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Fire Tower Reinforces Treehouse Platform

Outdoor Spaces

Joe Miller and Ben Brungraber of Fire Tower Engineered Timber worked with Jason Lindsey and Jake Jacob this fall to upgrade the platform support on their treehouse platform near Couer d’Alene, Idaho.  The facility is on a mountainside where an entirely impressive and thrilling set of ziplines start their plummet to the bottom of the mountainside. 

Ben recounts, "We stood ninety feet up swaying on Douglas fir trees, walking wildly bouncing suspension bridges and took seven separate ziplines to the bottom.  The final ride topped out at 480 feet off the ground.  All on a 5/8” cable."

The Fire Tower Engineers counseled their clients on retrofitting the main support glulam beam with the kingpost truss and cable system.  This augmented the capacity of the beam, without adding an issue-laden support to the ground.  One of the precepts of building in the trees is minimizing the numbers of supporting points.  Since trees move disparately from one another, and distinctly from the ground, multiple supporting points can disagree with one another and tear the structure apart.  When the owner decided to build a high rise treehouse, instead of the planned pergola, the options for reinforcing really boiled down to this solution. Joe and Jack and Jason worked smoothly and quickly, starting from a post-zip, local tavern napkin, to this elegant and effective solution.

Write to us, for details on how to book your own thrilling ride through the high Idaho forests.

Fire Tower Reinforces Treehouse Platform

How We Work

Leading authorities on pegged mortise and tenon connections and mechanically laminated beams, our team has been responsible for some of the timber frame community’s most impressive projects, while also advancing the science and capabilities of heavy timbers.

See our work

Where We Work

US licenses:
AK, AL, AZ, CA, CO, CT, DE, FL, GA, ID, IN, IA, KS, KY, LA, ME, MD, MA, MI, MN, MS, MO, MT, NC, NE, NV, NH, NJ, NM, NY, ND, OH, OK, OR, PA, RI, SC, SD, TN, TX, USVI, UT, VT, VA, WA, WV, WI, WY

Canadian licenses:
AB, BC, ON, SK, AND YT

Contact Us

Fire Tower Client Map

Anything But Standard

64' truss, anyone?

Commercial
Trusses
Raisings
Sometimes proportions of things look different on the computer screen than they do in the field. In this case, these 64' span scissor trusses looked big, no matter how you look at it.
Scissor truss

FTET in the air

Ben on site, doing what he does best.
Ben Selfie

Wooden Skyscrapers

Commercial

Fire Tower Reinforces Treehouse Platform

Outdoor Spaces
Joe Miller and Ben Brungraber of Fire Tower Engineered Timber worked with Jason Lindsey and Jake Jacob this fall to upgrade the platform support on their treehouse platform near Couer d’Alene, Idaho. The facility is on a mountainside where an entirely impressive and thrilling set of ziplines start...
Fire Tower Reinforces Treehouse Platform

Timber Busting

Testing
Watch Mack & Joe in action - testing and breaking timbers!

Timber Frame Trusses

Trusses
Check this out to learn more about timber frame trusses. We can help!

TFEC Technical Bulletin: The Capacity of Pegged Connections

Testing
Fun Connections
Timber frame structures often rely on pegged mortise and tenon connections to secure members together. Wood pegs, while large in diameter, are considerably more flexible than a steel dowel of the same size. Engineering design of these pegged tension connections is not addressed in the National...
Download Technical Bulletin
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