The old buildings are low ceilings. If you are the owner of such a house and want to increase the height of the ceilings, it is not necessary to disassemble the roof - you can raise it on your own. Our master class will help you with this.
Tools and materials for work
We will need:
- at least three jacks (preferably oil jacks) with a lifting capacity of 5 tons or more;
- the corresponding number of compressive-strength wooden beams, metal channels (optimal) or pipes of suitable length;
- the corresponding number of hard floor pads, which will redistribute the point load from the jack to the area load (thick boards, pieces of channel, etc.);
- cushioning material that will be laid under the beams and jacks in the process of lifting the roof (trimming boards, bricks, etc.): their number must be calculated so that it is enough for all beams on both sides to the full height of the roof;
- the material from which the walls will rise (brick, shell rock, adobe, etc.), as well as mortars (sand, clay, cement, etc.): their amount must be calculated depending on the length of the walls and height, on which the roof will rise.
So, let's begin
As part of the first stage of work, it is necessary to adjust the jacks to the ceiling beams. Beams can be initially visible or sewn from below, in this case, you need to calculate their position (it corresponds to the location of the load-bearing frame of the roof) and mark it on the walls from the inside in order to know where to install jacks. There will be a lot of dust in the process, so the furniture should be covered or taken out of the room.
We start from the corner. We install the jack on the distribution pad strictly under the beam and slightly wedged the channel between the beam and the jack by extending the jack rod. The jack should still have a power reserve of 5-10 centimeters for the upcoming lift. Next, you need to make sure that the channel is located vertically in all planes. If necessary, you can loosen the jack, correct the channel and wedge it slightly again.
If you do not plan to sew up the beams in the future, put a cushioning material between the channel and the beam, so the beam will not get damaged. Now you can try to carefully lift the beam. Watch the mutual position of the jack and the channel. If you see that a break occurs at the point of contact, loosen the jack and move it slightly to the inside of the break. Do not ignore this break - under increasing load during lifting, the channel can jump out of the connection, which is fraught with injury. If there is no break, extend the jack rod by 5 centimeters, no more, and fix this position by placing a gasket between the beam and the wall. Do not loosen the jack while doing this.
Repeat the same operation with all the jacks on one side of the house.
The more jacks you have, the better - you will save time on reinstalling them.
When all the jacks are raised 5 centimeters, you can start again from the first to the penultimate one, raising them another 5 centimeters and increasing the thickness of the spacers between the beam and the wall. It is not worth lifting higher yet: in case of a large skew, the roof can “move out” in the process of raising the opposite side.
Next, we weaken and rearrange all the jacks under the following beams, except for the last one, raised by 5 centimeters. We repeat the whole process from the beginning. When all the beams on one side are raised by 10 centimeters and gaskets are placed under them, we move to the other side of the house and lift them in the same way. From this side, you can already raise it by 15-20 centimeters, we also do all further ascents to the required height. This will compensate for the small displacement that occurs during the skew of the roof.
Additional difficulties
The first and last beams are usually hidden by the wall, so they will need to be lifted manually, using an enlarged shoulder. It will be much easier to do this when the second and penultimate beams of the house are already raised by 5 centimeters.
The distribution pad under the jack must be strong enough to avoid damage to the flooring.
We fix the roof at the desired height
When the beam is raised to the required height, a support must be erected under it. Even if you use clay when laying the openings, it is better to use mortar for the construction of supports, as it dries faster and acquires the necessary strength. It will be necessary to erect the support at the moment when the beam rests on the raised jack, after the jack is loosened, the load will immediately fall on the support - freshly laid clay at this moment will most likely give a drawdown.
Of particular difficulty will be the sections of the wall where the beams lie above the window openings. You will probably want to increase the height of the windows, to do this you will need to raise the lintels and fill the voids at the moment when the beams rest on the jacks.
Try to effectively organize the whole process so that it takes as little time as possible. While the roof is on temporary supports, this is a rather shaky structure - a gust of strong wind can spoil the result of your work.
Once the interior masonry has been laid and the roof is firmly in place, the exterior masonry can be raised.
