Smaller Marks Carpentry Training: Layout 1
At our latest Smaller Marks training, Technical Director Paul Caton and Superintendent Trent Carlson led the first in a series of three tutorials surrounding layout, beginning with the fundamentals of gridlines and story poles.
What are gridlines?
Gridlines are imagined layout lines architects can use to layout and dimension their buildings in plan sets. The grids are numbered or lettered, and align with prominent architectural elements in a building, including face of concrete, face of framing, or centering of structural steel. Ideally, these lines are used across all disciplines’ drawings to define the relationship between the structure, architecture, and landscape that can be easily understood.
What do gridlines prevent?
Gridlines prevent error and inefficiency, and in particular, compounding error. Consistently pulling layout from a prime gridline will prevent compounding errors from leapfrogging dimensions from one wall to another.
How do you set up a gridline on a project site?
Stakes, strings, lasers, sharp pencils, levels, story poles, nails and screws, tape measures, and squares are the primary tools for establishing gridlines in the field. Techniques can very from old-school plumb bobs or a builder’s site level, to modern Total Stations for GPS coordinate layout. Typically, a surveyor will establish fixed reference points, or “hubs” in the field from which lines can be set.
What are story poles?
Story poles are full-scale, dimensioned boards with a reference line that can be used for repeated accurate layout in the field. They transfer scale dimensions from plans, elevations, sections, and details into a tangible full-scale representation of the layout that can be checked against the actual building. Story poles can be used by the builder for precise and repeatable layout while aiding in visualization of scale and understanding, clearly highlighting any discrepancies within the building layout.
What do story poles prevent?
Similar to gridlines, story poles prevent error and efficiency. A good story pole can contain a great deal of layout information that can be used to transfer critical layouts to the building.
What is needed to create a story pole?
A long, clean 1x4 is a great place to start. Windsor One pre-primed pine 1x4’s are available in lengths up to 20 feet. They are long, straight. Lightweight, and take pen, pencil, and sharpie marks well. You will also need a sharp pencil, a square and a reference point, or a gridline to work from.
For the hands on training, Superintendent Trent Carlson gave our carpenters a set of plans and a 1x4 to build a story pole of their own, working in pairs to transfer dimensions from plans into the full-scale representation of the layout.
“Entire teams are oriented around the story pole,” Trent notes. “It’s the only time where a string of numbers comes together to form a vivid picture. Creating a story pole requires you to take ownership of the discovery process—you’re taking an idea and turning it into reality. Accuracy doesn’t come off the end of the pencil, it comes off a culture of professionalism, a high level of focus, and maintained work ethic.”