Hey
My partner and I got our first house last fall and are now in the process of renovating the basement.
I now want to replace the doors with new ones that also meet modern standards. I'm thinking 8x21 doors, which means I would need to raise the current opening by about 10 cm.
From what I understand, the small section that currently makes up the door opening is included in the construction drawings and should therefore not have a load-bearing function? How do I know that I can raise the opening without affecting the load-bearing capacity?
My partner and I got our first house last fall and are now in the process of renovating the basement.
I now want to replace the doors with new ones that also meet modern standards. I'm thinking 8x21 doors, which means I would need to raise the current opening by about 10 cm.
From what I understand, the small section that currently makes up the door opening is included in the construction drawings and should therefore not have a load-bearing function? How do I know that I can raise the opening without affecting the load-bearing capacity?
IF we assume that there are beams with cc 60 between the outer wall and the heart wall, then there should be a beam above the door. So there seems to be some load-bearing function there. But how it is constructed might not be visible until you start tearing it down.
Okay, what should I expect to encounter when I tear down, do you mean? Here is the construction drawing for the house if it can help?H hempularen said:
I know too little about this to offer any advice. There are others here on the forum who will respond.
My amateur guess is that there is a load distribution in the floor structure. That is, there is a wooden beam over the door, which is attached to the beams supported by the load-bearing walls. And the beam that would rest on the wall over the door is attached to the load distribution.
In that case, no problem tearing up a bit.
But there might also be some form of concrete beam/element over the door. Then it might be more sensitive about how you tear it down. I'm doubtful if that's usually done when it's "just" a door that needs to be spanned.
My amateur guess is that there is a load distribution in the floor structure. That is, there is a wooden beam over the door, which is attached to the beams supported by the load-bearing walls. And the beam that would rest on the wall over the door is attached to the load distribution.
In that case, no problem tearing up a bit.
But there might also be some form of concrete beam/element over the door. Then it might be more sensitive about how you tear it down. I'm doubtful if that's usually done when it's "just" a door that needs to be spanned.
I did a similar renovation a few years ago in a 1960s villa. The door opening was 100cm wide. The wall was made of concrete blocks, and above the door there was a concrete beam that was cast together with a reinforced concrete slab. It was a lot of work to cut the opening for these extra 10 cm in height.
From a structural perspective, this was not a problem since the beam was cast together with the slab. Also, the width of the opening was small enough, and the slab was sturdy enough, so the beam probably didn't bear much load. However, it's important not to take risks and cut more than necessary.
Something to consider is that new doors and frames can often be trimmed very easily. So you might be able to avoid cutting the door opening.
From a structural perspective, this was not a problem since the beam was cast together with the slab. Also, the width of the opening was small enough, and the slab was sturdy enough, so the beam probably didn't bear much load. However, it's important not to take risks and cut more than necessary.
Something to consider is that new doors and frames can often be trimmed very easily. So you might be able to avoid cutting the door opening.