adjacent truss or its bracing.

Many roof structures fail during the construction process while others have taken years for an incident to occur. A steel truss in a fire may buckle and overturn because of expansion or weakening from the. Lightweight wood truss failure beware the truss. Buildings with proper design and construction of bracing systems are essential in reducing and or eliminating wooden roof truss failures.