conservatory firewall - width of foundations

[zulu705]

I'm planning on building a conservatory on the back of my house, i am in Scotland and the rules are that if the conservatory wall is within 1 metre of a boundary it must be a firewall. I submitted my plans with a firewall of 250mm (cavity wall) and foundations of 450 mm wide. (This leaves 100mm each sode of the bricks) I have now been asked to update the plans to allow for a scarcement of 150mm . My question is what is a scarcement ? Does this mean that the foundations need to be wider by 100mm to allow another 50mm on each side so there is 150mm of concrete each side of the bricks or is a scarement another line of bricks like a ledge along the base of the wall?
Thanks for your help.

 

[peca27]

A scarcement is 'a flat plain ledge set in a wall. They were often built in to walls, for example to carry the ends of floor joists'.

By that definition i'm not sure what they mean........why don't u ring them + ask, they're usually more than willing to help. Can u also post the response on here as I want to to know what they're asking u to do.

 

[zulu705]

Thanks.

From looking on internet I too am confused as it talks about joists too and my conservatory won't have joists since I want a concrete base.
Having a meeting with building control on Thursday so will as then and report back.

 

[zulu705]

Apparantly all he wanted was the foundations to be wider i.e 150mm at each side of wall.