Since raising and repairing a roof is a rather laborious task, you should immediately think about updating the roof so that this issue does not bother you anymore.
A common problem with many older houses is very low ceilings. Once upon a time, houses were built like this out of economy, and many years of shrinkage had an effect.
What if low ceilings make you feel cramped? How to raise ceilings in wooden houses?
The main problem of old wooden houses is not dilapidation, but low ceilings.
Removing the hemmed ceiling
Look at your ceiling. Is he flat? You can't see the ceiling beams, right? And they are.
This means that the ceiling is hemmed to them from below. From the side of the attic there can be flooring along the upper side of the beams. Or maybe not. In any case, 10-20 centimeters in height (depending on the thickness of the beams) can be won by simply removing the filing from below.
Of course, from above, in this case, you will need a solid flooring without gaps, through which from the attic all sorts of unpleasant-tasting substances will pour into your plate.
Beams are easy to fit into the design of the room, creating a color contrast between them and the ceiling. Dark beams against a white glossy background look very impressive.
Tip: if the surface of the beams has such an irregular geometry that it clearly does not fit into the design of the room, the same darker colors will help.
Wired with the same PVC panels as the ceiling, the beams will not look very nice; but the MDF panels, imitating the texture of oak or ash, will come to the court.
Advantages of the method
The walls of the house are not violated, the costs of time and money are small.
disadvantages
The gap between the floor and the underside of the beams is not very different from what it was. Visually, the space will expand noticeably; however, if you are very tall and constantly touched your head in other rooms, the situation will change slightly.
Lowering the floor beams
In many houses built in the middle of the last century, floor beams are cut between the first and second crowns.
And this fact can be used for our purposes:
- We remove the flooring;
- We cut beams along the walls;
- We lay logs directly on the foundation;
- We lay a board, plywood or OSB.
Advantages
There is not much more work here than in the first case. And the effect is already more significant: the floor will sink almost to the crown.
disadvantages
Window openings and the door will be noticeably higher than usual.
We remove the ceiling beams and hem along the rafters
If the roof is made correctly, that is, it has both ceiling and rafter beams, a noticeable distance can be gained on the difference in height between them.
- We embroider the ceiling;
- We cut the ceiling beams along the walls;
- We hem the ceiling along the rafter beams.
Advantages
Again, there is a noticeable and real increase in the volume of the room. The height of the ceiling in a wooden house will increase exactly by the difference between the two sets of beams.
disadvantages
The thermal insulation of the house will deteriorate somewhat.
Please note: no one bothers, however, to improve the thermal insulation of the ceiling by laying mineral wool from the attic side.
We lower the floor below the strip foundation
- We remove the flooring;
- We cut off the floor beams resting on the foundation.
- Carefully, so as not to disturb the foundation of the walls, we deepen the floor, removing excess soil and backfill. Don't get carried away: if you try to dig below the foundation, it's almost guaranteed to move. With obvious consequences for the walls.
- Re-filling with gravel, reinforcing and pouring a new foundation under a new level of floor beams;
- We lay the beams and re-lay the floor.
The space inside the strip foundation is not only thermal insulation from the ground, but also extra centimeters of height
Advantages
The gain in height can be quite large: everything rests only on the height of the foundation of your house.
disadvantages
- Large amount of work;
- Danger of soil movements under the foundation during deepening;
- Windows and doors will again be much higher than usual.
We remove the roof
For small houses, the most obvious way will not be overly laborious:
- We disassemble the roof;
- We remove the beams;
- Add one or two crowns;
- Putting in a new floor and a new roof.
Advantages
We get higher ceilings without any reservations: windows and doors remain at the usual level, the real height of the room increases noticeably. As a bonus, the roof was re-roofed and rotted beams and rafters were replaced.
disadvantages
Even for a small house, the amount of work will be quite significant. In addition, the house will spend some time without a roof at all - you will have to monitor the weather, choosing sunny days.
We raise the house on jacks
Don't want to take apart the roof? You can do the opposite - raise the house, leaving the roof in its original place.
How to increase the height of the ceiling by lifting the whole house on jacks?
- Estimate the approximate weight of the house. The volume of walls and floors can be estimated by multiplying the height and width of each wall (or floor) by its average thickness. The density of dry wood is approximately 500 kg/m3.
