|
Hi Jen,
My ob is 9x6 and appears to have a very similar structural design as yours.
What I did was installed some 'dropped' rafters (meaning the rolling roof goes over the top of them) between the two rails the roof slides on to when opened and then roofed them in tinted laserlight (lightweight compared to tin). I also put in an extra post either side to deal with the additional weight and put a color matched colorbond fence along one side to reduce wind/weather ingress.
This effectively gave me a dry area which I store lawnmowers and other bits and bobs in......seemed such a waste to have those 2 x rails sitting there holding up nothing most of the time.
The rails are engineered to hold the weight of the rolling roof and you would never have the roof open in heavy wind anyway so structurally it is fine.
It survived a 100km wind storm that tore down a heap of trees around my property last year so I'm guessing my calculations/assumptions on strength are right.
|