If you’re framing the second-floor walls on the exterior of a house, you could toenail the bottom plate into the deck and hope that the whole wall doesn’t slip off the edge when you stand the wall up, but there’s a better way.
Mike Norton of Middleboro, Mass., has figured out a way to use steel lumber strapping to prevent walls from going over the edge. What he does is cut several lengths of strapping, slips a piece underneath the bottom plate, then he bends it up and nails that strapping to the bottom plate. Then he nails the other end of the strapping down to the floor deck. He does this at several points along the length of the wall, and then he know it’s not going over the edge.
That’s a pretty clever tip, Mike. Thanks for sending that in.
Read our 10 Rules for Framing
Kevin Ireton is editor-at-large and a good friend and former colleague of Chuck Miller’s. Keep your eye out for more Better Way videos from Kevin and several of our other regular contributors in the near future.
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View Comments
I like this.
This is a great practice, but a hard won a safety tip here... if the wall is tall or has heavy headers, SCREW the strap to the deck!
20 years ago I was standing up a tall wall with a big header and as we reached about halfway, the wall was top-heavy enough to see-saw over us and actually pulled the nails right out of the floor and it collapsed on top of us. I ended up with a broken hip when I did the 'splits' as the wall smashed me down.
Now I use a couple good structural screws, haven't had a problem since.