Hi everyone. For those who thought this was a how-to, my apologies.
I want to remove most of a load bearing wall diving my kitchen and dining room. I'd like to drop the wall to a half wall (about 40" high) and install a bar counter top on it. This will open things up in the house quite a bit. Here's the wall I want to chop:
Figure 1: From the dining room side
(I want to remove from the doorway over to the right to the back side of the fire place where the brick is)
The section I want to take out is about 9ft long. This wall is indeed load bearing. Here's what it looks like from the attic (all pics are taken from the dining room side):
Figure 2: General shot showing the joists and supports
Figure 3: The wall runs right where the joists overlap and join together
Now, I have searched to see if it's possible to do a beam across resting on the tops of the joists like the two beams already up there (Figure 2) but I found very little info and the info I did find pointed to a flush beam instead, requiring I cut the joists (big suck). Since I did not find any info on a beam above the joists, I'm assuming there's a reason why. But there are already two beams like that up there and I won't be taking the entire wall out.
What is a good way to proceed?
Side question: when the wall is dropped to 40" high, how can I prevent the end of the half-wall (where the doorway is) from wobbling and being pretty unstable? My idea was to have the end of the wall make a right turn into the kitchen and stick into the kitchen about 12-14" as a brace for that end of the wall. There will be cabinets on the kitchen side of the half-wall so it shouldn't look too funny.
I want to remove most of a load bearing wall diving my kitchen and dining room. I'd like to drop the wall to a half wall (about 40" high) and install a bar counter top on it. This will open things up in the house quite a bit. Here's the wall I want to chop:
Figure 1: From the dining room side
(I want to remove from the doorway over to the right to the back side of the fire place where the brick is)
The section I want to take out is about 9ft long. This wall is indeed load bearing. Here's what it looks like from the attic (all pics are taken from the dining room side):
Figure 2: General shot showing the joists and supports
Figure 3: The wall runs right where the joists overlap and join together
Now, I have searched to see if it's possible to do a beam across resting on the tops of the joists like the two beams already up there (Figure 2) but I found very little info and the info I did find pointed to a flush beam instead, requiring I cut the joists (big suck). Since I did not find any info on a beam above the joists, I'm assuming there's a reason why. But there are already two beams like that up there and I won't be taking the entire wall out.
What is a good way to proceed?
Side question: when the wall is dropped to 40" high, how can I prevent the end of the half-wall (where the doorway is) from wobbling and being pretty unstable? My idea was to have the end of the wall make a right turn into the kitchen and stick into the kitchen about 12-14" as a brace for that end of the wall. There will be cabinets on the kitchen side of the half-wall so it shouldn't look too funny.
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