What can I do with this -

I'd get a structural engineer in to advise.

transfer most of the roof load to the central supporting wall of the property.

Can't really see what is going on with the vertical beams - they may just be straps holding a tie beam that is there to stop the floor joists twisting and to support the ceilings a bit.

What sort of tiles are on the roof? (i.e. are they particularly heavy?)

What arr those purlins in cross section? (they look quite skinny)

What are you attempting to do - more storage space, partial loft conversion etc?

fred coughed up some electrons that declared:

conversions. But I would advise having a suitably competent person do the design.

In my bungalow, they are replaced with verticals and those transfer their load to either the new reinforced floor joists or in some cases, the old

A mate's whose loft was dealt with (single dormer, 3/4 house depth) a couple of months ago had a number of steels inserted.

You would be best off with a suitably qualified engineer or architect IMO.

Cheers

Tim

Yes. A structural engineer is what you need - and they are remarkably good value.

They look pretty heavy.

Don't know offhand, but yea, skinny.

Storage.

Cheers folks, i'll get a structural engineer.

Seems a lot of expense just for storage.Couldn't you floor it and just store round about?

Steven.

Beefing up the purlins would let you lose some of the diagonal struts that are supporting the purlins. I can't quite see on the photo, but I trust the purlins are supported on the end gable wall as well (if not that is something else that could be done)

Do the struts make that much difference then?

That was the reason for my question about if it was ultimately going to be a loft conversion. If you were going that route, then you would be able to design a floor that would be able to carry the roof load as well, by sticking dwarf walls where the purlins currently are. However without the strengthened floor it is much more difficult.

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember "fred" saying something like:

Bear in mind the cumulative weight of all the dope plants.

LOL, it's the cumulative weight of 18mm chipboard that worries me. About 15 sheets of 8' x 4'. The joists are only about 3" x 2"

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember "fred" saying something like:

Pretty skinny. I think I'd look at beefing them up a bit, but see what a pro says.

What I did with my loft that has a very similar joists was dump the chipboard and put some floor boards down, spaced out so that you don't end up falling between them. Floorboards are far lighter than chipboard and because you space them out, they are lighter still.

That's certainly an idea, Dave. Do you know how much lighter they actually are?

Regrettably no, but try picking up an 8 x 4 piece of chip board and then a bundle of floor boards that will span 4 foot, even if they are longer. Anyone else on here that can be more definitive?

Dave

From memory the density of chipboard is about 680 kg/m^3 whereas spruce is about 600 kg/m^3.

Gordon Bennet, my sums must be wrong, that works out at around half a ton. Sounds like a re-think. Cheers.

Exactly the figures I see. Most people "remember" chipboard in terms of worksurfaces for kitchens, which are very thick and heavy. There isn't that much difference in the density in reality. Floorboards can work thinner than you would with chipboard though, so one might save a bit there.