Tip: for old and not very dry logs or timber, however, it is better to start from 800 kg / m3. If you miss in the big direction - nothing terrible will happen.
- Stock up on the right amount of hydraulic jacks. You can focus on the carrying capacity of powerful specimens of about 5 tons.
Ideally, when the whole house is raised at the same time and evenly, then there is less chance that the interior decoration of the house will be damaged. - If the house is not finished inside, you can get by with one or two jacks for each corner. Of course, you will have to raise the house a little, using stands for crowns.
- The house is raised to the desired height and stands on stands? Now we put one or two more crowns. Not necessarily exactly logs - you can use timber. You can not add crowns at all, but raise the foundation and insulate it.
- Then again slightly raise the house on the jacks and remove the stands.
The main thing is not to rush and avoid distortions
Advantages
The roof and walls do not suffer at all when carefully lifted. The house just gets taller.
disadvantages
And here the window and door openings go up from the usual level.
Conclusion
As you can see, there are many ways. Which of them will be the least time-consuming for you - decide for yourself. Good luck!
One of the ways to increase the living space in the house is to install an attic in the attic. Unfortunately, this is not always possible due to the low roof. However, this problem can also be solved without even resorting to dismantling. To do this, you just need to know how to raise the roof of the house. If you solve this problem, then you can build any room, even a bedroom, even a nursery, even an office.
Preparatory stage of work
Before you begin to raise the roof, it is imperative to strengthen the base of the roof itself. For these purposes, it is most advisable to use a metal frame, which is made from a channel. Cable-stayed stretch marks must be made of reinforcing bars with a diameter of 14 mm. As guide rails, special support legs will be used, which provide an easy lift that excludes displacement to the side.
To attach the channel to the surface of the timber, it is necessary to prepare screws 10 cm long, 10 mm in diameter. The longitudinal channels located in the center are directly attached to the beam, metal ears are welded to them along the perimeter. Through them, the channel will be attached to the timber with screws. As practice shows, at least 70 screws with a diameter of 8 millimeters may be needed. Channels are used 2 times less, while their strength will be sufficient to hold the roof. In addition, their further use is quite acceptable for the installation of the ceiling between the attic and the ground floor. The weight of the channels that will be used to strengthen the roof of the house can reach 2.3 tons.
How to mount support legs
The purpose of the supporting legs is to provide easy lifting and avoid shifting to the sides. The supporting legs can reach a weight of 1.4 tons. It consists of the fact that each of the 4 legs weighs 350 kg. The height is 2.9 meters, and the legs are connected to each other by horizontal channels of the 8U brand. The product has a length of 0.385 m. The distance between the horizontal channels of the supporting legs is 0.25 m. Struts of brand 10 y are used for the manufacture of inclined channels. At an inclination of 45 degrees, their length is one and a half meters.
If you follow the proposed dimensions, you can get support legs that have the necessary strength. The permissible wind load for this design is 73 meters per second. Such legs will hold a 100-ton roof without any problems. However, before the device it is necessary to make calculations of both horizontal and wind loads. It is necessary to place supporting legs in those places where there is a main wall in the house or a partition in half a standard brick. This will allow you not to worry that the structure can destroy the floor of the first floor.
Roof lifting procedure
To properly carry out the process of lifting the roof, you need to prepare tools such as:
Jack with hydraulic drive.
Metal fittings.
Reinforced concrete pillars.
Standard metal strip.
Nail puller.
A hammer.
Channels.
Screws with the required parameters.
After the preparatory work is completed, you can begin to raise the roof. For these purposes, a hydraulic jack is used, which can lift a weight of at least 12 tons. It is possible to take two jacks, but this can lead to poor stability of the structure when lifting from 2 anchor points at the same time. In the process of lifting, for safety, you need to use special substrates that are made from a square pipe or from cut channel bars. The crossbars located on the supports must be at least 25 cm apart from each other. 12 cross rings must be used for each support. In order to achieve the desired height, the free space between the crossbars is laid with substrates made of square supports or channels.
