S-house plan drawing
There are no absolute scales used for all house plans, but commonly the minimum scale for a site plan is 1 inch equals 20 feet. House plans are drawn to scale, meaning that when you multiply the lengths of the lines in your plans by a previously determined number, you wind up with their length in real life.So, what's found within the pages of the these sections? Structural plan - plans for your house's important connections including trusses and second floor framing.Wall details - What's inside your walls? This section of the house plan shows insulation details and names the materials used in flooring and roofing.Exterior elevations - a view of each of your house's four sides, showing exact measurements for each side, along with the materials and details.Roof plan - an exterior view, showing the peaks, slopes and outline of your roof.Interior elevations - your vertical wall plans, including plans for built-in cupboards, bookshelves and other features whose construction the contractor will oversee.Floor plans - a page per floor showing rooms, walls, doors and windows, and additional suggestions for electrical outlets and fixtures.Foundation plan - your house's footprint, including any areas that require excavation.Cover sheet - shows an artist's sketch of the house's finished exterior.And these days house plans are printed and duplicated the same way everything else is - on the computer. Obviously over time this method of creating copies of drawings became replaced by other technology. Voila! The first real architectural photocopy machine was born. Therefore, after the sun had done its work and the paper was dried, the black lines drawn by the architect on the first sheet of paper would appear white on the second sheet of paper and the rest of that second sheet of paper would appear blue. When architects drew black lines on an original document, clamped that doc to paper coated in iron gallate and set it out in the sun, the black lines would block the sunlight. He also found that where the paper was shielded from the sun, it would remain white. In 1861, French chemist Aplhonse Louis Poitevin found that a substance called iron gallate could be spread on paper and would turn blue in the sun. They got this name long ago by virtue of being, well, blue. To give you a little background, architectural plans once were called " blueprints" (and still are sometimes by those outside the field). And since these plans are for your house, you really should. After all, the pages are filled with cryptic symbols just waiting to be "read." But unless you're familiar with the language, you've no idea what the drawings are trying to say. If you're not a builder or an architect, reading house plans can seem like cracking code. Sean Ellis/Photographer's Choice/ Getty Images