I'm sure we have some structural engineers on the forum might could steer me. I have a detached garage and ceilings are 9' tall. I'm tired of not having a lift and would like to raise just a portion of the roof up at least 3 ft. (Like a pocket in the ceiling I guess you'd call it, or a tray ceiling?) I got a quote from a company that primarily removes load bearing walls and he said it would need an engineered beam down the center of the garage and a beam to replace the garage door header. Quoted me $11,500. I'm in the medical field so I know nothing about this but I just wasn't expecting it to be that costly. The attached pics are when it was built, unfortunately, I only took one of the framing but if you look at the framing pic, you can see that beam going down the center of the garage, perpendicular to the door opening. I want the pocket built on the left side of the garage if you're looking head on at the door opening. Any input or advice or is this going to be cost prohibitive?
I am not a structural engineer but I have built my own 50 X 36 stick framed shop and my wife and I investigated raising our ceilings in the main room of our house. I don't think $11.5 is out of hand. You will require the reconstruction of several of your trusses. Another option is to raise your walls from 9' to 12'. You could build 3' "stem walls" and raise all your trusses to sit on top of the new wall. Either way, not really inexpensive but doable. Anything you do will probably require engineering since you are deviating from approved blueprints. I would reach out to a builder/remodeler for their ideas.
That’s going to be challenge in an already finished structure. I designed my garage with scissor trusses for an anticipated lift down the road. This allows for a taller ceiling in the center of the structure without needing to have taller walls.
I am a structural engineer, former builder and builder of multiple cars. The roof can be raised in a way you speak of with a new structural ridge above. Design and cost to perform the work is dependent upon how the existing roof is framed - stick or truss? Can't really tell from the pictures. Not sure why you would need to replace the door header. Another factor is the location but a price of $11,500 doesn't sound that bad.
I’d add more jack studs between your garage doors with a microlam that spans front to back down the
Middle of the garage. You could then essentially build a wall on top of the laminate beam up to the ridge beam. Thats going to take most your roof load. I believe you could then get away with removing the bottom cord on the single side of the garage. You could still add some web runners from your top chord to your new wall above the lam beam too.
Most of the load from trusses is designed to be tension on your bottom cord. Obviously the walls take the weight but the bottom cord helps to keep the walls from just pushing outward.
Looking at your picture again it looks like they stick built everything considering you already have a 1x8 running down the middle of the two car that they ran 1x with hangars too.
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