Gents,
Everyone seems to be focused on the hoist system, which is great, but another thing y'all really need to take into consideration is the ceiling you're attaching it all to. As stated in one of the earlier posts, the hard top assembly weighs a couple hundred pounds. If the joists/rafters that you're attaching your hoist to aren't able to support that, you're gonna find out the hard way. Your rafters are generally designed to support the weight of the roof pushing down on the whole rafter system, not necessarily designed to have weight hanging from the bottom of them.
Prior to attaching your hoist to any overhead rafter, you need to make sure the rafter(s) can support the weight or at least modify them so they can support hanging weight. As all rafters are going to be different, there's no clear cut way to determine which rafters can or cannot support the extra weight, so you're gonna have to make a bit of an educated guess. Here are a few ways to help beef up your rafters in order to help support the hanging weight of the hard top:
In the attached photos you can see what I've done to strengthen my trusses in anticipation of installing a hoist system after I complete construction. In the top of IMG 2056 you can see how the trusses came from the factory. There's a vertical 2x4 member attached to a horizontal 2x4 member with nothing more then a small stamped steel plate.
First, I cut 1 foot sections of new 2x4 and screwed and glued those to each side of the vertical member such that the end of the 1 foot sections were flush with the lower edge of the horizontal truss member. That will help strengthen the connection between the vertical and horizontal members.
Next, I added a 2x4 along each side the horizontal rafter member. This will not only help stiffen the horizontal member, but will also allow a wider area to sink my lag screws/bolts into. In other words, instead of trying to get my lag screw into the center of a board 1.5" wide, I've got an area 4.5" wide to work with (considering I'll get to that stage after the rafters have been hidden with the sheet rock). I attached the 2x4s with carpenter's glue and 3" #9 wood screws spaced about 6 inches apart.
Finally, I added a 2 foot x 9 inch sheet of 1/2 inch plywood on each side of the joint area. It's probably a bit of overkill, but I had the material on hand and it surely can't hurt.
The last thing I still need to do, once the house construction is complete, is to go back into the attic and reinforce the upper joint where the single vertical truss member, referenced above, joins with the upper portion of the rafter assembly. In IMG 2058 you can see where the vertical member joins with other truss members. It does no good to beef up the bottom joint if the upper joint could then become the weak link in the system. I'll simply add a plywood plate (similar to what I did above) to each side of the joint and attach it to all of the truss members that join at that location.
I realize this post is a bit wordy but I hope it helps get the point across.
- Then painted it white to highlight his work!!!
and the bezel too!
