Remove Patio Doors

"Wayne Barker" wrote | I have just had a conservatory built and I want to remove the | patio doors and leave an arch from the house to the conservatory. | As the house was built in 1995 will I need to support the wall or | will the lintel above the patio doors be enough.

I would think the lintel would be enough, but I am not a structural engineer.

I don't know if this work would require a Building Regs application but if it does it would probably fail, unless the conservatory has been built to the standards (especially thermal insulation) of a habitable room. It's probably been built under the conservatory exemptions, which rely on an exterior door between the room and the conservatory.

If you go ahead, you may find your room very cold in winter.

Owain

No patio door frames I've ever seen would take the load of a wall - it's usually quite critical that there's *no* load on the frame to get them to slide easily. But then anything's possible.

If there is a visible lintel, I'd say you're ok.

Wayne Barker submitted this idea :

If you intend leaving the lintel in place and completely undisturbed, then the intended arch would be not structural and therefore not a problem.

So how does he do it?

Michael McNeil explained on 04/04/2004 :

He didn't ask that, he only asked if it could be done.