Building Control & Load Calcs

[GPHouse]

Anyone know of a decent and pragmatic independent building control company in the Bristol Bath WestonSM area? (BS40)

Also, Anyone know of a cheap but reliable engineer who can do load calcs based on odd shape houses and random stone walls?

I have a feeling that some of the original features I want to keep / replicate wont be quite as BC want and I'd like to work with someone who knows his way around the realities of old buildings and modern building control!

Thanks
G

 

[MikeG]

Any structural engineer will do this stuff. It's bread and butter to them. So what you're really asking is "does anyone know a cheap structural engineer?".

As for Building Control....I am a big fan of local authority BCOs. I have worked with dozens of brilliant and helpful LA BCOs, and never come across one who was difficult or obstructive. I hate the idea of private people doing the job as I feel this is a corrupt relationship.........the inspector is paid by the person he is inspecting, and that is bound to skew the result. When I rule the world, private BCOs will be instantly abolished.

 

[malcolm]

What do you want to do? Building regs guy will normally advise and is the guy to ask before you get a structural engineer involved.

One structural engineer I had over here ignored any existing structure as it was unpredictable and insisted on new structure on new 2m foundations even for just altering an opening by 3 inches! Replacement structural engineer took a more sensible view. Can't recommend anyone in your area but hopefully someone can.

 

[mims&pip]

At our last house - a non-listed, Georgian ashlar stone & thatched house in Wiltshire - we used London Building Control and were very happy with the service they provided.

Mims x

 

[GPHouse]

Thanks all.

Varied response and experience! Having had a brief chat with the LABC team and I think I would prefer a private co. Will give London Building Control a call and have a look locally.

 

[malcolm]

I'm using PWC building control who are national and could be worth a shot. We get on OK but aren't completely aligned on insulation materials. They like Celotex and plasterboard and I like lime and woodfibre board (for solid walls). It will depend whether the guy you get has any experience outside modern builds.

 

[Flyfisher]

Any structural engineer will do this stuff. It's bread and butter to them. So what you're really asking is "does anyone know a cheap structural engineer?".

As for Building Control....I am a big fan of local authority BCOs. I have worked with dozens of brilliant and helpful LA BCOs, and never come across one who was difficult or obstructive. I hate the idea of private people doing the job as I feel this is a corrupt relationship.........the inspector is paid by the person he is inspecting, and that is bound to skew the result. When I rule the world, private BCOs will be instantly abolished.

It may be bread and butter for a structural engineer, but I suspect some will be more familiar with old buildings than others. As malcolm points out, this might have a significant bearing on how the engineer approaches the problem. I'd have little doubt that any competent structural engineer would design something safe but the issue would be the nature of the design itself. For example, our kitchen extension involved a 'catslide' roof following the line of the existing roof to be supported on the roof-plate (wall-plate?) of the existing C16 timber frame wall. Our architect was not confident about the structural loadings ( fair enough) and suggested that it may be necessary to build the extension as a fully self-supporting structure if the existing wall could not support the new roof. In the event, we used a structural engineer who was experienced with old timber framed properties and he was able to show that the wall could support the new roof, which was good news as a self-supporting extension would have required extensive design changes that might not have been asthetically pleasing, or even acceptable to EH. As with so many things, there are usually many ways to achieve the end result.

As for private BCOs, I share MikeG's concerns about their true independence. We might bemoan 'interfering' BCOs when trying to complete works to our own houses but I'm sure we would welcome those same BCOs to be independent if we were buying a house that had been significantly modified. It seems right to me that BCOs should be responsible to someone other than the homeowner. Anyway, we used the local council BC department, had no problems and the cost was competitive compared to the unsolicited approaches we had from private companies once the planning consent was granted. My personal view is that having a completion certificate from the local council would carry more weight in a future sale of the house than if it were from a private company that may not even be in existence by then!

 

[malcolm]

The private guys are held to account and will presumably lose their right to trade if they don't uphold building regs. On this forum we like old houses and won't tend to want to mess them up to save money - those who do want that don't tend to find the forum in the first place. I'm with GPHouse - find the person you think you can work best with whoever it is.

I still don't fully understand why my upstairs windows needed to be double glazed for a change of use as they were already residential windows. I think it was a trade off for not wanting to insulate the double thickness timber framed structures comprising the remains of the front wall. I think I was diddled by the private guy! (But I can see what he was aiming for.)

 

[GPHouse]

Thank all. Useful info. Will keep you updated!

 

[88v8]

About five years ago went to collect a load of oak timbers. The oak, perfectly sound but full of nails which rendered it quite useless grrr, had come out of a C18 cottage.
Not listed.
The owner was altering this n that, and somehow Building Control had got involved.
There were steel beams everywhere. Concrete lintels. All the lovely bent roof timbers had been replaced with new.
The roof tiles were new, the chimney had been rebuilt.
New plaster.
Plasterboard.
Insulation.
Windows.
Every scrap of character had been erased.
It looked like a new house.
An oddly designed new house with an inconvenient layout.
Of course the blame for some of this could have been laid at the owner's door. But not all.
Building Control. Beware.

Ivor

 

[plasticpigeon]

Yes it's amazing how many places are in imminent danger of collapse, and the homeowner only finds out when a builder, building control officer or TV crew get involved!

 

[Flyfisher]

I got LBC to open up an original inglenook fireplace that had been bricked up and rendered over for many, many years. After setting to work, I discovered the original oak bressumer had been replaced by a steel I-beam after a chimney fire. Clearly, a relatively simple job had turned into one with structural implications and I asked our CO if I should consult BC regarding replacing the steel beam with a new oak bressumer.

