Hello all. I live in a split-level house on the side of a steep hill, and am keen to use the void space behind the ground floor rooms – it’s quite a useful and spacious basement area, but it has a seriously sloping floor – a slope of about 30 degrees. I had a builder in last year who did a great job of putting a door in so that I now have easier access (previously I could only get in via a trapdoor in the upstairs main bedroom.) The previous owner-builder of the house clearly used a lot of concrete scree on the slope – the house is almost 20 years old and there is no sign of any damp anywhere on the sloping floor. It’s a perfectly dry basement area. But it seems there’s no official DPM under the concrete scree, because I can see where the DPM ends in the internal and external walls. I want to put down some heavy duty plastic over the slope and then put in a two level floor. Please see diagram.
The top level floor would purely be for storage, whereas the lower level floor would be for walking around on. I have no problems with the span tables, joist sizes, joist hangers etc as regards connection to the wall, but how should I go about fixing the joist ends that meet the sloping concrete scree with the heavy duty plastic on top. I was thinking heavy duty angle brackets rawlbolted into the scree and thru the DPM, with some sort of caulk around each hole and bolthead, or rawl plugs and tech screws (with the big rubber washers.) But would this be a no-no as far as building regs are concerned? I haven’t been able to come up with an answer. So if there’s anyone out there who has some advice for me, I’d really be grateful.
