How To Floor An Attic With Trusses

Attic trusses are popular over garages or anywhere people want to increase living or storage space without adding another floor to their structure.

How to floor an attic with trusses.

Since removing them is clearly not a safe option it s essential to replace them with horizontal steel beams that provide sufficient structural strength for the entire construction. Given that the w shaped trusses support the loft floor and ceiling structure through their diagonal bracing they don t allow for an open attic space under the roof. Room in attic trusses or more commonly attic trusses allow for living spaces within a truss. I have this above my own garage.

The bottom chord is increased and loaded for live loads similar to floor systems in residential spaces. As with rafter style roofs toenailing is one of the most common ways of attaching a truss style roof to a wall plate. If your attic joists won t bear the weight necessary to finish out a living space but the engineer cleared them to support floor decking for light storage you can install inch plywood or. Use bracing to keep the trusses in place as you work your way across.

If the roof slope is steeper than 9 inches in 12 inches of run it doesn t take much width to end up with a nice room 12 feet wide with an 8 foot ceiling. If you have a rafter framed attic the floor joists may or may not be large enough for living space and may need to be reinforced or replaced. Look at this photo of the space created by attic trusses at my home. Certain conditions must be met before an attic truss can be built.

Measure the space where you want to lay the floor. Attic floors are made with floor joists or with truss members. If the attic joists are not adequate one way to strengthen the floor for live loads is to sister the old joists. In the case of 2x6 joists you can pair them up with additional 2x6 joists by nailing them together side by side.

The structure should be sufficiently wide to allow for a loft and attic spaces the loft area must be on a living floor and have attic rooms on both sides separated by knee walls a flat ceiling in the loft area and a floor below steep enough roof pitch to provide appropriate ceiling height for the loft area. However if you keep the storage weight to a minimum you may be able to build a storage platform above the insulation by attaching supporting beams to the sides of the trusses. Sistering is the process of adding a new joist next to each existing joist. Use a tape measure to measure the length and width of where you want to place the flooring.

If you have attic trusses not conventional trusses the members will be sized to support living space. You can t see the floor but. Attic trusses have a rectangular shape inside each truss. Attic insulation between roof trusses.