rockcity
everyday is a chance to get better
- Joined
- Apr 10, 2005
- Location
- Greenville, NC
Looking into the lining room from foyer and into where the dining room will be. Opened up the wall from foyer to living room and then also installed an LVL between living room and what was the old dining room, thus creating a more open concept and increasing the size of living room. LVL will be installed between the French doors to open up that wall as well. I wanted to remove the wall between the foyer and living room entirely but was advised by my SME that would likely not be the best idea since the knee bracing helps keep the building from falling down. So I removed walls to just the knee bracing.
LVL installed between French doors. The span was like 26' and with ceiling joists just 2x8, we had to get creative if I wanted a flush LVL. So we opted for triple 7.25" tall LVLs. We decided to put the kitchen in the middle of the house to overlook the dining room and new larger living room. So we placed a couple columns where the back edge of the kitchen island would be and spaced them so the oven would be centered between them. The columns held up a girder that the two LVLs tied into. Below the columns I had to dig and pour new footers and install CMU piers with anchored and treated sole plates, filled blocks, and crush blocks to transfer the loads to the ground. There is a girder nearly between the columns that I could have tied into but it would have been a single column and would have been oddly off center of the stove and cooktop. It just would have looked weird. So, I poured new footers and installed a pair of columns. My plan was to put new columns on the front porch as well as faux columns on either side of the fireplace, so these new columns supporting the LVLs would hopefully tie it all in together.
After LVLs were installed, new French doors were set, wall was wrapped, and we prepped for new siding. To the right of the deck, you can see the old wood siding that was under the vinyl siding. A lot of the old siding was in good shape and I really wanted to keep it and use it. But, all the leaded paint was peeling off and there was no building wrap behind it. So I left it and the building wrap and the vinyl siding to keep things as simple as I could. The deck was also nearly complete at this point except for the steps.
Last edited: