I have acquired an HEB 140 beam (as far as I could measure) at a shamefully low cost for disposal. My question for the knowledgeable is whether I can use it to replace a load-bearing wall in the living room.
The house was built in the 1940s, with walls made of tongue and groove planks. The walls are double as there are built-in sliding doors. The wall on the upper floor looked exactly the same. Today, the large opening is sealed on the second floor, and a door has replaced these according to the explanation in the picture.
The outer roof is a hipped roof type (1940s functionalist style).
All measurements are in the picture.
I forgot to measure in the attic. The first roof truss is not visible in the picture; it is located next to the chimney.
The house was built in the 1940s, with walls made of tongue and groove planks. The walls are double as there are built-in sliding doors. The wall on the upper floor looked exactly the same. Today, the large opening is sealed on the second floor, and a door has replaced these according to the explanation in the picture.
The outer roof is a hipped roof type (1940s functionalist style).
All measurements are in the picture.
I forgot to measure in the attic. The first roof truss is not visible in the picture; it is located next to the chimney.
Member
· Västernorrland
· 11 695 posts
That should be calculated precisely. The problem with your house is that it is built in the old way with roof trusses that are not self-supporting, but everything relies on load-bearing walls. A beam of 140mm may sound thick and strong, but it won't be in practice. Just the weight of the beam itself can cause it to sag...
Regardless of how you do it, remember not to attach the beam to the chimney stack. Our structural engineer suggested this, but when the chimney sweep came by for another matter, he saw it and prohibited us from using the chimney until the beam was removed and the holes were plugged. So we had to come up with another solution ourselves since the structural engineer left us in the lurch.
HEB 140 is not a super strong beam. As a substitute for a heart wall, it can handle about a 3 m span with a distributed load of 15 kN/m. In your case, I guess the load is greater. In principle, I think it's a backward way of thinking when it comes to a residential building, even if steel beams are quite expensive.