The roof of the house is not raised at the same time, but in turn from each corner by about 5 centimeters in one pass. Moving in a circle, and making alternate rises from different points, you need to gain a height of 25 cm. The crossbars are welded to the supports only after this height has been reached. After raising the roof by 185 cm, in parallel, they begin to lay bricks for the outer wall. Climbing to this height takes at least 3 days. A reinforcing belt should be used in the masonry. In the wake of raising the entire roof, the jack supports also rise. It is installed on the same base on which the roof rests. To make a full-fledged attic, the roof must be erected to a height of about 287 cm. This will take about 12 days. The entire space between the ceiling and the roof is filled along the perimeter with brick walls.
The device of the attic space
After raising the roof and installing the walls in place, window blocks are determined in the corresponding openings, the formation of which must be carried out simultaneously with the laying of the walls. Insulation of the under-roof space is carried out after the complete installation of the walls. In this case, good protection against ingress of water from the outside must be ensured. For the attic, it is necessary to provide good insulation, since the attic has a large area of contact with the external environment.
Most often, mineral wool is used for this, which is a material made of fibers with excellent heat-insulating qualities. Waterproofing on the insulation is arranged not only outside, but also inside the room. In order for it to be of high quality, special membrane films must be used. The insulation must be of good quality, since the attic will be used all year round. The attic itself should have a multi-layer structure, including vapor barrier, waterproofing, insulation, roofing, and interior decoration. Ventilation must be arranged to protect it from the appearance of mold, fungus and dampness. A large gap is needed between the insulation layer and the roof, the thickness of which should be from 2.5 to 5 cm. It depends on the roofing material.
A raised roof can be fitted with vertical or slanted windows, which are often used for attic spaces. It is much more difficult to build vertical windows than inclined ones, since this requires constructing a truss system for each window. Using option 2 has other advantages. Sloped windows allow more light to enter the room. According to the regulations, windows should occupy about 12% of the entire surface of the walls.
The operation of raising the roof and building residential premises under it is a rather laborious process that requires serious material costs and the participation of professional builders. Therefore, with the independent implementation of these works, it is necessary to carefully study the theoretical foundations of the technology. It is advisable to consult with specialists before starting work.
Low ceilings are a problem in many old private houses. If you bought such a house or own one, the height of the ceilings can be increased without dismantling the roof. You can do this on your own with one or two assistants.
But first, you need to prepare well for this work. To do this, we need at least three oil jacks with a lifting capacity of 5 tons, the more the better. Logs, beams, metal profiles (pipes, channels, I-beams) can be used as racks. We will prepare gaskets from thick boards or the same channels on the floor, and under jacks and ceiling beams.
We will also take care of the material with which we will build up the walls: brick, adobe, foam blocks (we are not talking about a wooden house now). Do not forget to buy cement and sand to prepare the solution. All materials should be enough for a full cycle of work, because they need to be done as quickly as possible. Otherwise, a strong wind can undermine the roof, standing on the gaskets, and add a bunch of new problems to the owner.
If everything is ready, you can slowly start. We determine where we have beams (in some houses they are sewn up, in some they are visible from the outside). We start from the corner. We need a stand (channel, log, timber) and three gaskets: under the channel on the floor, between the jack and the channel, and between the jack and the beam. The axis must be strictly vertical, otherwise the stand and the jack will begin to warp, the latter may jump out and cause injury. Therefore, be extremely careful. If the work went skewed, loosen the jack and straighten the entire structure vertically.
After making sure that the vertical is observed, carefully extend the jack by 5 centimeters, no more. Place a spacer between the wall and the beam. Do not loosen the jack. Take the next jack and raise the adjacent beam. Having extended all the jacks, you can again go to the corner from where you started, raising the beams another 5 centimeters and laying gaskets of an already greater thickness between the beams and the wall. Now we move to the opposite wall and perform similar operations, raising the beams by 5 cm and installing spacers between the beams and the wall. From this side, they can be raised by a total of 15-20 cm.
