The text might be bait, but this seems like an awful lot of trouble for a joke. Someone probably did do this and someone took a picture to show it off.
My dipshit contractor did something similar.
Me, before demo on a big remodel: “Hey, if you could get rid of these soffits, (on the first floor, with a lot of weight above them) that would be cool.”
Them: " Yeah, after we get it open we’ll take a look and let you know."
I swing by a couple days later and this is how they rerouted things that were in the soffits, without saying anything to me.
So anyway, I’m in litigation now.
What particular brand of OCD do you need to have to care so deeply about the pipes under your house being clean that you would do this?
Hahaha I love it. Wood? That can’t possibly be important. No way.
Just extra pieces of wood! So lazy to leave them there!
Yeah, for me it was the “extra pieces of wood”… hilarious
I’d say he cut through the bearers, which is somewhat worse.
This kills the structure.
Wait…wait. Did he cut through the floor joists in order to inset the pipe?
Yes. Yes he did
Why…why would he not just use u-brackets to attach the pipe to the joists??!
Not only did he miss the easiest way to solve this problem, but he cut perfectly square notches that were twice as wide as the pipe. You need multiple tools to do that, and a LOT of quality time on your back in a crawlspace eating sawdust to do it.
A circular saw and a hammer would do it. Just 2 cuts and a thwack per board.
If the cuts are too deep a sawzall and longish blade would work too but take longer.
If I somehow ended up owning this house I’d probably just screw some 1/8” steel straps across the bottoms of the joists and call it a day. The the bottoms of floor joists are in tension anyway.
Sawzall and a hammer works fine
Surely there is more to this
As complete dumbass I can almost assure you that the person who did this did it to the first one and then went in for a penny in for a pound so they kept going. I did this with my bathtubs faucet, problem with that was at least I didn’t need the old one so taking a sawzaw to it didn’t break anything else.
Steve don’t know anything but he did it for love.
That divorce is going to be glorious.
He’s going to laugh last when she keeps the house
Pretty sure he’ll just slice it down the middle and take his half.
For the vibes. Now he can show his guests how clean his crawlspace is.
He didn’t even make sure his cuts lined up!!!
Me looking at his poor craftsmanship on top of his house deprecating dumb ass decision…
If this dude had taken the time to snap a string and still didn’t realize what he was about to do then I’d really have no words
Yes. Zoom in on the photo and contemplate it further.
This kills the tenant!
Physics will ultimately win.
America, where houses are built out of wood and there’s no such thing as insulation.
Wooden beams for the floors is even common in houses made of bricks though. I live in the Netherlands and brick houses that have been standing for hundreds of years have wooden floors and the foundation is even standing on wooden piles. Wood isn’t as shit of a building material as you think it is. There are even modern apartments in freezing Northern Europe that are made with cross laminated timber. https://www.dezeen.com/2015/09/23/puukuokka-oopeaa-tallest-wooden-apartment-block-finland-wins-finlandia-prize-for-architecture-2015/
The problem in American buildings isn’t that they are made of wood it’s that they do it cheaply. Stick framing is the most common way to build a house in the US. You can build a very solid house out of wood if you opt for timber framing. Like in Japan there are wooden temples that have been standing for more than a thousand years.
I remember being a kid and watching a few films where people fall over and put holes in the walls; I was so confused. I didn’t understand how people could put holes in bricks using their arms and legs.
thats just drywall. its shit but a lot of cheap builds use it.
its shit but a lot of cheap builds use it.
Wait… What do you use to cover your (non stone) walls??? Is there some sort of beadboard or shiplap supremacy group I’ve never heard of?
yeah every place I lived in in Europe had brick walls for every wall
Why would you have non stone walls?
Because there are earthquakes where I live literally all the time.
Interesting, I do live on a fault line (eger graben) and while the earthquakes are frequently here they are barely noticeable, they just sound like a loud car. Are the earthquakes wearing down the stone where you live, and what do you use for walls instead that can withstand bigger earthquakes?
sheetrock with plaster on top
God I fucking hate plaster. Granted, my house uses oldish-fashioned metal lath and plaster, but it’s such a ball ache. I wish it had been built with just drywall so I could use stud finders and shitty drywall anchors. Instead it’s all fuckass toggle bolts and “use this giant magnet to find the stupid screw that attaches the stupid lath to the stupid stud.” Ugh.
