Lintel on lintel

[Imola]

Hi, we have been planning a diy project, but one thing has been bothering me slightly. We want to put a door leading into the garage, this means installing a lintel. Which I can do, the problem is it will be supporting a preexisting lintel that supports the stairs and is load bearing.
The pre existing door way is around 762mm wide and the new one is 682mm wide.
The lintel will rest on the new one about 200mm in, the pre existing is single cavity and the new one is double cavity. Any help on this would be very much appreciated thanks

 

[^woody^]

Is the existing lintel really supporting the stairs or just a bit of wall under the flight? Normally the stairs don't rest on a lintel.

It all depend on the load on this existing lintel. Have a look and see if the floor or any other wall upstairs is bearing on it too.

 

[Imola]

Hi thanks for the reply, it is part of a load bearing wall that spans the width of the house, above the lintel is a course of bricks, then the stairs, the wall also supports the joists, the walls upstairs are stud walls, so there isn't too much weight

 

[^woody^]

The load from stair flights is normally supported by the strings either side of the flight, and these in turn tend to go onto a timber trimmer in the floor, which in turn goes into the wall. So check that.

Otherwise a point load on a 65mm lintel would need to be assessed.