On 12 Oct, 14:04, wrote:
On Oct 12, 1:33 pm, willshak wrote:





on 10/12/2007 12:41 PM said the following:

I hired a contractor to put in a cathederal ceiling in my house. He
hired a structural engineer, pulled the permit, removed the old
ceiling and put the new cieling up to the ridge line of my roof After
it was done the inspector said that the LVL beam that was put up is
blocking the ridge vent now and roof venting is needed.

When I called the contractor he tells me that since my contract with
him was just for the framing he is not responsible for putting in the
new ventilation.

My question is since the venting was fine before the cathederal was
put in and he pulled the permit shouldn't he be responsible for fixing
the problem identified by the building inspector? btw this is
Massachusetts if it matters.

Thanks in advance for any help

Mike McCarthy

Did the builder leave all the attic rafters and ridge beam in place and
just put up ceiling panels (sheetrock) on the original rafters along
with the LVL beam as a decoration?
I can't see where the ridge vent would now be blocked if he left
everything in place, or he put in insulation without leaving an air path
between the soffit vents and ridge vent. You have soffit vents, right?

--

Bill
In Hamptonburgh, NY
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No this isn't decoration, he cut the roof joists, replaced the old 2x6
ridge beam with a lvl and re-hung the joists on the lvl. The problem
as that the lvl is significantly wider than the old 2x6 so it covers
where the plywood sheating was cut to allow air flow.

And no I don't have soffit vents and these weren't part of the
contract so I'm responsible for them.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Totally uneducated opinion he

Before the work was done, the structure was code compliant. An
engineer drew up a set of plans that the contractor followed. I can
see the contractor saying "Hey, I just followed instructions. I don't
know anything about venting codes." In that case, the fault would fall
to the engineer.

What if you had contracted to have door put in a wall that had
electrical wires in it? Would you expect that when the work was
completed the wires would be runnning across the floor? Of course not.
In both cases I would think that the engineer who drew up the plans
would have taken the venting (or wires) into account and included
dealing with the issue in the plans.

OK, now if that's correct, the next thing to look at is this: If the
original plans had dealt with the venting, what would have changed?
Would roof vents simply had been added to the plan or would the
existing vents been worked around in some fashion - and what would
have been the cost differential? If roof vents would have been part of
the original plan, then you would have been responsible for the cost
anyway. If you have someone do them now, you have not been
significantly harmed, so just go do it.

However, if the original vents could have been left as is and a
different type of beam used - at the same cost - then any extra cost
should be the responsibility of whoever caused the structure to be non-
compliant - i.e. the engineer.

Bottom line - if the "fix" will cost you more than an original plan
that dealt with the venting issue in the first, the engineer should
bear that cost.