Helpful Council LOL

Hi. Hopefully someone can help me out here as the council are a word I wont use here.

So my story is that I want to remove the entire chimney stack including above the roof, as supporting the stack is too costly despite it being a very small stack above the roof. This Stack is on a party wall and back to back with nextdoors in a 1950-1960s semi detached.

Now what I want to know due to the council being unhelpful and seem to want me to pay them first is if I need building control involved?

I plan to put a party wall act thing in place and get a structural engineer in to ascertain if it can be done without compromising the wall. Obviously if it turns out that it will need certain measures put in place to do the work and keep the wall secure then Building Control application will be needed but if my SE says its fine do I need to involve BC at all?

The other question is that my front wall has a door opening then a column of about 600mm wide then a large floor to ceiling window *Shown bricked partailly up in the pic attached. Intersecting the column between the door and the window on the inside is a wall dividing the hall and the living room shown circled in red on the pic attached. This wall is currently much longer with a doorway in it and only goes up to the ceiling level. Do you guys think it is a buttressing wall seeing as its not the full height of the front elevation and if its not can I reduce it right down to 150mm so its just enough to sit an RSJ on?

Thanks for all your thoughts.

James

With the first part, building control would probably only be needed for structural work. As you say, the structural engineers report will throw up that answer.

As for the nib, nibs are there to add strength to a wall as a wall without a return is flappy in the wind. Also, the size is often determined be the size of a lintel sat on it. When your structural engineer lands to look at the chimney, ask him to look at the nib as well.

You will need a b/regs application for the chimney and stack removal and they will need to check various things apart from the structural aspect.

That internal wall is not butressing anything, so can be removed. You wont even need a 150 nib, and can set the steel beam on the external wall.

Building regs approval is required for

Bonni said:

When your structural engineer lands to look at the chimney, ask him to look at the nib as well.

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I would agree with that.
Is the chimney stack shared with the neighbour above roof level

Thanks for all the replies. Been talking to the SE and he says there is no need for building control to be involved in the chimney, but they will be involved for the wall as that does alter the supporting structure. So he is coming to give it a coat of looking at.

The chimney is shared above roof level, yes. It looks like I will have to cut it and rebuild my side of the party wall up to stack height then close the roof back up to maintain the integrity of nextdoor chimney.

Thanks again

Building control didn't care about me taking my chimneys down to loft level. There was no structural changes so nothing for them to worry about. They DID care that one of the fireplaces was still functional and are insisting, not unreasonably, that it's bricked up to make sure no one tries to use it again.

Taking it down in the main house might be more complicated as it's a party wall. It wouldn't surprise me if you did need BC and maybe a structural engineer for that.

IT Minion said:

Taking it down in the main house might be more complicated as it's a party wall. It wouldn't surprise me if you did need BC and maybe a structural engineer for that.

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- it wouldn't surprise me either.

Jadele said:

Thanks for all the replies. Been talking to the SE and he says there is no need for building control to be involved in the chimney, but they will be involved for the wall as that does alter the supporting structure. So he is coming to give it a coat of looking at.

The chimney is shared above roof level, yes. It looks like I will have to cut it and rebuild my side of the party wall up to stack height then close the roof back up to maintain the integrity of nextdoor chimney.

Thanks again

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Your SE is wrong. Perhaps he should stick to structures.

If the chimney is shared, then building control would be very interested in how you are dealing with the flues, the roof, and fire safety in that area.