As the title says, I am in the process of building a 5x12 covered porch on the front of my house. I am not a contractor by trade, just a home hobbyist with a good sense of how to do things. I started the base deck and originally when I ha drew this on paper it seemed that I could get away with only 2 posts on the front and 2 on the side. I realize now that this is not going to be enough support for the roof, especially if we get snow again like this past winter. There is an almost identical porch down the road that I am looking at and they have 3 x4 posts on each side which is my new plan. The problem is, I already had the footers made and had planned to integrate them with the deck and porch support posts in 1. Now my spacing is all different and I'm wondering if it will pass inspection if I change my plan to what I am about to propose.
For my deck I used a beam of 3 2x8's, and 2x8 joists, and 2x10 ledger and outer rim. The beam is almost at the end of the joists so it's very strong, and supported by a 4x4 post with a 2x4 attached to make it a 2x6 and fit under the beam. Now I am wishing I went with a 6x6 for the base supports, but I didn't want to spend the extra on that since the place only had long 6x6 posts and I only need short pieces. Originally I was going to have the porch posts come down in front of the deck posts, supported by the same footer and everything bolted together. Now I am thinking that I want to beef up the deck base since I originally planned on having more there anyway, so I'm going to put the extra 4x4 piece there anyway and bolt it to the rim for extra support. So i'll have a 4x8-1/2" true size post support under/alongside the beam now.
My question is would I be ok to mount the porch posts on top of my deck beam? Or do they absolutely need to have their own footings poured. It would be a huge pain to add new footings now that the deck has been built. The beam is very solid and doesn't move at all with my weight jumping anywhere on it. I feel that it would be able to support the full load of the deck and roof, but is that possible or would it not pass inspection at all? I think the main limiting factor here is that I didn't use 6x6's under the beam, but the 4x8's should make up for it and I can still add more under there if needed. I could box them in with more 2x4 pieces around it. The footings are a 12" diameter concrete filled sono tubes and almost 24" deep so they can support all the weight.
Here are a few pics to make this easier to visualize. The roof is going to be a gable type with a little overhang around each side. I will have a post by the center stairs, in the corners, and in the back touching the house.
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