Second floor fireplace !

[spike47]

Hi

My friend wants to pull down a fire breast in the basement , it is not the original , it is a brick built one , built around the original , have taken some bricks of to see if it is supporting anything and I am a bit puzzled has to what I am finding .


Lucking at the very top , it seems there is a concrete base base above it which looks like the fire hearth of the second floor fireplace !.

The way I understand it is that there was some timber going across the top of the floor/Ceiling joists and that would of been the form to cast the concrete base for the second floor fire hearth ! .


But it seems ( if I am correct ) that someone has chopped away part of that timber along with part of the Joist and stuck a couple of bricks from the new fire breast up to the concrete below the second floor hearth ! .

Maybe the pics attached will explain it better me


It is quite a old 3 storey sand stone building

Cheers
Spike

 

[oldbutnotdead]

And the question is?

 

[spike47]

And the question is?

Hi
Thanks for your reply , in my posting I had said , " it seems there is a concrete base base above it which looks like the fire hearth of the second floor fireplace !. "
So that is one question , the second was " The way I understand it is that there was some timber going across the top of the floor/Ceiling joists and that would of been the form to cast the concrete base for the second floor fire hearth ! ."
And finaly the third query was " But it seems ( if I am correct ) that someone has chopped away part of that timber along with part of the Joist and stuck a couple of bricks from the new fire breast up to the concrete below the second floor hearth ! ." and I wanted to know the reason why someone would do that .
I was just showing a situation and really how to solve it , if I remove the brick will the hearth from second floor fire place come crashing down , well something like that .

cheers

spike


Read more: https://www.diynot.com/diy/threads/second-floor-fireplace.522531/#ixzz5n3bOZl1F

Read more: https://www.diynot.com/diy/threads/second-floor-fireplace.522531/#ixzz5n3b7yBbG

Read more: https://www.diynot.com/diy/threads/second-floor-fireplace.522531/#ixzz5n3aX3Nhd

 

[oldbutnotdead]

Ah OK. The lower floorboards in your pic are forming the base to hold the concrete/whatever in place, usually there'd be a couple of trimmers for the sides but that is quite a shallow hearth (unless it is proud of the floor above) plus the joist that normally would stop either side of the chimney seems to go straight through. Not unusual for the downstairs chimney breast to be wider and deeper than the upstairs.

I'm not sure what those 2 bits of joists sticking out would have been doing. Are the tops of them level with the underside of the joists (can't tell from the pics). I can't see any other woodwork that has been chopped about

Looking at the joists (which are relatively small for the span) the floor in that upstairs room was probably sagging like timber floors do, those bricks will be carrying some floor load and reducing the sag so unless you have a very good reason to remove them I'd leave them be. The fireplace probably won't come crashing down (the timbers will support the hearth, the 1st floor breast is being supported by the sides of the ground floor breast)

 

[Leofric]

Won't the chimney breast in the basement support the chimney breasts all the way up the building to the chimney stack , so if you intend removing the basement chimney breast you need to provide alternative support to the brickwork above (or have I completely misunderstood the situation )

 

[spike47]

Ah OK. The lower floorboards in your pic are forming the base to hold the concrete/whatever in place, usually there'd be a couple of trimmers for the sides but that is quite a shallow hearth (unless it is proud of the floor above) plus the joist that normally would stop either side of the chimney seems to go straight through. Not unusual for the downstairs chimney breast to be wider and deeper than the upstairs.

I'm not sure what those 2 bits of joists sticking out would have been doing. Are the tops of them level with the underside of the joists (can't tell from the pics). I can't see any other woodwork that has been chopped about

Looking at the joists (which are relatively small for the span) the floor in that upstairs room was probably sagging like timber floors do, those bricks will be carrying some floor load and reducing the sag so unless you have a very good reason to remove them I'd leave them be. The fireplace probably won't come crashing down (the timbers will support the hearth, the 1st floor breast is being supported by the sides of the ground floor breast)

Hi
Thanks for your reply .
Firstly: the 2 bits of joist sticking out are just dummies , not doing anything .
Secondly: Your first parragraph is exactly right .
Thirdley: The 2 bricks are only holding the second floor concrete hearth , nothing else , and the new breast is only bricked to just below the ceiling , it is not supporting anything at all .

As I had said in my first post , the breast we are wanting to remove is a new breast , the original breast is still there ( I think ) but it is not very deep and does not come out far enough to support under the concrere hearth ! .

I just keep thinking why they would of chipped away the support form and a good part of the first joist , then stick a couple of bricks there , I just can't get it .

cheers

spike

 

[tomfe]

I just keep thinking why they would of chipped away the support form and a good part of the first joist , then stick a couple of bricks there , I just can't get it .

No idea, maybe for cosmetic reasons to get the bricks up the ceiling.
Who knows and it does not really matter in the end as you will need to support the heath anyway.

Also do you know that this is a question mark ?

 

[spike47]

No idea, maybe for cosmetic reasons to get the bricks up the ceiling.
Who knows and it does not really matter in the end as you will need to support the heath anyway.

Also do you know that this is a question mark ?

Hi
Thanks for your reply , I just like to know why someone has done something , it stops my brain from going into overdrive trying suss it out , and yes ? that is a question mark , I was not really asking a question , it was more a ! explanation of why someone has done something .

cheers

Spike