Load Bearing Wall

Discussion in 'Home Improvement' started by Samual Yoder, Dec 3, 2021.

  1. Samual Yoder

    Samual Yoder Very Well-Known Member
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    My son ask me how to tell if a wall is load bearing, simple answer, tear it down if ceiling falls it was load bearing, if ceiling does not move it was not load bearing. Curious as to what he does.
     
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  2. Samual Yoder

    Samual Yoder Very Well-Known Member
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    My son seems to think that being raised Amish I know all there is to know about wood and building construction, granted my father taught me much but I have no idea how to build or construct a house or barn for that matter. Helping with a barn raising is not designing and constructing a barn it is simply rebuilding a barn where one once stood. I am trying to get it through his head I am not Mr. Wizard.
     
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  3. Bobby Cole

    Bobby Cole Supreme Member
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    The easiest way I know of telling if a wall is load bearing is to look at the peak of the house. Every interior wall that runs the same direction as the peak is load bearing.

    My goodness, doesn’t EVERY Amish person know how to raise a barn, make fine furniture and make Bleu Cheese? :)
    Seriously though Samual, whether you were raised Amish or not, a good son will always look up to a good father. It’s probably more frustrating to you than it is to him that you don’t have all the answers.
     
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  4. Faye Fox

    Faye Fox Veteran Member
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    Great advice! Hahaha! Even a wall that appears load bearing may not be depending on the strength of the trusses above. In my cabin, for instance, the 24-foot span was done with some sizable beams designed to hold up 100 feet of snow, a D 8, both, or all three. When I went to sell it was of more value to put up a wall and have more bedrooms. After the place sold a couple of times the new owners wanted to remove that wall but were told they couldn't by the inspector because it was load-bearing. They contacted me so I sent them photos of those massive floor joists showing that the 2X4 wall held up nothing. They were able to return it to one large room.
     
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  5. Samual Yoder

    Samual Yoder Very Well-Known Member
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    I may be a little slow in some things but I don't get "wake the other lions" in the quote, isn't the point to escape the lions not get eaten??
     
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  6. Bobby Cole

    Bobby Cole Supreme Member
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    .
    Socio-military terminology.
    In society, there are always those who will follow along like sheep and refuse to wake up to the facts.
    The lions, in this case, are those who will make a stand against those would claim to rule over them.
     
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  7. Samual Yoder

    Samual Yoder Very Well-Known Member
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    I find that those who take a stand against those who claim to rule over them generally don't fare too well in exerting their rights. In the Socio-military terms those who claim rule over the sheep have the military, police and court system on their side not to mention the weapons to make one comply with their demands.
     
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  8. Faye Fox

    Faye Fox Veteran Member
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    Correction to my post: Not floor joist but ceiling trusses. I used the same rough 4 X 12s on 2' centers for both floor and ceiling.

    I love this thread that covers load-bearing walls, Amish barn building, and waking the other lions in seven posts. I think this may be a SOC derailment record. :D:D:D
     
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  9. Samual Yoder

    Samual Yoder Very Well-Known Member
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    Not sure what SOC derailment means but what the heck you doing building cabins, you one of those SHTF survivalists buying food buckets from Jim Bakker to survive the end of the world scenario?
     
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  10. Bobby Cole

    Bobby Cole Supreme Member
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    The majority of those involved with the Declaration of Independence lost their lives or their livelihood but nonetheless the point was made.

    So far as who has what; yeah, that’s pretty much what Joe Biden said. And may I write that no other sitting President of the United States has ever threatened the American citizens in such a manner.
     
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  11. Faye Fox

    Faye Fox Veteran Member
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    Ouch, that hurt Sammy! I built a log cabin 45 years ago when I lived in the remote mountains and it had nothing to do with radical survivalists or frauds like Jim Baker. If I had $1 for every time I have been asked "what the heck were you thinking living alone in the mountains" (being a female) I would have maybe $1000 maybe $10,000. It was after my baby died and my husband committed suicide (I was 20) that I decide to move to the mountains and be self-sufficient as possible. Being part American Indian it was also a vision quest of a sort. 15 years was enough before I came down to become an edge-of-town dweller. It was in the first few years of my time there that I found answers that still to this day hold "truth' for me. 51 years an independent conservative widow bound only by the universe.

    Derailment means the thread got off track on a downhill side rail.
     
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  12. Samual Yoder

    Samual Yoder Very Well-Known Member
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    Sammy? Sammy?? You don't know me well enough to get so informal, I am Samual or Mr. Yoder never Sammy!
     
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  13. Bobby Cole

    Bobby Cole Supreme Member
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    Yep, I think it’s a record alright. But, it’s his thread and only so much that can be said about load bearing walls on a home so I just went with his flow.
     
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  14. Faye Fox

    Faye Fox Veteran Member
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    @Samual Yoder My apologies Mr. Yoder. @Bobby Cole but then again Mr. Cole, maybe "load-bearing walls" have more meaning than meets the eye. Perhaps removing our countries load-bearing wall is what has caused the ceiling to collapse. I apologize for interrupting this thread and will now zip it! :D
     
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