Wood "I" beam

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abunaitoo

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I have a post in the garage I would like to romove.
If I do, I will need to extend the beam that the post holds up.
The span is about 20'.
Insted of using a solid or composit beam, could I use two composit wooded "I" beam joist?????
 
No, not evan close. The reason you have a post is because of the size or cost of the beam was to much. This is a question for an engineer but you can expect a very large and expensive beam and then you will be doubling the weight on the ends of the beam, so a good engineer might question the footing size at the ends of the beam. The usual answer is, live with the post.
 
About 30 years ago I had a similar situation and the post held the intersection of two beams holding up the roof on my old garage. I didn’t have a clue what I was doing then and half the time I wonder if I still do. I needed to paint a car in there and couldn’t with the beam in the center between the two bays. So I tripled up thick rough sawed joist material I had and added posts at each end for additional support and bolted it all together thru the existing split beams after jacking the roof up just a little to put a camber in the new work. It held fine , but around here we could get 4 foot of snow load up there and I didn’t trust myself so I saved the post and when I was done replaced it. Because of the jacking I had about 1/8 gap at the top. During several winters when I would get a load of snow up there I would check that gap and it never closed up so I felt fairly safe at that point leaving the post out during the warm months and sticking it back in the winter when I don’t really use the building much. It’s been over 30 years now. These days I don’t need a wide bay and the post stays in most summers now.

As Neil suggests an engineer should be consulted for proper sizing of the beam.

On a side note I once looked at a house to buy that had posts in the garage all over the place right in the center of the bays even so that you couldn’t park a car in the garage. I found out why when I went up to the bonus room above the garage to find a massive water bed. I didn’t buy that house but really thought that an odd owner fix.
 
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