With its team of seasoned professionals, the company OMT (OUVERTURE MURS PORTEURS TREMIES) specialises in taking down load-bearing walls built from concrete blocks, solid bricks, stone or concrete.
Called in by a client to demolish load-bearing walls, we recently worked in his apartment in Maisons-Alfort. The feasibility of the project had been studied by a structural engineering office (BET), which determined the opening and demolition procedure and, based on its precise calculations, the support to be put in place through reinforcement with steel beams.
As with every job, we begin by installing protection combining self-adhesive sheeting and hardboard panels, to protect the surroundings and leave everything perfectly clean at the end of the job.
With both people and the structure in mind, we start by supporting the upper floor with several timber planks laid perpendicular to the walls, each secured by two props. The load-bearing walls are then demolished with electric saws and, once the rubble has been removed, we secure and then strengthen the newly created opening with a steel reinforcement.
From a technical point of view, the study previously carried out by the BET showed the need to use HEB180 and HEA140 steel sections, to be placed at each bearing in a 200 mm recess, and to create a square-section steel tube column of 100x100x5mm. The choice of reinforcement with beams and a square tube, and the selection of materials, were based on calculations around the existing structure and checked against the Eurocode standards in force.
To ensure a perfect distribution of the loads from the two types of beams we used, HEB180 and HEA140, we built reinforced concrete padstones at each bearing in the pockets cut into the walls.
All the beams are robustly assembled with steel splice plates and angle brackets, and are connected to the columns by 10 mm thick base plates, welded and bolted.
As a guarantee of long-term durability, after every job on steel elements we apply an anti-corrosion paint.
This large-scale project, which was about much more than simply taking down a wall, was carried through from start to finish by the joint efforts of the BET and the company OMT.
This apartment in Maisons-Alfort now enjoys a larger floor area and a completely remodelled space, the result of our experience and the reliability of the technicians at our company, which specialises in load-bearing wall demolition and reinforcement with steel structures.
