internal brick wall to support load other than rafters.

[champagnecharly]

Wanting to remove a supporting wall. but have a flush cut with the remaining wall. The load bearing wall goes up into loft space to support purlin.
Can in theory a single skin internal non load bearing wall support a steel beam if the load is converted from point load to UDL by use of a secondary small steel) beam acting as a wall plate.
Or could even a large pad stone even lintel suffice?
All that have come to see says a section of remaining wall needs to stay put to support the beam but I cant help but think that there are many ways to achieve the flush wall cut.
Obviously and before anyone else mentions.. yes SE and BC will be involved.

 

[tony1851]

Can't quite understand this - pic or sketch would be helpful.

 

[champagnecharly]

Excuse the sketch. Not to scale. Both purlin and wall are more central to the house.

Also note that the external wall is cavity. Only represented as lines.

Untitled

• champagnecharly
• 12 Apr 2015
• 1

 

[oldbutnotdead]

As far as vertical loading goes, yes your plan will probably work.

Problem is keeping those walls vertical- the wall you want to remove is buttressing both walls (ie preventing them from buckling). Rule of thumb is to leave a nib of the wall (300mm or more), if you've got a structural engineer on the job then he/she will be able to give you a detailed solution.

You will be able to have your flush cut but it may cost you (SE might require a goalpost structure formed to maintain the stability of the remaining walls or some other exotic solution). A lot depends on how high those walls are, how long they are, how far away the next buttress (chimney breast/corner) is

 

[champagnecharly]

Thanks.. Never thought of brick wall buckling but makes sence. Will see what the SE come up with.

 

[tony1851]

As the old fella says, it would probably be do-able; it always looks better without clunky piers each end.

The main issues are 1. having a suitable padstone to spread the load from the new steel on to the top of the wall. This depends principally on what the wall is made of - brick? cinder block? lightweight block? - your se will spec the length of the padstone required. The weaker the material, the longer the padstone.

Issue 2 is the suitability of the wall as a whole. As advised, it can buckle if it is too slender (that is if it is tall in relation to its thickness). If the slenderness is high, the se has to do a check to make sure that the compressive stress remains within accepted limits for the wall.

Don't be too put off if the se says 'no, it can't be done' - query why; some se's like to make life easy for themselves by only doing the minimum number crunching!

 

[champagnecharly]

I'd been reading up on slenderness/buckling of steel columns just a week or so before the post.
Se's haven't come back with any concerns as yet and only one wasnt prepared to quote an actual figure for the calcs. So fingers crossed.
Wall is brick however type of and as such compressive strength I have no idea.