The end beams usually go above the walls. Don't get in there with a jack. Here the old Archimedes will help us. You will have to lift the beams manually, with a lever with an increased shoulder. When the rest of the beams have already been raised by this point, the task will not be so difficult. You may want to raise the height of the window openings as well. To do this, it will be necessary to raise the jumpers above them and lay voids at the moment when the roof is on jacks. But it’s better not to be smart with windows, but to build brick columns on the mortar under the beams on the walls. Once it is up, the jacks can be loosened by gently lowering the beams onto the new supports. It remains only to report the wall to the level of the beams, cover up all the cracks, and walk in the renovated house to its full height, and even jump for joy.
One nuance. Do not leave the jacks under load for a long time, and even more so at night. They can fail, and if you rented them, you will also have to explain to the owner. If you did not have time to finish the work by the evening, lower the beams onto the spacers, and let the jacks rest. Do not rest the jacks against the beam itself without spacers. The effort is quite large, and the roof weighs decently, so the beam is easy to split or split, because it is also aged. Take your time and do the job carefully. Then the house will serve you for many more years. Good luck!
The problem of raising the roof is often encountered when they want to increase the living space of the house by building an additional attic in the attic area. Sometimes (very rarely) the need to raise it is explained by the subsidence of the walls of the building and the desire to prolong its life at any cost.
Note that before you raise the roof of the house, it will be necessary to bring a reliable foundation under it that can withstand the full load of the entire structure.
Preparatory activities
To arrange the base of the roof, it will be necessary to prepare a special metal frame, assembled from channels and rigidly fixed to the roof support beam.
The list of accessories and materials used to lift the base of the roofshould include the following items:
- metal channels of brand 14U;
- special cable braces used for safety retention of the structure during its lifting;
- the so-called supporting legs, which play the role of guides, ensuring a strict verticality of the ascent (without noticeable displacements to the sides);
We note right away that cable-stayed stretch marks can be made of reinforcing bars with a diameter of about 14 mm. To prepare the metal frame, 14U brand channels are used with metal lugs welded to them, which are necessary for fixing to the roof base.
The channel bases are attached to the lower cut using ten-millimeter screws with a length of the screwed-in part of at least 10 cm. When choosing channels used to strengthen the base, care must be taken that the total weight of the structure does not exceed 2 tons.
Installation of support devices
Support legs are necessary so that the roof structure can be lifted without moving it to the sides. In addition, they can be used as temporary roof supports until a permanent foundation (walls) is laid under it.
A complete set of supports includes four legs, each of which must withstand a load of at least 1.5 tons. Such legs are made from 4 channels about 3 m high. They are connected to each other using horizontal jumpers about half a meter long, cut from 8U brand channels.
Support structures prepared in this way will be able to withstand a total vertical load of up to 40 tons. In order to avoid damage to the floor slab, the leg base stops should be placed in areas capable of withstanding ultimate loads (in the area of \u200b\u200bbearing walls or reinforced partitions).
Roof lift
Upon completion of the preparatory procedures, you can proceed directly to lifting the roof. At the same time, it is most convenient to use a hydraulic jack, designed for a maximum load of 12 tons, as a lifting mechanism. Note that sometimes two jacks are used to raise the roof, but this method is not at all safe, as it can lead to loss of structural stability.
In addition to the jack, you will need the following consumables and tools for work:
- hammer and nail puller;
- fixing screws;
- metal fittings;
- blanks of channels used for arranging fixing crossbars;
- metal mounting strips.
For additional strengthening of the supporting zones (at the location of the supporting legs and the jack), it is desirable to prepare special substrates made from several channel cutoffs welded together.
The rise is carried out by sequential movement in the vertical plane of each of the corners of the roof to a height of not more than 5 cm.
Passing in turn from one corner to another, it is necessary to ensure a uniform rise of the entire structure by about 25 cm. And only upon reaching this mark can another safety crossbar be welded to the supports, fixing the position of the roof base.
Sequentially moving along each of the 4 supports, after a certain time (as a rule, it takes from 2-3 days), you will be able to reach the required height of the base. Note that as the roof rises, the jack's anchor point will also need to rise.
To obtain a full-fledged attic "superstructure", the roof will need to be raised to a height of about 3 m.
To carry out a full range of preparatory, lifting and superstructure work, you may need 10-12 days.