Another question for the structural engineers

[jagermeister]

I'm doing a bathroom remodel (must be the season for home renovation) and want to tear out some walls. If I posted up a floor plan showing the walls I want to remove and gave details about the overhead truss structure, is it possible to determine from that if the walls are structural or not?

I'm 90% sure they're not structural but am looking for some second opinions.

Thanks.

 

[Cake_Boss]

No idea, post the drawing though.

 

[Haddonisreef]

As long as there not a bearing wall you should be good but I'm no engineer!

 

[jagermeister]

Well, I'll go ahead and post drawings. The more I look and think about it the more I'm convinced what I'm tearing out is not load bearing.

I'm taking out the bathroom wall and closet header depicted in the drawing. The bathroom wall most likely is not a structural wall as it runs parallel with the floor joists and ceiling trusses. I think the closet header is not load bearing as there are no trusses or joists terminating on it. Also, because the attic is completely uniform (all trusses running 24" O.C.), if the closet header was load bearing, you'd probably see another beam or closet header identical to it in the bedroom across the hall.

The only wall that I think might be load bearing is the wall between the master bedroom and the master bath and then the wall separating the other two bedrooms.

Make sense?

 

[amonchak]

I'm not a structural engineer (just a water/WW engineer) but agree with you that the walls in question would not appear to be load bearing. The closet has a headder just to transfer any load to either side of the opening (which is standard for doors and closets, etc).

Where are the support beams or walls on the lower level in relation to the walls on the upper level? This may help to determine if the walls in question are transfering any load to the support beams or floor joists below.

 

[jagermeister]

Thanks for your reply. I'm no structural engineer either and coincidentally, am a water resources engineer. BTW what company do you work for?

I finally opened up the floor today. 2x10 joists running parallel with the ceiling trusses. There's a large steel support beam in the floor, depicted in red on the drawing. The joists overlap on this beam.

Given the location of the beam, I would think that the wall separating the master bath and master bedroom is probably the only load bearing wall.

What do you think?

Thanks again for your input.

 

[LooseHip]

Jason,

I ended up calling the City of Arvada for a demo permit. The cost was $55.00, and they sent out a city inspector to tell me whether or not the wall was load bearing. In my case I was lucky, the wall was not load bearing. I also called several structural engineers, the average cost for a structural engineer was about 300.00. This included an onsite visit, plus a stamped and signed letter stating whether or not the wall was load bearing.