Did you conceal the steel work in the ceiling?

[Rhica]

So the builder and the architect have both said the rsj's will be lower than the ceiling height but it won't ruin the design. But then a builder friend (who is not local) has said they are being lazy and he always conceals them in the ceiling. What have you all done?

I'm fed up of being told no. I'd be happier if they said it's difficult and will cost £x extra to do what I wanted. Then I can make a decision if it's worth it or not.

Yes we did. Had to drop the ceiling height slightly but I would have hated the steels showing.
Defo can be done. Actually I don't remember it being an option not to hide them iykwim

I understand that it depends on which way the ceiling joists run. If in the same direction as the rsj, then you can hide it in the ceiling. If at right angles, then you'd have a problem. I'd guess it would be a £££££ problem, rather than a completely insurmountable one.

Disclaimer: I am not a builder, engineer or in any way qualified...

Yes - it was a little bit tricky as we had a very slight increase in the floor level - so the landing goes up hill very slightly over about 10 feet.

Yes it's at right angles. Gutted 😩. The option I'm considering is to lower the ceiling. But worried will look too dark/cramped which defeats purpose of extension

Depends on how deep they are , very unlikely they can be raised above the floor upstairs for all obvious reasons so the steel tends to show in the ceiling below ,

mine here are a good 12 inches deep and cannot be raised any higher , the ceiling is not high enough to lower any more ( it's already been lowered to accommodate spot lights ) but having said that it ( the beam ) looks great , I like the industrial look it gives

My previous house had very long beams installed to open up across a wide open plan area , the size meant that they were below the existing ceiling , we talked about this a lot whilst it was being worked on and decided that they added a nice feature and shape to what would have otherwise have been a longer bland space again a great modern industrial look coupled with the edgy vaulted roof lights we installed

Can you ask your architect to show you some photos of what he thinks it will look like , talk with him and tell him your concerns , he is supposed to be working with you not against you , ( but sometimes you have to accept the limitations of what you have to work with )

Nope, ours are sticking in. It doesn’t particularly bother me. If we lowered the ceiling we’d probably be banging our heads into the light fittings hanging down.

From my reclined position on the sofa in my basement room, I'd estimate that ours are 4-6ish ins below ceiling height in here - don't bother me at all. Personally there's no way I'd be shelling out £££ to have them concealed. When I look at it now I'd imagine that lowering the ceiling even that little bit would make a real difference to the sense of space and light in the room, but perhaps this is exacerbated due to being a basement.

They can generally be hidden in the ceiling even if at right angles to the joists (without lowering the ceiling) but yes it does cost extra. What length will the beam be? Is it going to block light to an internal room - ours was so we have shelled out the extra to have it in the ceiling.

Not got the plans back yet but will be a big beam going in - thee width of the house is almost 8m so I guess its going to be large steels. Minipie how big was yours?

I guess of it's only 4-6 inches could be ok but would rather pay extra if it can be hidden. I've arranged a meeting with my builder to discuss my concerns. He really seemed to get my need for cosmetic attention to detail so hopefully we can come up with a solution.

Thanks for your help

I had a large steel in our kitchen extension, but was able to cheaply conceal it by putting in a new false ceiling to conceal it. Do you have high enough ceilings such that you could lower it across the entire room?

Ok so ours is 7.5m so similar. That’s pretty big for a residential project I gather.

We were given several options:
1 - use a massive steel, hangs down below ceiling (blocks light)
2 - use a massive steel, build false ceiling to conceal (lose height)
3 - use two smaller steels side by side, conceal within ceiling (costs more, means you have two lots of pillars on each side wall to work around)
4 - use one smaller steel and use a process called “jacking” to preload the steel so it is already deflected when the house weight goes on it. this enables you to get away with a smaller steel. (requires structural engineer to supervise jacking process, plus hire of kit etc so costs more)

We’ve gone for option 4 ... jacking is happening in a couple of weeks so will let you know how it turns out (a lot is resting on the engineer’s maths!)

8m is a very wide opening. If it's a single storey extension it's possible that you could in effect push the steel up into the wall above, but that does also depends on what you are doing with the extension roof.

Jacking is possible - the purpose of jacking would be to stop the walls above cracking as the steel took up the load - but it isn't really a standard operation, and you'd want to be sure that they knew what they were doing.

The other thing I've done in large openings is to put a goalpost type frame in. The main benefit is that it reduces the movement in the beam, but it is more steel in the columns, and potentially having to mess about with the foundations. You might need that anyway if you are taking a large amount of the wall out, both because the walls still in place might not be able to take the load from the opening, and that you need to put something in that will stabilise the house.

I have attached a picture of our lounge beam. It’s around 5m. You can see it also has a small pier to support it.

Had we spent a lot more money, no doubt we could have avoided a pier, but it would have caused a great deal of disruption. The beam really makes little odds to everyday living. DH is a Structural Engineer but we decided the ceiling certainly couldn’t be lowered. It’s quite a large room (the picture is held of it) and it would look ridiculous with a lower ceiling. There was no real possibility of building it into the floor space without considerable upheaval. Again, just not worth it.

I’m happy with what we have. We have a much more complicated set of beams that support the corner of the house in another area and these are clad in oak. The beams are near an oak framed part of the house, so that works well, in my opinion!

So, don’t be afraid of having a beam a bit lower. It was better to have a beam showing a bit than a ceiling that makes the room feel like it’s on top of you. Of course if you have a very high ceiling, it might not matter.

Oh yes we are having a goalpost frame as whatscoming mentions, so we have side steels as well as the ceiling steel. In fact I think there is a steel buried in the floor too (“sacrificed”) to make it a box frame rather than a goalpost. And then we are using jacking as well.

Hoping my house won’t fall down whatscoming!

I'm sure you'll be fine minipie! I doubt someone would suggest that or be able to design it if they didn't know what they were doing. It's the builders who have bought a cheap beam design program, or someone charging £50 for "designing a beam" (the beam design is the easy bit, it's making sure that the rest of the house is OK still) that you have to watch out for.