I have a relative that had these, he recently upgraded to drywall so he could easily make modifications.
sheetrock is literally a brand of drywall
Wait what? Wooden houses are great! With insulation, of course
Instead of building out of wood they should come up with a material made from carbon extracted from the air through an organic process.
Wouldn’t the world be better off if we used building materials that were carbon negative?
There’s parts of the country where it doesn’t regularly get cold enough for insulation to really matter.
That said, my house in the Chicago suburbs is over 140 years old and was definitely never insulated underneath. By the feel of the walls in the winter any insulation that was in there has probably all collapsed as well.
Insulation in the floor is really much less important than walls/roof. Heat rises so if you wanna trap heat the ceiling is most important. And in the summer the basement is usually the coolest part of the house. Basically only matters if the floors being cold to the touch bothers you in the winter, and a very modest energy savings (likely never will recover the install cost).
Mine is a pretty backwards situation lol.
The crawlspace under my uninsulated floor will get cold enough a few times in the winter that we’ve had to install heat tapes to keep pipes from freezing. I put a wireless thermometer down there and it’ll average temps in the mid-upper 30’s January and February. No one walks barefoot in the winter because it makes your feet hurt lol.
As for the heat, being such an old house we have hot water baseboard heat. We finally figured out that we think they have it pumping the wrong direction, because the hottest water off the boiler heats the second floor before coming down to heat the first. This means I set the heat in the winter to 64 (one thermostat in the center of the first floor) and the second floor will be 78 in the bedrooms and the first floor will be 63-64. If we try to heat the first floor beyond that we have to open windows on the second floor to exist up there. And yes, this is with blocking the stairwell to reduce heat that rises through there. I’m also assuming there’s not much attic insulation either because snow really doesn’t stick to the roof. I’d check the attic, but there’s currently no access and we’d have to decide which ceiling to cut a hole in for greatest convenience.
Some day with enough money it’ll get fixed, but for now the focus is just keeping the bills paid.
But… Insulation also insulates in summer against heat?
Yes. I live in a hot area of the US. Walls and ceiling need insulation so you can keep the house cool. Usually by Air conditioner. Attics a lot of time are under insulated so cause a the AC unit to work harder to keep it cool. Attics are not livable or a good place to store stuff. Where I live most houses are built on concrete slabbing so you don’t have a crawl space under your house.
What’s wrong with wood? Please excuse my ignorance
Nothing much, really. It’s just that in Europe we build houses out of concrete, which is better. Especially if You consider environmental hazards, which the states have more of, than we do.
wood
You can’t get obscene and unsustainable shitbox bungalow sprawl without using fires favourite food. Everything else is uncapitalist.
You can’t get obscene and unsustainable shitbox bungalow sprawl without using fires favourite food.
Yes, yes you can. Unfortunately.
Have you heard about brutalist apartment blocks? Row upon row of huge concrete and glass buildings with little green spaces. American style suburbs are less efficient but much easier on the eyes and not directly a capitalism issue. More of a cultural aesthetic.
Ah yes, the two architectural styles: consumerist and commieblock.
Concrete apartment blocks are a very capitalism fixture. Shoving a much poor people into an area as possible to extract more rent since each apartment has to be cheap enough for them to sorta afford it.
Yeah you can. Older houses are typically not filled with oil based products(e.g. paints, flooring, plastic furniture) so even if they are wood, it takes much longer for them to start really burning. Whereas a modern room in a modern house becomes inescapable in seconds.
How are you in my house!
What is your house made of, if not wood?
Brick, cement.
Well known for their insulative properties.
Yes, the bricks have holes in them, after building they are filled with air, which insulates. And often for the outer shell 2 walls are built with an “air” wall in between which used to be just air but now is filled with insulation materials.
There are many parts of the world where insulation is not a concern at all when building.
