Half wall in basement

[Brad Bruce]

I'm thinking of putting up a half-height wall in my basement to seperate the laundry/workbench area from the kids play area. It will have to half doors in it. One for the furnace and the other for access to the laundry area.

Between the doors will be a section of wall about 4 feet long with no side support (it will be attached to the floor only). Any recommendations on attachment method? The concrete floor is 80 years old, so I'm a little leary of using just nails or screws to hold the bottom plate down. I was thinking of drilling a hole and filling it with anchor cement. Then I would use lumber ties to make sure that the studs were well attached to the baseplate.

[HA HA Budys Here]

Try using "nib" walls in your design, where walls meet at right angles, (90 degrees) especially near openings - and the walls would support each other.

[Brad Bruce]

[e-mail] (HA HA Budys Here) wrote in news: [e-mail]:

I'll bite... What the heck is a nib wall? A google search turns up a lot of "New In Box" items and few texts mentioning nib walls, but no descriptions or pictures.

NJBrad

[ameijers]

Agreed. A floating half-height wall only 4 feet long wouldn't last a month with kids climbing on it. Add little stub walls at the gates.

Another observation about kids- a wall like this will become a toy for the kids, and increase the odds of them straying into forbidden areas. Climbing it, walking along the top, toy car highway, throwing things at each other over the top, etc. If you want an open wall for air and light reasons, I'd top the stub wall with sliding screens, perforated panels, shutters, or something, and use full-height doors. That way you can open them up when you are using the shop or laundry, but kids have a visible boundry to 'their' area. A cheap alternative might be a whole bunch of sliding or z-fold closet doors hung from a track in ceiling, or set between posts every X feet along the perimeter. Or if you just want the area kid-safe and don't care about looks, put up a chain-link fence wall, with lockable gates, warehouse style. Hard to make good recommendations without seeing your space.

aem sends....

[Jim Elbrecht]

-snip-

Google is so cool but you have to search their help section for some of their cooler features- For instance- type in; define nib and you get a definition-- followed by a link to "more definitions" . .. way down on that page- A small projection of masonry from the face of a wall.

Jim [The page with Googles coolness is-

well worth spending an hour browsing ]

[Brad Bruce]

"ameijers" wrote in news:%gnKb.284604$ [e-mail]:

Lots of ideas thanks

Might be time to go full height.........

NJBrad

[rb608]

The half wall idea will still work, don't despair. It's just that the catilever support off the basement slab is prone to failure. One suggestion I'd offer is to carry just an occasional column full height to anchor to the ceiling. That will give you the support you need but still leave you with an eseentially open space.

Joe F.

[Brad Bruce]

"rb608" wrote in news:BZnKb.284716$ [e-mail]:

It's about 12 feet end to end and needs two doors in it. One of the reasons for only going half height is that the expansion tank for the boiler is right where I'd want the wall to go. That and I'd have to cut down the doors anyway (floor to joist is only 6ft 5in). Oh well, time to tell the wife NO!

NJBrad

[RB]

I have several half walls like this and anchored them by keeping the framing in constant compression. In my opinion no other way will work without wing walls. The reason is that the lumber you frame with will shrink seasonally and once it becomes loose the wall will move.

If you have a good concrete floor and can anchor securely to it, perhaps even with a toggle below the slab, pass several threaded rods through the wall vertically and with a nut and washer tighten down on the structure. The wall should now be quite stable. Leave some provision for re-tightening the wall when it shrinks though, perhaps a removable trim cap on the top. In my case all rods pass into the basement below so access is available.

My architect designed several complicated weldments to hold these walls but failed to realize that wood is not dimensionally stable. So in time the walls loosened and there was no way to re-tighten them. The threaded rod approach solves this. After 12 years all is still tight.

RB

Brad Bruce wrote:

[Goedjn]

Don't put in a wall at all, put in freestanding cabinets. It's not like you have too much storage, after all.

--Goedjn

[Goedjn]

Come to think of it, you could just post up to the ceiling on either side of each doorway.. and use bar-style batwing doors, so you don't have to cut regular doors down. Or just do a normal wall with a window-like cutout where the tank intrudes.

[edee em]

Either way. I used a lot of Tapcons in my remodel: worked great. Don't understand your fear of using screws...

By the way, why would there not be any side support for your half wall? Seems to me that you could tie it in to the door framing, no?, or am I missing something?

[Brad Bruce]

"edee em" wrote in news:OxHLb.165$ [e-mail]:

The idea was that there would be nothing (not even door frames) going to the ceiling. There is a span of wall between two openings that would only have an anchor to the floor.

|-------------------------------------------------| | | | | | open | | | | | |-------| |---------------| |-----| | | 1/2 | | 1/2 | | | | door | Problem | door | | | | | wall | | | | | | | | | |-------------------------------------------------|

[edee em]

Ohhhhh. Don't know if I like that. That half wall will be susceptible to a lot of damage without lateral support. A 4' x 4' wall built of 2x4 framing isn't going to hold up. You might get away with it if you go to a 2x6 wall, with anchoring as you mentioned. I like the wall sitting on a 5 1/2" base rather than a 3 1/2" base.

If I could offer another option, why not build an "open wall" as opposed to a half wall? What I mean is bring outside studs of the 4' wall to the ceiling with a plate at the top to join the two. Put a small header in to accommodate drywall and your good to go. Let me know what you think.

[Brad Bruce]

"edee em" wrote in news:IvILb.336$xm1.31462 @read2.cgocable.net:

Maybe use 4x4 posts for looks on either side of the openings?

floor joist ---+ | V |-------------------------------------------------| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | open | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |-------|----------|---------------|--------|-----| | | 1/2 | | 1/2 | | | | door | Problem | door | | | | | wall | | | | | | | | | |-------------------------------------------------|

[DanG]

I find the need to develop sturdy partial walls in commercial work occasionally. I have had excellent results by drilling through the concrete to install a piece of black iron pipe. With metal studs I have surrounded the pipe with 2 studs and 2 pieces of track (create a box) and fill with concrete. With wood I have fastened a stud to the pipe with electrical EMT straps. I have used 1/2", 3/4", and 1 1/2" pipe depending on height of wall, amount of jeopardy, etc.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Keep the whole world singing. . . . DanG

great.

half

framing, no?,

going to

would

[edee em]

Do you mean on each side of the openings so that you would end up with (wall, post, opening, post, 1/2 wall, post, opening, post, wall)? If so, that might look sharp! My concern would be with how you would tack the posts into your joists and the floor. You will have the same problem as with the wall on its own because the posts won't offer you the support you are looking for.

A simpler solution to all of this is to rough frame the openings as if you were putting in doors. The other poster on this thread seems to know a better solution where you wouldn't have to worry about posts.

Good luck

[safemale]

[xrongor]

i dont know if you realized this but you seem to be replying to 5 month old posts...

randy