Hey all, I was tasked with figuring out for our client how big of an opening they can make in an existing load-bearing masonry wall. The building is a large warehouse that is built around an existing smaller warehouse, and they would like to open up the interior, existing warehouse walls to the rest of the larger warehouse. The wall has a triangular top section (looks like a section cut of a classic house with triangular roof) and the actual roof is supported by wooden rafters going across. The rectangular section of the wall is ~12' tall, the triangular section ~9'-6" tall, and the span 56'. I've attached a sketch below of what it looks like.
I know that you can create these openings in masonry walls given proper shoring during construction and an adequate lintel going across, but I haven't encountered a project where you need to determine the maximum possible size opening you can make. I'm not sure how the load path would follow down the wall from the roof if there's a large opening in the middle of it as a result. Would you simply take the two sections of masonry on either side of the opening and treat them as columns? And if so, does there need to be extra reinforcement in the corners besides the lintel since they'd experience the most stress?
Any tips on how to approach the analysis of a wall like this with the condition of having the maximum possible opening size would be immensely helpful, so thank you for your time!
I know that you can create these openings in masonry walls given proper shoring during construction and an adequate lintel going across, but I haven't encountered a project where you need to determine the maximum possible size opening you can make. I'm not sure how the load path would follow down the wall from the roof if there's a large opening in the middle of it as a result. Would you simply take the two sections of masonry on either side of the opening and treat them as columns? And if so, does there need to be extra reinforcement in the corners besides the lintel since they'd experience the most stress?
Any tips on how to approach the analysis of a wall like this with the condition of having the maximum possible opening size would be immensely helpful, so thank you for your time!
