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| I have a 24ft X 24ft room with a basement. The floor joists are 2 x 6 on 24 in. centers. There are 4 cross beams in this room to make the floor sturdier. Approxiamately every 5ft is a post. I was wondering if it was possible to replace these 4 cross supports with 2 – 5.25in X 5.25in Parallam(trusjoist) X 24ft long with one post in the center? Thank you for any input as this room is not very useable with all these posts. Kemp | |
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A beam that shallow won't span that far.
You might get a steel I-beam to work somewhere around an 8" depth.
I am trying to give myself as much headroom as as I can. I went to the truss joist site and ask this question but recievd no reply from them or another manufactor. A 3.5 x 9.23 joist is 1.5 times stiffer and 3 time stronger than comparable lumber. this 5.25 x 5.25 is only supporting an 8 ft. x 12ft. area. I am not a carpenter and have not talk to anyone using these new joist, but from what I have read I think this would work. Thanks for the reply, Kemp
For a wood beam to work, it needs to be roughly 1" deep for every foot of span. You can push that some with engineered lumber, but not a whole lot. Since you aren't even close to that ratio, I have no doubt that it won't work. You might be able to make the beams flush beams and save a lot of your hedroom. But that can be a mess with mechanicals in the way.
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Thank you for the info, Kemp
I was thinking the same as Boss, that by letting the beams in so the tops of the beams flush to the top of the joists, you could get a decnt beam in there. I can't see all the hundreds of details of your situation from here, and since you are not a carpenter, you need a real framer or engineer on site to help you evaluate all the problems. I would imagine that it might be possible to double the number of joists by sistering or changing layout to 12" OC, even going to 2x8 or 2x10s and then only have one beam bisecting the space, with either one post in center, or two posts at outer portions, depending...
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I think you are missing a crucial element of the stiffening. You have 2x6 at 24oc. Even with the right sized beam you will have 8 foot spans of 2x6 floor which at that joist spacing I would think will bounce.
Just my 2 cents.
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