Hi
Hate to come across as a ingnorant home owner looking for free advice but … Anyhow I plan to have my old garage replaced this summer with a garage-carport combination. Do you think I need to have an architect involved or select a builder and work with them? The inclosed garage is 15′ acrosswith a 9′ opening and the carprot is 12′. Both are 22′ deep. I would like to leave the carprot open on all three sides. I guess I’m courious as to where there are any glaring concerns such as header sizing, support post sizing, etc. The roof will built wtht trusses. A friend made up this drawing just to get my idea on paper. Appreciate any input.
Thanks
Replies
You don't need an architect for your job, Tom, any experienced builder can handle it. There can be local concerns, snow loads, winds, ground conditions, building permit restrictions and such that a local builder would be familiar with. This forum is for questions like yours, just don't ask us how much it should cost.
A lot depends on where you live. If you are in a hurricane state or an earthquake state you might neen an engineer or architect
One thing to do is to go to the local home centers and see if they have a set of ready-made plans that are close to what you want. Often these are already stampped/certified sufficiently to handle some of the bureaucratic stuff, if that's a problem in your area.
Also, the truss supplier can be a good resource for both ideas and engineering stamps.
But in any case most competent builders should be able to handle this. In some areas there are builders who specialize in garages, and will probably give you a slightly better deal, if you take one of their standard designs.