How to Design Your Storage Buildings With a Hip Roof

A hip roof is one with four sloped sides.  Designing this type of roof is not difficult.  In fact, the most difficult part is calculating the length and angle of the hip rafter but you can always have a carpenter do this for you. 

• Create a plan view for your rectangular building.  This is the view of the building's footprint and walls as seen from above.


• Draw an elevation view showing one of the building’s two narrower faces.


• Decide upon the height of the top plates (the horizontal two-by-fours or two-by-sixes that will tie your studs together at the top).


• Draw the two vertical sides from the base to the top plate.


• Draw an angled line upward and inward from your top plate past the centerline.  Use a protractor to measure the angle.  Use this same angle in reverse to draw another angled line upward and inward on the opposite side of the building until these two lines connect.


• Draw an elevation view to show one of the two wider facades from the base to the top plate.


• Draw a horizontal line across the drawing at the ridge point. 


• Draw identical angled lines upward and inward from the outer edges of the opposing plates.  Make them the same pitch or angle as the lines that you drew in order to create the ridge.


• Establish the rises and runs for your four hip rafters.


• Draw a vertical line downward from where the hip rafter meets the top of the ridge.  Draw a line that runs horizontally from the corner of the top plate to this line. This will create a right triangle that you need to label A (the line between B and C), B (the line between A and C) and C (the line between A and B).


• Square the value of B (multiply it by itself).  Square the value of A then add it to B.  This is the value of C, which is the length of the hip rafter.