His advice was "I wouldn't if it were me" on the basis that BC would likely know the strength of the (very substantial!) steel beam and insist on a replacement piece of oak with the same strength, which would likely be massively oversized. So, taking my cue from the 9x6 inch burnt stubs of the original bressumer, I replaced the steel beam with a piece of 10x10 inch oak. Seven years on, the chimney breast shows no signs of stress and all is well.

I'm in no way suggesting BC is unnecessary in all cases, just agreeing with 88v8 that things should be carefully thought through before inviting them in by default.

 

[MikeG]

....... I replaced the steel beam with a piece of 10x10 inch oak........

With a couple of substantial chamfers to the back, I trust.

 

[malcolm]

Buildings have altered enormously over the last hundred and something years. It didn't really matter in the past if your building slowly settled by half an inch a century as all the materials were flexible and could move. With portland cement it would be a huge issue if the building settled by half an inch as it would probably crack a lot and generally fail structurally, so everything needs to be thicker and stronger to provide the stiffness needed to stop portland cement from cracking. The structural calcs have little to do with strength or safety - they are mostly about stiffness (in the old days a bit of young tree cut into quarters worked for strength in most cases but floors were a bit more bouncy).

Applying modern structural thinking to old buildings can cause trouble (even apart from the modern trend to waterproof everything) - a new extension on actual foundations secured to an old wall which is still moving will probably cause failure in the old wall as the structure won't be able to move evenly. Best to not attach them together too well and allow for the relative movement.

I reckon a 10x10 oak would just about do the job as a fireplace lintel. Which reminds me - I must put a lintel in mine as it seems to be lacking one. I think I'll plaster my fireplace and an oak lintel would be a nice feature. Did you post any pictures of your fireplace while I was thinking about outside stuff last year?

 

[Flyfisher]

I reckon a 10x10 oak would just about do the job as a fireplace lintel. Which reminds me - I must put a lintel in mine as it seems to be lacking one. I think I'll plaster my fireplace and an oak lintel would be a nice feature. Did you post any pictures of your fireplace while I was thinking about outside stuff last year?

I posted some before, during and after pictures in this topic last year: http://www.periodproperty.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=15279&p=209895

I'm fairly sure the 10x10 oak is over-engineered for the task, even though it is quite a wide opening, though there are also aesthetic considerations and a much smaller beam would, I think, just look wrong. Personal opinion, of course.

You'll notice that we lime-plastered part of the new opening. This was because the original brickwork had been previously knocked about and poorly repaired, presumably when the original opening had been bricked up and the last fireplace was installed. The damaged brickwork was mostly on the left hand side but we plastered both side so it didn't look too odd.

A new hearth about nine inches thick was laid directly on the underlying bare earth using a limecrete/leca mix before tiling with new pamments from Norfolk Pamments.
Details at: http://www.pamments.co.uk/index.php

 

[malcolm]

Thanks for the link. There is some evidence in my newly exposed fireplace of a lintel slot 2 bricks tall but only half a brick bearing. I'm tempted to install a bit of oak and expose the outside surface like yours.

The bricks on the edge of my fireplace have also been knocked around - the corners have been knocked roughly off, I guess so the plaster that may have once have been there could be curved.

I didn't find useful photos of original 1700ish fireplaces to copy to see exactly how they finished the fireplace.

 

[Flyfisher]

The bricks on the edge of my fireplace have also been knocked around - the corners have been knocked roughly off, I guess so the plaster that may have once have been there could be curved.

If the brick corners were roughly knocked off I'd guess that implies the original would have been plastered. Our fireplace bricks showed signs of being quite carefully cut to provide a neat 45 degree chamfer to the edges of the opening so that, together with the herringbone pattern, leads me to think the fireplace opening was not originally plastered.

Unfortunately, there were few such bricks remaining and the replacements were poorly matched, both in brick type and smoothness of cut (or not!) so I suspect that later work was always intended to be covered.

Another interesting thing, not visible in the photos, is that the Chimney breast itself originally curved inwards above the bressumer, and not even symmetrically. At some time in its history a single skin brick 'facade' was added to the left hand side to 'square it up' and the lesser curved right hand side was totally filled in and 'squared up' before being plastered over. I presume this was all done at or around the time that the house was given a 'Georgian' makeover and the timber frame was hacked about to insert the current large sash Windows, though we have no documentary evidence for this.

 

[cecere]

Hello, I KB2 based in Bristol to come out to our second home as I had Dimensional Instability. Reputable firm but the cost of the works and the time scales, far exceeding our expectations.

Tried to sell it at auction, didn't achieve the reserve so we sold to a cash buyer.

http://www.kb-2.co.uk/

http://www.hollismorgan.co.uk/auctions/auction-list/

http://www.homehousebuyers.co.uk

 

[GPHouse]

As an update.... LABC contacted and the main guy there is v knowledgeable and pragmatic... but it took some struggles even to get through the initial meeting with the guy that came out.

Infact my engineer had already predicted what the chap that came out would sayabout foundations, celotex, and breathability.... Without the advice and documented forethoughts of the engineer id be pulling down more wall, disturbing foundations with a 1m deep 600mm wide footing and all sorts.

Will let you know how things go as we progress but I can see sme having to navigate some other differences of opinon.

Fingers crossed the main guy who was meant to come out will do on the next visits!

G