Removing a load bearing wall - pictures of the project
We decided to take out a load bearing wall. Completely remove it. In order to arrive at the decision we spoke with a carpenter/handyman who had an architect friend who determined that it could be done. The load the wall was carrying would be transferred to a steel beam.
So we proceeded to remove all the kitchen cabinets from the supporting wall, and look what we found:
Holes in the floor and top plates of the wall betrayed that the voids had been used as cold air returns (until we took off the drywall). A metal duct led up to the ceiling and took a turn overhead toward the outside wall... a 2nd floor HVAC duct. And a cylindrical chimney was easily identified as coming from our hot water heater. All of these would have to be relocated before we could remove this wall. And a related project included relocating wiring that had been hanging in the soffit.
Much demolition took place... the kitchen was gutted, and a non-bearing wall nearby was removed. Finally it was time to get serious.
The architect calculated that to bear the load across the almost 18' span we would be opening up, we needed an 8"X8" steel beam. Our alternative would have been to use about 14-15" of wood beams laminated together, but that would have hung down that much lower, and we wanted more clearance, since the beam will be crossing our living room. So steel was decided upon, located, and purchased by our handyman.
Here the handyman and his friend are measuring to make sure the beam can be maneuvered out the patio door and back in again (it would enter through the front door).
The beam appeared in our front yard and spent the night out there in the rain before D-day.
Before the load bearing wall could be removed, two temporary support walls had to be built out of 2X4 studs, running the full length of the expanse on either side of the load bearing wall. For a time, our future living room was full of studs, (and I'm not talking about the handyman and his crew - hey, I'm an old married woman).
Then a few of the handyman's buddies and his dad showed up, and my husband pitched in to bring the steel beam into the house, intending to lift it into position... that is, on top of two jacks, one of which rested on the outside foundation wall, one resting on top of a similar jack in the basement.
The beam weighed in at 36 pounds per foot... about 620 pounds total.
As a passive observer, I thought it was touch-and-go for a while... the weight of the beam was more than you'd think. They decided to lift it part of the way and rest it on an adjustable aluminum ladder that was folded into a table or scaffold formation... but the usually sturdy ladder was threatening to give under the weight. So they got another short ladder under one end of it, with boards to make up the gap between it and the current height of the beam.
That's when I was given the go-ahead to call in reinforcements. My dad owns a business near where we live, and he dashed over with two of his salesmen, who managed to provide just enough umpf to get the beam up onto the two support jacks, one end at a time.
The guys went to buy some bolts to attach the beam to the jacks, and my husband took down the temporary stud walls. In the end, we had a big room.
Currently drywalling is in progress, with our contractors helping my husband with some of the hanging of sheets, and us looking for yet another contractor to take care of mudding the seams. Last house, we did all our own mudding and sanding, though we hired a guy to paint after that. We were sick of touching every inch of those walls. This time my pregnancy is affecting me more physically (maybe I really am getting old) which doesn't allow me to help as much as I did before, so we need to hire some help to keep things progressing along.
Next thing will be leveling out and patching the subfloor, then hubby will put down the laminate floors.