Sure but they didn’t make reply to a comment thread specifically about insulation…
The comment I replied to was about construction in general and had nothing to do with insulation. Try to keep up
You may want to reread this thread, you are the one who decided to ignore half of what was going on
Sounds like you’re the one not keeping up. Make a random reply out of context with the thread and then be a dick about it when someone points it out.
Even a brick house has wood in the walls, roof, and joists.
There is the old, classic cinder block home, as laid out in a vintage Popular Mechanics publication. You can find it on the Internet Archive & the other archive.
Slabs are generally not great, for repairs. I prefer a basement, but you do you.
Even a brick house has wood in the walls, roof, and joists.
No, no it doesn’t. Or at at it doesn’t have to. Wood is definitely not standard building material in all countries.
My familiarity is only via YouTube, wherein handy, woodworker types in Norway, England, and such fix their own houses. Did watch a guy use a steel I beam to fix his upstairs floor sag in a 200? year old house.
Can’t speak for England, but Norway does use quite a bit of wood in construction. It really depends on the country and their habits.
No, it doesn’t. Roof? Sometimes. Anywhere else? No.
Wooden walls? Like a fucking tree house XD
Wow, you sure are confidently incorrect. There’s paneling, wainscoting, and shiplap to name a few appliqués. Some people even build false walls to install pipes, cables, or extra insulation. It also helps with hanging things like TV’s or family photos. Not like a fucking tree house XD. Additionally, some old brick buildings you can’t modify due to historic building codes so the only way to “modify” the structure is to build around it.
Yeah, people even have furniture made out of wood! Incredible.
Not really what people mean when they talk about what a house is made of. Otherwise you’ll have to add in a bunch of plastic and textiles as well.
“I’ll build this wall out of fuel, so it’ll be easier to hang a picture” XD
Doubling down on your own lack of knowledge is certainly a choice. What are your thoughts on millenniums old Japanese and Chinese wooden architecture? Let me guess “hur dur hurr I am funny”.
It’s not dry tinder, it’s pressure and chemical treated lumber that’s extremely fire resistant but not fire proof and yes, I’ve made a living installing false walls for people that want extra insulation in drafty brick building, or to hang things like white boards or medical equipment.
Just because you don’t know about it doesn’t mean it’s not done around the world. It just means you should recognize when you’re wrong. It’s a valuable skill in life.
Any chance to dig in on America.
I’m sure other oppressed populations suffer similar conditions.
It’s entirely possible to do what they wanted, but there’s really no point in a crawlspace like that.
You just have to cut no more than 1/3 the size of the joist, and stay at least 2" from the edge.
This would require a lot of planning and redoing all the plumbing, but it’s possible.
Most plumbers would probably say “sure, I’ll do that but it’ll cost you” cause this job would be a super pain in the ass.
Hypothetically speaking, if he just cut a whole big enough for the pipe to go through how much better would it have been?
Much better. Imagine you’re bending something. The maximum tension is going to be at the very bottom and the max compression is going to be at the very top (this is why steel I-beams are shaped the way the are - to put the most material in the areas doing the most work). If you can put the hole in the middle you’re not impacting the structural integrity of the joist too much. You’d still have to worry about shear forces so you’d not want the hole to be too close to either end. Look up “castellated beam” if you want to see some steel examples.
A joist hole can be no more than 1/3rd the total depth of the joist, I think that pipe is larger than that. Even if you placed it in the very middle you’d still be compromising the structural integrity.
Best to just get some hangers and a fix it to the bottom; you’re still well clear of the ground. Put in some shims near one end if it’s a drain and you have to maintain pitch; I think this is a thick electrical conduit though?
EDIT: nope that looks like 4” PVC drain pipe
Why not just use hangers? No way a metal bracket doesnt exist for hanging pipe from joists. DIY some metal wire and a screw to hold it if you have to, hang that sucker like fresh venison, but why cut existing structures?
100% a better way of doing it. I was just trying to answer the question of notching versus drilling a hole.
It’s not structure, it’s just extra wood
I meant structure as in existing stuff, not ‘structural’ as in load-bearing. Extra wood would indeed still count as ‘structure’ within the context I meant.
