Load Bearing Wall Explaination

[chromis]

Risking sounding stupid (my ego can handle it) Can someone explain how you can figure out which walls are load bearing in a brick house?

[ozwinner]

Should be internal walls on the perimeter.

If you are after dividing walls inside the house, you will have to get in the roof and have alook.

Al

[namtrak]

Your looking for struts coming down from the roof onto your wall. These struts stop the roof from sagging and come from about halfway up the roof. Your also looking to see if the roof joists run across the wall or paralell to it. Photos would handy. Dislaimer, if you need to ask about load bearing walls then your probably not the best person to be ripping it out

Cheers

[Ian007]

That would depend on a few things like if its a trussed roof or a conventional roof.

If its a trussed roof and only if its a wall under the trussed area ( sometimes you can have a trussed roof with a conventional roof section in the same house) then it should not be a load bearing wall, but then I didnt build your house

But having said that, even if it was a load bearing wall you can still do things like putting a LVL beam to move the load ect.
but this would need to be done by a trained person, at least the load calcs so you get the correct size beam.

Cheers Ian

[chromis]

Dont worry I'm not about to start ripping out walls. I just wanted to know how to figure out which ones were load bearing...Just curious..

Are there any websites that have plans that highlight the structures of a roof?

Conventional? I dont think that describes my roof structure. It was constructed in the 50s and I dont think around that time there were any building by-laws (in perth). Looks like a dogs breakfast up there. If I was going to do any major renos I would get a builder in to fix it up. Some of the rafters (the downward sections) are not nailed in. I can actually slide them across the main beam.

I'm guessin that cant be good.

[ThePope]

Are there any websites that have plans that highlight the structures of a roof?

Are you looking for explanation of all the different members that go into constructing a roof.

Some of the rafters (the downward sections) are not nailed in. I can actually slide them across the main beam. I'm guessin that cant be good.

Don't sound good does it, so next time you're up there take your hammer and handful of 3's and nail em off

With your roof there's a high probability that any internal wall will be loadbearing. Either carrying a roof load or ceiling load.

With today's new fangled truss's all loads, roof and ceiling are carried across to external walls leaving internal non loadbearing. mmm wonderful inventions they are

SORRY: accidently edited your post rather then quote.

[silentC]

With today's new fangled truss's all loads, roof and ceiling are carried across to external walls leaving internal non loadbearing.

Not necessarily! I have two internal load bearing walls in my house (currently being built). Probably should have been girder trusses but they're not.

[ThePope]

Are always exceptions of course.
Is yours an usual design or extra large spans involved.

[silentC]

It's just two ridge lines at 90 degrees to each other. It could have been done with a girder truss. I think this was a case of "there's a wall there, let's use it and cut some costs". I wasn't all that happy about it but only found out after it had been put up.

Anyway, the point is, don't assume that if it's a trussed roof there are no internal load-bearing walls because as ThePope says, there are always exceptions . You can still tell by getting up there to have a look though.

[ThePope]

Perhaps they utilised someone else's leftovers, cheap buggers.

don't assume

ah, wise words

[thebuildingsurv]

Trusses sometimes have loadbearing internal walls which will be clearly marked on the truss layout, loadbearing trusses usually have a vertical web directly above the supporting stud. I'd check with the truss supplier.

[silentC]

The girder trusses in my joint just have a deeper bottom chord and maybe a few more struts. You can tell what they are though because the perpendicular trusses are bolted to them in truss boots. Note this is in NSW and "they do things differently" up here (according to my Victorian builder).

[chromis]

Are you looking for explanation of all the different members that go into constructing a roof.

Yes that's what I was after...

Don't sound good does it, so next time you're up there take your hammer and handful of 3's and nail em off Will do...

With your roof there's a high probability that any internal wall will be loadbearing. Either carrying a roof load or ceiling load.

With today's new fangled truss's all loads, roof and ceiling are carried across to external walls leaving internal non loadbearing. mmm wonderful inventions they are

Are you saying if a beam runs from external wall to external wall then no internal is load bearing?

[Razor]

Hi Chromis
The internal walls do not carry any load if the 'beam' is the bottom member of a truss. The truss is designed to load onto the outside walls only. If however the 'beam' is on its own (not part of a truss) you can bet that it is relying on the walls it rests on for support.
Hope that is clear
Ray