Is There A Cheaper Way Than Getting A Structural Engineer Out?

[Macko1968]

any good joiner could reinforce the joists from underneath, my sister has a large hot tub which is outside on decking that is on stilts, i'm not sure how much water is in there but it's a lot more than a large fish tank and it's been fine, i wouldn't worry to much anyway if it's on the ground floor.

Unless the hot tub is constantly full you cannot compare it to a tank. Maximum load bearing capacity & maximum continous load bearing capaicty are two very different things.

 

[ellena]

any good joiner could reinforce the joists from underneath, my sister has a large hot tub which is outside on decking that is on stilts, i'm not sure how much water is in there but it's a lot more than a large fish tank and it's been fine, i wouldn't worry to much anyway if it's on the ground floor.

Unless the hot tub is constantly full you cannot compare it to a tank. Maximum load bearing capacity & maximum continous load bearing capaicty are two very different things.

I think hot tubs stay full all the time? I've never had one, but seen them in holiday homes and the like. Maybe they are drained for winter but that's about it.

 

[talisker]

any good joiner could reinforce the joists from underneath, my sister has a large hot tub which is outside on decking that is on stilts, i'm not sure how much water is in there but it's a lot more than a large fish tank and it's been fine, i wouldn't worry to much anyway if it's on the ground floor.

Unless the hot tub is constantly full you cannot compare it to a tank. Maximum load bearing capacity & maximum continous load bearing capaicty are two very different things.

I think hot tubs stay full all the time? I've never had one, but seen them in holiday homes and the like. Maybe they are drained for winter but that's about it.

yep the hot tub is full just about all the time it's only empty for about 2 months of the year, it's about 8foot square so there is a lot of water in there.

 

[jonnygman]

If you are on the ground floor get under the floor and prop the joists with acros, make sure the acro has a solid base to sit on it would be a far site cheaper than an engineer

 

[ellena]

Spoke to an architect friend last night about this and she said it would be a massive job. Mainly I think because of what you said jonny-make sure it has a solid base. Below the crawl space is just soil, so concrete or acroprops would eventually just sink in.
She suggested building one into the chimney breast though, which I think is a great idea, so investiagting that now!

 

[5teady_2012]

All standard Uk terraced houses have a joist every 12" ....

if your putting up against the chimney breast, they are running across the joists aint they? joist always run from wall to wall, not front to rear... cos joist sit in the bricks for strengh...

 

[Betta5]

I have a 6 foot tank upstairs in my bedroom. I didnt even think about it. Just Got it, put it in there and filled it up. Been fine for ages.

 

[ellena]

You see, I'm almost certain our joists run the other way. When we had the house checked for damp, they lifted the floorboards under the front and back windows to check the ends of the joists for damp.
If ours do lay as your diagram (which is fab btw!) then the way I want the tank would work well.

 

[OldMan47]

If you want to be safe doing this, you need to actually know what you are dealing with, not start guessing based on a standard that may or may not have been followed on your particular building. I can clearly state what standards are used in the US and Canada as I have used those standards to do some building, but I would never guess that some house that I did not build had actually followed the same standards. Instead I would remove enough of the facing materials to find out what I really had. Usually there is a place that you can access to find out how the building is constructed. Going under the floor into a crawl space is often the easiest thing to do for an inspection.

 

[ellena]

Oh, I most definitely would start ripping up floorboards before I actually went ahead. I'm going to try and have a look somewhere hidden to see if our joists do run as livebearer master thinks.

 

[5teady_2012]

A mate of mine told me today as we was speaking baout your problem, seems to think the joists run the same way as roof trusses as you can see in this picture below

 

[OldMan47]

Because the floor and ceiling are both supported on the same walls, they often do run in the same direction. Nonetheless, I would have a look myself.

 

[ellena]

Right, I actually checked today and my floorboards run across the house, so joists run the length of the house. So that would be in line with roof trusses and also in line with where I want to put the tank
So it looks like a built in is my only option. I'm going to get my small community up and running and keep that for about a year, just to make sure I'm going to stick to this hobby, before we start knocking huge holes in the walls!

 

[yabadaba]

I wouldn't rule things out just yet because you can still have the area beneath where you want your tank to go strengthened. Yes, it's a bit of work, but shouldn't cost the earth and wouldn't take long for a builder/carpenter to do. I'll try and find the photos I took of the work I did.

 

[yabadaba]

I wouldn't rule things out just yet because you can still have the area beneath where you want your tank to go strengthened. Yes, it's a bit of work, but shouldn't cost the earth and wouldn't take long for a builder/carpenter to do. I'll try and find the photos I took of the work I did.

Here's some of the pictures....

These ones show the opening I cut to get into the crawl-space. You can see how the aquarium sits in relation to the floorboards and the joists. You can also see the 'sleeper' walls running under the joists.

Although the 'sleeper' walls reduce the effective span of the joists, I still decided to add some additional supports.