We have seen a lot of townhouse construction lately, and have been having a mild disagreement in the office about how the foundations should be protected from frost. These are typical IRC townhouses, defined as
[RB] TOWNHOUSE. A single-family dwelling unit constructed in a group of three or...
I am working on a renovation to an existing building, and one section of the IEBC is causing a bit of disagreement within the office. The section in question reads as follows:
[BS] SUBSTANTIAL STRUCTURAL ALTERATION.
An alteration in which the gravity load-carrying structural
elements altered...
We have been having a discussion in my office lately on the requirements for designing townhouses per the IRC. The main question is do we need to comply with the braced wall requirements per unit, or is the entire group of townhouses to be designed as a single structure. Often these structures...
Creep is a known concern with wood trusses, and the additional deflection over time can lead to higher than expected deflections than those reported by the design software. I am currently working on a building where there were some drywall cracks and the owner is concerned that the building is...
I have a project where they were supposed to install wood sheathing on a shear wall, and neglected to do so. The contractor is now trying to argue that the densglass sheathing and spray foam should provide some shear resistance, so they don't have to strip off the existing gyp and provide the...
I'm designing an interior wood bearing wall to support 3 floors and a roof, as well as the standard horizontal load of 5 psf. The code does not specify exactly what this horizontal load is, and how it should be combined with other loads. Since this is a wood wall, the duration factor of the...
