12_Installing Beams

As we opened some walls, we needed to install beams as a replacement to support the ceiling. To ensure that we wouldn’t put too much load on the remaining walls, we needed to put a support underneath the floors.

Supporting The Floor

On June 25^th, we bought dry walls, a big lumber, and a jack to provide a support for the house floor. This was our first big purchase and my first time flexing my muscles i.e. lifting these materials. We also bought a battery-run lawnmower, so I could flex more muscles. Well actually we bought the battery-run type because it was cheap and energy efficient compared to the gasoline-run ones.

Our first big purchase. Yes, I had to help carrying them.  

My husband installed the lumber and put the jack underneath the floor. He had to crawl in the crawlspace during the hot and humid North Carolina weather (around 30^oC or 86^oF) to do it. He disliked this job so much, but by the end of the day the floor was supported.

Bolts for supporting the floor from inside the house.

A jack underneath the floor.

Installing The Beams

On Monday or June 26^th, we contacted a local sawmill to buy beams during the lunchtime. The beams consisted of two long and heavy solid woods. It was 14’ x 15” x 3” (or 4.26m x 38.1cm x 7.62cm). We couldn’t even close our backdoor van because the beams were too long. I had to sacrifice my jacket to tie the backdoor to the beams, so the door wouldn’t swing wide. We brought the beams to the house and left them, as my husband had to go back to work.

Transporting the beams. I had to sacrifice my jacket to prevent the backdoor from swinging wide.

After work, we went back to the house to install the beams; only to find out that we left the garage door opened the whole time! We rushed to check our tools and appliances, especially the ones that we just bought e.g. an industrial vacuum cleaner and a lawnmower. Thank God, everything was there. I guessed this was a proof that the neighborhood was a safe area.

We installed the beams by installing temporary studs, which were shorter than the other studs, to hold the beams. Since there were only two of us, we couldn’t hold the beams while screwing them to the ceiling; so we put the beams on the temporary studs while the beams being screwed.

Me, before installing the beams.

Temporary studs were shorter than the other studs.

Even though we put temporary studs to reduce our burden on holding the beams, still, we had to lift the beams to the studs; and they were so freaking heavy. Of course we did it one beam at a time; but holding a beam while standing on a ladder was tough. I had to hold a heavy stuff while balancing my standing position. Not easy.

Furthermore, even though we had measure everything, still the beams wouldn’t fit on the first try. There were always some crooked edges that made the beams couldn’t fit right away. This meant, we had to put down the beams, trimmed some surfaces and lifted the beams up again. What a tiring work!

The beams were installed. 

We finally finished installing the beams around 11PM. We took pictures to show how open the space was before going home. We rewarded ourselves by eating late night ice creams at McDonalds.

We had an open space!

No more walls.

A few days later, we contacted a dry wall contractor to finish our dry wall installation. He was amazed to find out that two people could install such heavy beams.