Yeah, I was kinda giddy when that design popped into my wee brain. The more I thought about it, the more it made sense.
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OK, on to the structural engineering.
Rocky T nailed it about the second floor. I am going to maintain the 28' wide footprint and use 16' of it for the second floor. Keep that in mind....
The first floor is a 28' x 42' footprint (I might stretch it to 28' x 44', but that won't change the basic structural engineering).
The plan is to frame out the first floor with 2 x 6 exterior walls around the 28' x 42' perimeter. I want to use engineered I-joists or trusses on top of the walls to span the entire 28' distance without intermediate supports. I REALLY DON'T WANT any poles or beams if I can avoid it. Based on the spec's of manufacturers for these products, I am going to be using a 16" tall truss @ 16" O/C. I'm all good with that. The load bearing issues come with the bearing walls on the 2nd floor. They will support the top section of the roof and the walls that support that roof will bear down to the same clear-span trusses at a point 6 feet out from the 1st floor load bearing walls.
In Eddie's pal's pole frame, that top roof bears directly down to the grade with posts. As I mentioned, I don't want posts at the first level if at all possible. I have an email into a truss manufacturer for their "engineering opinion" on the application as I want to do it. I'm kinda expecting them to either recommend an even bigger truss, or use the same 16" truss at 12" O/C. We will see.
