![]() ![]() As you'll see, it appears that the lath and plaster bit only goes just over halfway along the length of the wall the rest has a much more hollow sound, and I'm fairly sure is a more modern stud wall construction (whether it existed originally and has been replaced, or is a newer wall, I don't know)Īnd this is a picture of the wall, in case it's any use (it's probably not!) This is a diagram of the wall, showing where the hole I made is. And the wall next to the staircase (the shaded bit) appears to be a very solid double brick wall. ![]() The thick wall going left to right halfway up the floorplan is an old external wall (I believe the rear (top, on the floor plan) half of the building was added on to the front after it was built). ![]() For reference, the wall on the left is a very solid wall (there is a flat next door, but it's actually a separate building). And there was me hoping this would lead to an easy answer! Here are some more diagrams/pictures: In fact I'd be surprised if you have more than a 6-8ft span of lathes without another vertical member if my house is anything to go by (though mine's a few hundred years older). If the span's big enough, you will definitely have other vertical beams embedded on that wall. Might be easier to visualise if you knocked up a sketch, but in answer not necessarily.Ĭan you see vertical beams at either end of the wall? The "horizontal" beam going above the one you can see in your photo (I assume that's what you're meaning) will finish off in the same way. ![]() What do you reckon? I'm happy to do more destruction, but didn't know which direction to go to get useful information - and I'd rather leave as little patching up as possible if I do end up not taking the whole thing down! I don't know quite how far these extend and don't really have any idea why they're there. In addition, there were what appeared to be two very chunky horizontal beams running across the top of the wall. Normally, I'd be pretty confident it's therefore not bearing any weight, but it's a fairly big span - about 19 feet. The joist immediately above doesn't appear to be resting on anything in the wall (I could push a knife underneath it without too much difficulty). I made a few holes today where the wall meets the ceiling, which confirmed it's a lath and plaster wall. There's nothing on the ground floor underneath the wall and, above, there is a parallel wall offset by about a foot or two. It's a first floor flat in a relatively old (mid-late 19th century, I think) bank building. In our testing, we found that an 8mm rawlplug with a 5mm x 50mm screw into lightweight block we failed at about 50kg tensile (pull-out) load.I'm trying to work out if an internal wall in my flat is load bearing, and thought I'd tap into the wealth of PH knowledge - don't worry, I will check with a structural engineer before I take it out completely! If you are drilling into a light weight block, use an HSS drill rather than a masonry drill.The screw used with a wall plug also needs to be the right size so that it can be tightened up firmly within the plug. Masonary drills in particular often tend to drill oversize holes (the best masonry drill for an 8mm plug is often a 7mm drill ). It works very well indeed in a solid wall made from brick, concrete, stone or, to a lesser extent, lightweight concrete or ‘aircrete’ blocks.Rawlplugs come in various sizes. This brand name has become genericised in the UK, being equally applied to wall plugs from competing manufacturers’ (Wikipedia).The rawlplug has been the workhorse in the fixings world for years and remains a top selling product. ‘The original wall plug was invented by John Joseph Rawlings in 1911, and marketed under the name Rawlplug. ![]()
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