Chimney Breast plan/thoughts.

[Northbeach]

Hi all,

I was seriously contemplating taking down a chimney from loft downwards.
As space is a little tight in the dining room (doubles up as 2nd living room/guest room) I wanted to add TV to breast wall (sunk in) which would mean building a stud out of the existing breast. Doing this would obviously give me less room, hence removing the chimney breast.

Above is our bedroom and the breast there negates any option of adding a bedside cabinet (breast is snug against the bed...my side!).

We had someone look at the structural element and it was deemed necessary to add gallows brackets in the loft. The breast when it extends up into the bedroom and loft is only around 18", so not particularly large.

Given the amount of work I've also been tasked to do in the house and the space we'd actually gain, I decided it simply wasn't worth it (financially and the amount of extra dust...yet another skip or two). Besides, for the bedroom it dawned on me I could simply reverse the bedroom set up (when it's time to refurb) and face that breast and incorporate it into the furniture/wardrobes/stud for TV et al.

So down to two ideas - just after a little advice/experience.

1: As I want the TV 'sunk' into the wall (I'm doing this in another room, but building stud 'fireplace' from scratch) and conscious of that space (where the fireplace meets the dining table) I thought of part building a stud around the TV (32" size so not a biggy), creating a 'three tiered' effect....I'd combat any criticism by 'suggesting' it was 'Art Deco' to match the same style adoring the stairs

2: Place a lintel so far up then board in and around the new opening - either for AV gear, or 'ornamental' reasons. As you can see from the pic below, the fireplace is 'arched' and not in great nick. I was surprised how cheap it is to hire those Acrow strongboys for a few days. I'm fairly confident I could carry this work out myself too - just not entirely sure about lintel size - I've seen a few locally (concrete) for around a tenner, but won't commit to anything before making sure I have the correct size.
The lintel would be placed just above half way so the TV bracket can be placed in part of the new opening (will stud out to hold bracket).

I also really like the brick I've 'unsheathed'...not evident on that picture, but the bricks (house dated 1947) are a nice pale colour...possible I might incorporate that into the design (but that's another tale).

To sum up:

1: Plan will look a bit 'odd'
2: Reasonably easy to fit into lintel and work out lintel size?

Many thanks.

 

[tony1851]

Sorry, I got a bit lost but if you mean to say you're widening the opening
a 140mm deep concrete lintel would be fine.

 

[Northbeach]

Sorry, I got a bit lost but if you mean to say you're widening the opening
a 140mm deep concrete lintel would be fine.

I do tend to ramble! I need my own personal forum editor

Well, I want to take the opening as wide as you can see the 'arch brickwork' - one and half bricks wider than the opening (you can easily see the outline of this on the picture). Would the width of the lintel have to be much wider than the opening?
Apologies - I'm not quite sure how that works in this situation - just above the 'arch' brickwork is where the chimney breast becomes that 18" wide breast (all the way up to the roof via bedroom and loft). So, I presume with 140mm depth of lintel, I'm only holding the front bricks (as you can also see on the pic, the depth is only 1 and 1/2 bricks too). Once this is in I can then remove all of that arch bit and any above as along as it's under and inside the lintel?

The width of the arch (and eventual new opening) is 830mm - I presume 900mm lintel wouldn't be sufficient so 1200mm better? Wickes (first thing that came up in quick google search) seem to do the concrete lintels at only 100mm depth.

Perhaps I'm over engineering this, but I want to get this right.

Many thanks.

 

[tony1851]

The lintel needs to bear at least 4" (one half brick) each side.
Don't use the shallow ones, go to the proper builder's merchants and get a 140 deep one. If they don't have the r ight size, get a bigger one and cut it down with a disc cutter (sometimes the men in our local yard will cut it down for a few bob -try asking).
You only need one lintel even though the breast is wider. The bricks will support themselves over the gap by being bonded in at the rear.

 

[Northbeach]

Thanks - I'll pop down the local builders merchants and grab one from there.

I'm a tad confused with the depth issue: 140mm is one inch deeper than half a brick - so, am I looking at the lintel sticking one inch out of the wall (slightly less actually as there's the mortar) - otherwise I'll have to take out bricks to the rear? Have I got that right?

Lintel height wise, will 65mm suffice i.e. one brick high?

Thanks - apologies for the (probably seemingly) simple questions...as there's a bit of structural work involved, I'm walking on egg shells a little, however irrational!!

Cheers.

 

[tony1851]

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• tony1851
• 14 Aug 2012
• 1

 

[Northbeach]

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• tony1851
• 14 Aug 2012
• 1

Ahh - 140mm height! Therefore taking two courses of bricks out. Makes complete sense now. I won't be attempting this for a couple of weeks but I'll post updates as and when. Pretty sure a local place hire those acrow strongboys out. Thanks for the advice and tips.

From what I've read, I shouldn't completely block the vent up (thereby keeping the airflow going and preventing damp issues) - thinking of leaving a gap just behind the studded out opening and incorporate a vent somewhere (I'll mock up a pic of the way I see it) - probably at the back base of the new opening. Since I've exposed the current opening, even in driving storms and wind nothing has moved down the breast (dust etc).

Many thanks again.

 

[Northbeach]

Hi folks - apologies from to drag this one from the past!

We've had a load of other 'bits and bobs' to do around the house, so this job has been left to one side for a while.
However, I managed to finally pick up a lintel last week on the recommendations of the poster above (local builders yard - good price too).

I'm probably being a bif of a wuss over this, but I'm hoping I can just double check a couple of things before I proceed with the work.

The lintel is 140mm high as advised above and 1200mm wide (100mm depth). This may mean I don't need to cut anything off the lintel - it's more than wide enough with approximately 180mm of lintel over the width of the proposed opening (the opening is 840mm):



This means that there's just over half a brick from the end of the lintel to the end of the brick fireplace. The actual brick flue is only two bricks wide (the wide brick section in the photo finished at ceiling height, whilst the two brick flue continues upstairs, into the loft then out as the chimney.

My worry here is that when I take out the bricks to fit the lintel, I'd have to take the full brick out of one end (not possible to cut in half in situ) - but would this be ok as (again, as mentioned above) the brick behind this is tied into the fireplace as a whole?

I've sat the lintel down just in case I can't manouver it in once the acrow props are fitted.

Would I need two acrows (with strongboy attachments) given the actual chimney breast is only two bricks/455mm wide - if so, would it best to place one each under a brick (say 12" apart) of the main chimney breast (one for each of the two brick wide breast/flue)?

The take out the two layers of bricks below for the lintel, cement the lintel in, leave for 24 hours before removing the acrow/s and finally the bricks for the opening (part of the opening has already been helped along as you can see in the image - this section will come out following by 4/5 course above).

Perhaps I'm over panicing but I'm a tad anxious having never worked structurally like this before (and I've no one really on hand to help).

Many thanks!

 

[TheJay]

What happened in the end and what advice/knowledge can you share regarding this type of work? I am looking to do something similar.