Stopped by a barn renovation in Vermont and noticed something about the ridge beam

I was up in Stowe last weekend helping a buddy look at an old dairy barn he's turning into a workshop. The ridge beam was a full 40 feet long, hand hewn from a single white pine, and it had zero sag after 150 years. My buddy wants to reuse it, but there's a crack running about 8 feet along the grain near the center. I told him to leave it alone, but he's thinking about sistering a steel plate on it for strength. Has anyone here dealt with reusing old ridge beams like this, or is it better to just leave the crack be?

2 comments

2 Comments

adam_patel1d ago

Beams cracking and me getting out of bed have a lot in common, both happen more than I'd like.

young.kim2d ago

Is the crack following the grain or cutting across it? If it's running with the grain that's usually just a check from drying and not structural, but if it's a split that's opened up along the whole 8 feet something else might be going on.