Confused.. Plans or Calcs?

[Daniel McKenna]

Hi all,

Can anyone help.

I've just purchased a property that i want to do some building work to, i'll definitely need steels for some openings and also a floor in the loft, however i'm confused as to whether I need a structural engineer for plans or whether i just need calcs done for the steels?

I don't want any designs doing, as i already know the layout i want, however i'd like to know "To remove wall A i'll need two steels with certain specifications etc...".

Goes without saying building control will be involved too, but conscious they're only involved to check it's compliant with building regs and not there to advise on the above.

Can anyone help clarify what it is i need?

Thanks.

 

[Notch7]

do a sketch of what you want with dims and give to SE.

structural engineers these days often use cad and will do drawings as part of the specification.

You may need more involved drawings if other elements of the building regulations are involved.

 

[Daniel McKenna]

Great, thanks for the advice!

 

[^woody^]

Do you know how to build a compliant floor, know about means of escape, requirements for fire safety so that when the inspector comes to check, everything is compliant?

 

[Notch7]

If its a loft conversion, get building regs drawn, theres a lot can go wrong.

Means of escape can throw up some tricky problems. Its one of those situations where its quite possible to build something that simply cant comply

 

[DIYer Damo]

I had this issue with my extension

If you go the ‘Plans route’, they are signed off in advance of any work. You then have to stick to them exactly otherwise you’re in trouble.
If you just get the SE calls then you do need to ensure that everything you do is compliant which for me involved a lot of reading up. I had a really good building control officer so at every inspection I’d talk him through what I planned to do next and occasionally called him for advice / clarity. Doing it like this saved me probably £1500 on having plans drawn up. The SE drawing I had for x8 rsjs where not good enough to build from as they didn’t have all the room dimensions, only what needed specing for the steels so you need to know where you want everything to go and ensure it’s compliant along the way
Hope this helps

 

[Daniel McKenna]

Thanks this all helps a lot. I've done a loft conversion and single story kitchen extension before, and got on well with the building control officer who was very happy with what i done. So have what i believe to be an 'OK' standard of knowledge around building a compliant floor and means of escape etc. I'm going to get some quotes on having plans but depending on price may go down the SE only route.