This is, however, not just extra wood. What was cut through in the picture is floor joists, which are what holds up the flooring and supports whatever is on the floor, including people and furniture. Cutting these joists severely compromised the integrity of the floor. Now instead of a squeak from stepping in that spot, it’s far more likely that a loud crack followed by a fall through the floor will be the result of a heavy step.
No no no, I was being sarcastic, because this is indeed structural and not the way the text in the photo described it
Any chance you could point me to an example of hangers?
Thanks mate!
Assuming it’s centered vertically and not too close to the ends, then the joists would still have essentially full strength. Because the top and bottom are seeing compression and tension, there’s an area in the middle that’s not so critical.
No, no they wouldn’t. In the UK there are very strict rules about notching or putting holes in wooden joists. Precisely because it weakens them.
Full joist the load is spread through all the fibres of the timber. Drill a big hole in the middle and the load only goes through the top and the bottom fibres. So essentially it’s as strong as those two blocks of fibers. So why not make the joist just that thin the the first place then? The answer is because it’s nowhere near as strong.
There are various steel, composite and wooden joists with a special frame construction that can have hollow sections. A standard piece of timber with a big hole drilled in the middle of it is not one of them
I was trying to keep it simple for the sake of answering the question, but I’m literally a carpenter and drilling solid wood joists is totally fine (at least in Canada) as long as you roughly follow what I said. Maybe I could’ve said “design strength” instead of full strength but again, trying to keep it short and simple.
I’ve worked mostly commercial though so you’ve inspired me to look back in my books to make sure I wasn’t way off base in my recollection.
Thanks that exactly proves my point. As your diagram says. You’re allowed to drill a hole at a max of 1/4 the width of the joist. So even if that’s an 8 inch wide joist the biggest hole you can put in it is 2 inches wide.
That looks like 4" waste pipe. So to drill a hole through a joist for that the joist would need to be 16" inches wide.
So you can’t just drill holes in joists in the “middle that isn’t critical” As I said there are specific rules about where the size of holes you can put in joists because the size and location matters very much to the strength of the joist.
Well, the joist loses perhaps 25 % of its strength to the big hole, as opposed to some 75 % to the bottom notch. It’s still fair to call it “much better”.
It also “won’t pass inspection” and it has the additional effect of “making your property worthless without repairs”.
Additionally it might still “kill you” when the fridge slides over and tips on top of you when your floor is suddenly 28 degrees sloped downward because it cracked in half.
Imagine dying pinned under your own couch because you did this thinking it made your house stronger
Damn, you even have a diagram.
Ooh. Nice. Thanks for that! No idea when I’ll need that, but I’m sure it will be useful in a future project.
A lot. Most of the strength from a beam comes from the top and bottom, because these are the parts that have to stretch or compress most when the beam is bending. The middle part is contributing relatively little for strength.
That is why metal poles are often hollow, that saves a lot of material and weight without losing much strength.
Every part of what you said is wrong.
The middle indeed provides strength, when it is intact. It prevents the top and bottom from additional deflection under load as it takes on part of that stress. That is why there are very strict rules about when and how you can cut a penetration through a load-bearing joist (which, by definition, they all are).
Additionally, metal poles are a cylinder and take an axial compressive load, for which a cylinder is a very good shape; if you tried to support a floor with a wooden cylinder as a joist and the load was lateral to its length, it would likely buckle - its whole shape is hollow so it has the same problems as a joist with the middle cut out.
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I’m really proud of how confident you are.
Well I don’t think it would have been possible to assemble
I wonder how they repaired that, and who paid.
Remove pipe, replace the house, reinstall pipe.
Remove owner, remove pipe, replace the house, reinstall pipe, install new owner, otherwise it and even worse things will keep happening again. I’d hate to see how it’s wired.
My dad used to have a little old house where the previous owner cut a notch like this through the main beam to run a PVC pipe for the toilet. We bridged the gap with a strip of steel plate and then braced it with a foundation jack. That wouldn’t work with so many beams cut though.
👷♂️🍿
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