Sliding Door In Load Bearing Wall

Inserting a door or window in a load bearing wall can be a tricky situation but not an impossible one.

Sliding door in load bearing wall.

It was a load bearing wall requiring. I needed a space to park my john deere zero turn mower. It s not in a normal door if it s a two foot door it s going to be a 26 28 inch header. The reason why this project is so difficult is due to the potential danger a load bearing wall supports the structure so its absence through accidental destruction could lead to the room or entire house collapsing.

The header is usually made out of dimensional lumber installed on its edge. That s why the header has to be twice as big. The header for a door is much like a bridge transferring the weight above it to the floor and foundation below. The first thing to understand is there could be a concentrated load above a door.

Non load bearing windows and doors do not require a structural header. This happens on bearing walls. An engineer will be able to determine the necessary size of the header type of wood and the number of king studs and jack studs. Installing a pocket door in a load bearing wall requires replacing the old header with a longer one.

Doors in a load bearing wall that holds the weight of the house created by beams and trusses need a larger header than those in non load bearing walls. In these instances there s a structural header that acts as a beam over the door to support the load or weight that s bearing down on that portion of the house. Creating the opening for the new header may require temporary ceiling support while the header. You put the pocket door in and the hardware for it and you leave the exposed part and then it slides into the wall and that part gets covered with drywall.

However it s often necessary to involve a structural engineer as fred and kim did when they removed a load bearing wall. So i removed this door video below and expanded this doorway.