Triple Truss

[Jeffrey R. Pope]

A damaged truss is bad enough. This is a triple on a relatively new (2004) home.

I have no idea how it happened. . .

[Michael Larson]

Originally Posted by jpope

I have no idea how it happened. . .

Heavy equipment damage either before or after installation. I suppose they figured they would be long gone before anyone found it.

[cgoyette]

Going way out on this one---how about earth quake...tree fall damage....looks almost like it twisted and if so may have been real wet wood and dryer then cracked as seen.

Again total guesses but thought you may want to here even a guess.

Curt

[Jeffrey R. Pope]

My guess would be that they were damaged prior to installation. The damage was too isolated to be from an earthquake (IMHO), although we did have a recent jolt that could have contributed something.

The triple appeared to be the shearwall bridge supporting a vaulted ceiling and a concrete tile roof. . .

[bjones1]

[quote=jpope]My guess would be that they were damaged prior to installation.quote]

I've seen a lot of trusses get broken when they're delivered. If a single set is sent on one truck, they ususally raise the bed and let the trusses slide off. A wrong move and the bottom 1 or 2 trusses get broke.

I've also seen trusses get broke being hand-bombed from the ground to the roof. truss falls, or gets caught with another as it's being lifted.

Also seen them broke being lifted by a crane. Truss gets snagged, operator doesn't see it and keeps going.

[Marcel R. Cyr]

From what I can see, this truss was picked up by a forklift on the flat, or picked up with a Crane on the flat to move from one location to the other, or was unloaded on un-level ground from the slide off beds.

Too many variables here, truss is damaged before or after install, and the integrity of the structural capacities have been hindered, recommend a truss Manufacturer or structural engineer to evaluate.

Marcel
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[Kenton H. Shepard, CMI]

The trusses stored were onsite waiting to be loaded when the bottom chords received an impact. It could have been the lift (rough terrain forklift) which ran into them or they could have been dropped and damaged during the setting process.
It doesn't really matter although it's fun to try to figure out. Report must specify evaluation by a structural engineer since their structural integrity has been comprimised.

[Scott Schultz]

Originally Posted by kshepard

The trusses stored were onsite waiting to be loaded when the bottom chords received an impact. It could have been the lift (rough terrain forklift) which ran into them or they could have been dropped and damaged during the setting process.
It doesn't really matter although it's fun to try to figure out. Report must specify evaluation by a structural engineer since their structural integrity has been comprimised.

It's pretty simple to repair broken trusses like these and bring them back to their original load strength. The plan for repairing that truss must be posted though so that it can be confirmed it was done to spec. Not sure if a SE has to be called in unless the repair specs cannot be located by the builder.

[Mike Truss Guy]

It's simple to repair a single ply truss. Repairing a three-ply girder truss with no visible bracing on the chord might be near impossible.