Supporting Roofs With Brick Walls

In older houses the roof structure often relies on support from an internal wall.

Supporting roofs with brick walls. A lot depends on the roof construction. In a shed roof the rafters intersect the wall at a right angle at their upper ends and their lower ends rest on the exterior wall of the addition. For example a gable end truss may be designed with support members that transmit the roof weight load outward to the side walls allowing the end wall directly below it to have breaks or openings in it that would otherwise be impossible. A movement joint is required to be installed between veneers supported by foundation and veneers supported by wood or steel.

The loss of roof coverings and roof decking can allow water to enter a building and damage or destroy interior finishes and contents or even worse may destabilize a structure and lead to building collapse. More modern roofs with w shaped roof trusses introduced in the late 1960s are designed to span right across the house from the main wall to another without internal support. A structural brick wall is built to actually support the building floors and roof. One brick thick wall 40 m.

Supporting wall could have been a design factor when the truss was enginneered. If it s traditional then any internal walls could be supporting the ceiling joists. The first is to support the brick veneer by a steel angle that bears directly on roof rafters. The roof rafters must be sized to support the weight of the brick veneer with a deflection less than 1 600 of the span of the supporting member.

At a minimum a structural brick wall is comprised of at least two wythes of brick bonded together by bricks placed crosswise in the wall or by metal fasteners. Tear roof sheathing from supporting framing see figure 7 4 and rip roof framing from supporting walls. The trusses on my father in law s house was designed to span the full width of the house even though there were walls that could be load bearing. All these roof systems are discussed herein.

Supporting brick veneer can include steel angles bolted to wall framing or steel angles supported by beefed up rafters. Engineered roof truss systems may be designed to eliminate the need for load bearing walls or change where the bearing walls are located. Take away the wall and i can guarantee your ceiling won t look very good. In both cases the weight of the roof is.