Frameworks - Frame Manufacture

Oak has been used in this country as a traditional building material for hundreds and hundreds of years. The resilience and strength of the material makes it ideal for use in the construction industry, as does its innate warmth as a natural product.

There was certainly a lull in the appreciation and manufacture of these buildings until about twenty years ago when their historic importance and interest in the skills needed to make them was revived. In addition to this we now have a huge environmental push towards a greener lifestyle and a hundred and one television programmes showing us what can be achieved. This has all led to traditional timber framed buildings becoming increasingly popular in recent years.

The timber we use for our buildings comes from France where they are able to produce long straight oak relatively defect free. Once it has been delivered to our workshops we begin the laying up process needed to mark the joints. Each timber is selected depending on where its final position in the building will be.

Every timber frame building is made by breaking it down into its constituent 2D frames and manufacturing each one independently. The method we use is called 'French Scribe' as each timber is scribed to fit its final position perfectly. We presume this was the method of framing we adopted after the Norman conquest.

Once all the timbers have gauge lines on them and are laid up correctly, we can scribe and cut the joints for that particular frame. When the peg holes have been drilled the frame can be re-assembled and checked for accuracy. This frame is now complete and the next 2D component of the building can be started.

Framing in this way ensures that the building will fit together correctly when it's being craned into position on site and also that it will be a quick process as all the work has been done back at the workshop. The frame can now be pegged together using cleft oak pegs approximately 12 inches long.

Once other parts of the build have been completed such as roofing and so on, some people adopt to have the frame sandblasted to remove any unwanted marks such as water stains it may have picked up along the way.