Church cross constuction

[Scott Stephens]

My FIL wants me to build a cross for his church addition. They want it to be 8' tall and 5' wide. The wood will be 8" wide and 4" thick. He bought the wood and dropped it off for me to build. My question is how far from the top should the cross piece be? I was going to look at the cross at my church, but wanted to get started before Sunday. Any help would be appreciated.

[Jeff Sudmeier]

I do not have any formula for you, but it seems to me that most crosses are about 1/4 to 1/3 of the way from the top.

[John Pollman]

I may be wrong, but it seems to me that most crosses have the "cross" section about 25% of the way down from the top. Look at it this way. Take 6 equal sized squares. Place four of them together and then take the other two and place them on either side of the second square from the top I think that's about the right proportion.

EDIT:
Looks like we were both working the problem at the same time Jeff. ;)

[Randy Moore]

ScottI never gave it much thought but when I have looked at crosses it appears that the part parallel about 2/3 up. Don't know if that helps butit is a start.

Randy:)

[Marc Hills]

Hi Scott:

These links don't contain any formulae for locating the intersection (at least that I saw upon quick glance) but they do have some interesting discussion about the different forms of the cross.

It might be helpful from a design standpoint, or at least to get you in the proper frame of mind.

http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/encyclopedia/C/Ch/Christian_cross.htm

http://www.designboom.com/history/cross_2.html

http://www.kensmen.com/catholic/symbols.html

[Brad Schmid]

Hi Scott,
Here is a website that might help you:

http://www.christiancrosses.org/Dimensions.htm

These are the dimensions used by Rev. Bernard Coffindaffer who erected the 3 cross clusters along the highways that many of us have seen. He used 2 different sets of demensions, 1 for the large middle, and 1 for the 2 on the sides.

Otherwise, you could simply take a picture of a cross, or find one you like, and scale it up to the dimensions you mention to find the "distance from the top" dimension you are after.
Hope this helps.
Cheers,
Brad

[Lee Schierer]

I'm no authority, but the ones I've made the top and the length of the arms are equal and the lower leg is twice as long as the other three. If there are other crosses in the church it is best to get proportions from them and match their proportions with your new one otherwise, it will look somewhat out of place.

Lee

[Tom Scott]

Scott,
I was asked to do something similar several years ago and went researching. Basically came up with same proportions that Lee noted...1:1:1:2.
So, your's works out fairly close putting the center of the horizontal piece 2.5' from the top.

Tom

[Scott Stephens]

Thanks for all the input. I am going to lay it out with cardboard using the 1:1 1:2 ratio and see how it looks. It's supposed to be an ugly weekend here so maybe I can get some shop time in.

Thanks again