Could heavy piece of furniture be too much for second floor of house? 2

[millworker301]

We just bought a mountain house in NC. My wife has purchased a buffet I guess it is called and I am very concerned about the weight of it. It is about 6' long and 32" high and will be getting placed in the kitchen where there is just an empty wall with no cabinets. It is a wood piece but it is very heavy. The kitchen is on what I would call the second floor although it is really the main floor of the house. There is a finished basement below it but it is more at ground level than actually be a dug out basement. I know this my sound stupid but I am just concerned about the weight of this item being too much. There is not a supporting wall located directly below this part of the kitchen.

Does anyone have an opinion on something like this? What should I be looking at? Am I worrying about nothing? Thanks for any input or help that you might be on this.

 

[millworker301]

Thanks. And when I say "buffet" it is like what your pic is of sideboard. Looks like I probably don't have a worry. Think I would have liked being a structural engineer. The stuff you work with is really interesting. Thanks again.

 

[jakordas]

Hey its never to late. Although we don't get invited to parties much. haha

Thanks. And when I say "buffet" it is like what your pic is of sideboard. Looks like I probably don't have a worry. Think I would have liked being a structural engineer. The stuff you work with is really interesting. Thanks again.

 

[HouseBoy]

I very seriously doubt that there is a structural problem with the furniture piece that you describe.

Several things come to mind;
Most residential floors are designed of about 10 pounds per square foot (psf) dead load and 40 psi live load.
If the thing is 5 ft x 1.5 ft, at 40 psf, that would be 300 lbs. I would not expect it to weight that much but even if it is close, there is no way that there will be 40 psf all over the floor. That would be equal to 29 people in a 12 ft x 12 ft room if they each weighed 200 lbs.

Most likely, the main "problem" will be performance of the floor from someone walking across it and the china rattling. Vibration of long span joists is sometimes a problem of behavior (but not usually a structural problem in the sense of overload).

As others mentioned, IF the furniture is located near a wall, and the floor joists are parallel to the wall, you might find that the relative deflection of the joists is a problem in that the joist that is nearest to the wall will not likely deflect much but the first and/or second joist out away from the wall could deflect.

You mentioned that there is not a bearing wall nearby and below so, the thing might be located out near the midspan of the joists. Again, this might be a vibration problem. 16" deep joists tend to be used in long span conditions (although sometimes we see them in "two span" conditions). Long spans tend to have a higher deflection allowable since it is often based on a ratio of the span. Two span conditions can sometimes have vibration behaviors due to being overly stiff. I'd be curious about the span length and locations of joist support relative to the furniture.

I would guess the only concern would be possible vibration that might cause the china to rattle a little but it would be extremely unlikely that actual strength (semantics aside) will be a problem. As mentioned, each joist has a pretty god shear load capacity.

 

[JStructsteel]

Tell us how many people it takes to move it. 2-4, no problem, 4-6, place it near a wall. 6-8, call an engineer