Corbels, Knee Braces, & Arches
It's been said that the "devil is in the details" but in the case of designing timber features, the "beauty is in the details". When designing a custom timber feature, these details can include corbels, knee braces, and arches.
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These items can offer structural support or be purely decorative. They can be integrated into a truss or entryway or be a stand-alone feature.
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Curved beams are especially striking and can elevate almost any project. We have crafted arches for bridges, coverings for bus stops, arched top windows, etc.
FAQ: How do you make a curved beam?
There are three main categories of curved beams that largely depend on their application and structural load. For lighter structural loads, we can cut a curve into an oversized, straight beam. For larger structural loads or projects with a wide radius, we can glue up several sections to meet these requirements. We can also use wood splines to stabilize the joinery. For heavy load applications, we source curved glulam beams to integrate into your project.
FAQ: Why do timber features commonly have knee braces?
The main structural purpose of knee braces in timber framing is to resist shear stress. This is the force along the length of the wall that would cause the wall to rack and fall into a parallelogram. Knee braces are essentially wedged between vertical and horizontal beams to prevent this from occurring.
FAQ: What is the largest knee brace you have ever made?
We crafted extra large soffit braces for a new hotel. They were 11 feet long and 14 feet tall, weighing over 1500 lbs each! To check out some pictures of these monster knee braces, check out these photos.