Open up area in basement

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Originally Posted by maxdustington
Originally Posted by madRiver
Originally Posted by maxdustington
Anyone in this thread who mentions a load bearing wall in a basement in this thread has never swung a hammer. Basements use posts for support, not walls.



People have been known to build walls away from the posts and use the studded wall as support instead removing those posts. I think people mentioning load bearing walls are far more experienced in what happens especially if the wall was built DIY by a previous homeowner or their contracted hack.
No they are not. They just don't understand how houses are built because they don't build or renovate houses. They throw around buzzwords to make it seem like they know something about construction because they watch This Old House, but they don't know the first thing about how a house is framed. I'm a professional "contracted hack", btw.




Then I guess what I saw does not count in your mind?

Someone I knew years ago bought a house with a full basement. Someone beforehand had removed the wood posts and the blocks they sat on and framed a new wall a short distance away for a spare bedroom. The reason we went into the basement was because there was a bit of a slope on the main floor on that end.

We figured it out because the marks where the old support blocks were located were still visible on the concrete floor.

The solution was to install a new beam and support posts. The floor had to be jacked up slightly. It ended up pretty good in the end.

Whoever took the supports out was pretty foolish.

But it didn't happen, right?
 
Generally the wall that divides a basement exactly in half will be load-bearing. Houses built without such a wall will almost always instead have a beam and posts in the same place to support the middle of the floor.

This middle support is under the center of the floor joists. The floor joists run across the shorter dimension. Walls that are parallel to the floor joists won't be load-bearing, if they did they could only hold up one joist.
 
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Update, the wall I want to take out is not a load bearing wall, it simply butts up to one floor joist and runs parallel to the joists in this area. I see all of my I beams, posts and foundation and now know this isn't a load bearer.
 
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