The first purlin was relatively easy to fit because we could work off the mezzanine floor below. We had to remove a lot of stone from the front gable as it was a rectangular purlin, the original purlin had been a smaller square one.
The first purlin is installed in the front gable wall
The other end of the purlin is positioned inside the first a frame, it rests on a wooden insert which is secured with high tensile steel threaded bar and timber connectors.
The purlin is secured in the first a-frame.
Because of the distance between both gables was approximately 10m, and thickness of the gable walls was over 0.5 metres, we had to use 2 perlins on each side of the roof each one was 5.5 metres long. It was harder to fit the purlins at the back of the barn because we were working off scaffolding and we did not have enough of it! Anyway when all the purlins were fitted they almost joined in the right places!
The front and rear purlins almost meet in the correct place. (We forgot to allow for the curvature of the earth!)
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