wall removal surprise

Advertise with us
SpartanEpoxies
shop deals on amazon
House Repair Talk

Help Support House Repair Talk:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
T

trumpetdoc

Member
Joined
Dec 3, 2011
Messages
9
Reaction score
0
Hello,
So I had a licensed contractor come in and bid on a project in the home (had several actually) and I asked about.a particular wall I wanted to knock out to make BR bigger.
Told for sure it was a non bearing wall. I went up to crawl space and it would appear so.
However, upon removing the drywall, we find many doubled studs and one near the middle that appears to be bolted to foundation! Wall was also braced with plywood.
Newer him, pulte, 7 yrs old.
I have removed a bunch of walls in our homes over the years and have not ran ink this yet.
Big problem? Is this acually a bearing wall? Is this an earthquake thing? <br />
Figured to put a header in the opening anyhow, but dont want the added cost of a bearing wall.
Thanks
 
Turns out this is a shear wall, almost definitely. However, it's a relatively small interior wall.

We still have to make a roughly 12 ft walkway through it.
There are 2 hold downs one at the junction of the exterior wall and one near the center
Sill plate on floor with multiple bolts.

Is this gonna turn out to be a costly endeavor? Would think a nice header across the top would work but I have learned never to assume anymore.

Thanks!
 
Engineer is the only one to answer this question. Sounds like a shear wall to me, I'm guessing your in CA, or another seismic zone.
 
It is strange to find a none barring wall bolted down and made into a stress wall. The double studs may indicate a barring point. If you have a truss roof, keep in mind that some trusses and girders a tri barring or more. That is when they are designed to drop some weight on an interior barring wall. Like Instector said, you need an engineer to spec. your new header.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Back
Top