first time builder

I am without my husband on this one, and only have the help of a friend of ours. I have a 10' by 10' chain link dog kennel without a permanent roof and I wanted to build one for it. I need to build three trusses with a 2/12 pitch. If anyone could give me some pointers on how to put all this together with sketches, I would greatly appreciate it! I wanted to try and get this done this weekend because the tarp I have will not hold up anymore. Thank you!

 

Welcome to the forums

How do you envision holding up these trusses?

 

I was thinking about either building a frame on the top of the kennel for the trusses to be nailed to then anchoring the whole thing to the kennel, or just using 2 by 4s to nail them together and tying them to the kennel frame. Either way, I want to use corrugated tin for the roof, just like my porch.
I was also thinking about how to make sure that when someone goes inside his pen that no one hits their head on the bottom of the center truss. I just want to build something that will hold up and shelter my dog from the usual wind rain and snow. I also had thought of building a roof that sloped one way away from my porch, kind of like a salt-box style house. Nothing fancy, but with the way my porch was built, it helps keep that side of his pen completely dry with no openings.

 

2/12 is a shallow pitch. Assuming the kennel gate is at one corner of the kennel, I would go with a single pitch roof. A truss height of 20 inches on the gate side would help some with the overhead clearance. How high is the kennel?

 

The kennel is 6 feet high, and the door is, in fact on the corner of the kennel itself. How should I build the single pitch roof? The clearance is not a problem, considering the height of anyone having to go in and out of the kennel is under 6 feet tall.

 

Snow loads will be a problem with the low pitch. You will need more than 3 trusses(I think 6 spaced 2 ft apart). Each end of each truss will need adequate support.

Is the kennel of the chain link fabric and tubing variety?

 

No. The kennel is the regular old chain link. Plain old metal (or whatever it's made of). So, would you still suggest the single pitch roof? I can handle getting the supplies for the extra trusses, but I would think I might only need 5 spaced two feet apart, considering it is a 10' by 10' kennel. I am thinking of tying it into my porch, if at all possible.

 

I wanted to add something else to my previous post. Since I am thinking of building the single pitch roof, it will have a higher pitch. Am I wrong in thinking that I won't have to worry as much about the snow load?

 

Please post a photo of the kennel and its related position to the house.

 

I will post a photo of the kennel here in a bit in my next post.

 

I'm not sure how to insert a photo because it's asking me to type in a URL.......help!

 

Not certain I could insert an image either
see if this will help, http://forum.doityourself.com/electr...your-post.html

 

Let's hope this works.....http://www.flickr.com/photos/upload/[/IMG]