Does IBC have a Minimum Live Load for Agricultural Buildings?
mikeysp
| Posted in General Questions on
Hi. I am in 4a (Nashville area) and building a post frame barn. It will not be inspected. I have been trying to find the “minimum” Live Load for an agricultural roof, but have not been able to find it.
If yuou know where I can find this data, thank you!
-Mike
GBA Detail Library
A collection of one thousand construction details organized by climate and house part
Search and download construction details
Replies
I did find some info in the 2012 IBC section 1607 26 which did not have an ag buuilding section, but it did say an unoccupied roof live load min @ 20PSF.
However, I also found an agricultural Building Handbook that cited a 1990's Standard Building Code 1604.6 @ 10PSF a 100% seems a bit off.
The two pics show the two texts cited.
Mike,
The live loads for floors in various occupancies differ because of the types of activities that take place there. The loads for roofs don't because roofs have no idea what is going on below them. Agricultural roofs experience the same loading as residential or commercial ones.
Yeah, it's more of a regulatory thing than an engineering thing. Agriculture is less regulated than other activities. Barns collapse all the time when it snows.
Collapsing barns is more of a problem with people not building to code to begin with. Lots of buildings out in farm country are built or modified in a very haphazard kind of way, with no inspections. It doesn't matter what the code says if you have no intention of following it to begin with after all :-)
Code for roof load is by zone and locality, mainly for snow load. Snow load is x pounds per square foot for a geographic region regardless of the type of occupancy.
Bill