Sections left over from taking a wall out - can you get rid of them?

[NineNine]

See photo

I assume it’s done like that for structural support. How big a deal would it be to remove them?

They're holding your ceiling and the upstairs of your house up. And if this isn't a detached house your neighbours house may structural depend on them too.

You can remove them by putting in big steel beams above which is a huge job that will cost tens of thousands of pounds.

Oh. Ok.

Tens of thousands? Really?

Not my house yet, just curious looking at estate agent photos.

I wouldn't say tens of thousands of pounds, a single steel would be way less than that but you'll need to enlist a structural engineer to work out what you'd need. You may need a party wall agreement if you need to bury the steel in the party wall, plus building control sign off. Far easier to keep it as is.

Steel is fecking bloody expensive these days & you'll want the job doing properly at all stages for the security of your whole house and then there's the mess & replastering/making good to deal with. Where I live that'd be at least a 10k job. Probably a few k more. I've seen the effect of these columns minimised by having bespoke mirrors cut to fit on all sides then you sort of looked through/past them.

I had a kitchen extension which would have resulted in one of those nibs (the wall needed to hold the floor above up) not two and so I opted for a vertical steel in the wall.

As I was able to photo the exposed interior and exterior brickwork (bog standard 90's house construction) the structural engineer didn't even need to visit the property, just emailed me the drawings for the builder. This was 5 years ago and cost less than £200 for the structural drawings.

I had a concrete padstone for the steel to sit on at floor level, then a padstone at the top to take the weight of the horizontal steel.

The steel will not be cheap but it would not cost tens of thousands.

Your first port of call would be a structural engineer as you wouldn't want the rooms above to come crashing down.

We had two steels put in when what had been an external wall was removed. Cost £1500. Internal wall is going to have different loading, but it shouldn't cost a huge amount more.

I'd restore the original wall tbh. Can never see the point of two very similar use rooms which aren't separated - the front section behind the armchairs doesn't look to have a dining table or a sofa and the overall effect is too long and narrow to function as a single living room.

^agree, much better idea.

I always leave nibs like that to provide lateral stability to the external walls. You can use a portal frame to remove them, but it would be a big job with some substantial steels.

I would Also reinstate to two rooms.could the rear room be knocked through to the kitchen? Much better layout.

Crittall doors

I would be keen to reinstate, but I think it would make the rooms quite small.

This is the current layout. I thought it might be good to take some of the lounge and knock through to the kitchen and also extend back to include the conservatory somehow. But if you only took some of the lounge the leftover sections of Wal would look even weirder.

Oops, forgot layout.

Where are the nibs? I would move the kitchen to the back half of the lounge (after the wall goes back in) and have a wall of units along that wall with an island unit, and a dining/ seating area in your current kitchen.

Reinstate the wall then open the existing kitchen into the back part of the living room. Can you mark on the floorplan where the nibs are?

Not sure exactly. They’re just after the first door, but I don’t know how accurate the plan is.

Are they really called nibs? 😄

I made this, which reinstates the wall, knocks through from the kitchen and extends back to the line where the conservatory goes to at the moment.

Just in case anyone’s interested 😄

Ooh - looks great!

NineNine how did you make that second plan? Looks great!

@Worieddd on Floorplanner. They only let you do one without subscribing but it’s pretty good. I’ve had fun knocking through walls in all sorts of houses we’ve looked at 😀

I wouldn't reinstate the wall between the two halves of the lounge, but I would put in glazed doors so that you have the option of closing off the lounge from the back of the house.

I'm not keen on glazed doors between rooms. I'd guess most of the time they're left closed and you're just left without the wall space to put a sofa or something against. Also, I want two separate living spaces, as our dc approach teenage years, rather than one big open plan area, which it would still feel like with the view through the doors.

Thanks NineNine

I've always called them nibs. my husband does as well and he is also a structural enginer...

I wasn’t doubting you SocksRock . It just seemed such a cute and dainty word for big annoying chunks of wall that are holding your house up