What kind of construction is this

Dedekind

Have some works at the moment in our house, this is a picture of one of the walls (landing wall with the bathroom behind). Whats all this timber? I thought my house was built with bricks... I also found several spots of other walls which have timber mixed up with bricks.

https://imgur.com/a/uDHaOxS

jk0

Looks like a Victorian terrace to me. They did not have RSJ's in those days, so used very thick timbers instead.


The bathroom walls are made of bricks, as the tiles were very thick & heavy.

Dedekind

A bit more background: the house is a mid-1920s semi detached. External walls are definitely what I (ie someone who does not know anything) would normally call bricks, with a few timber things here and there which I don't know what they are doing. Is it maybe just to nail the plaster to something perhaps? As many of those timber sections have nails

not_in_but_out

Google Lath and plaster construction.

Dedekind

So it has some lath and plaster and some blocks. Seems a mix of stud wall and blocks? Is this normal?

ed110220

Dedekind wrote: »

So it has some lath and plaster and some blocks. Seems a mix of stud wall and blocks? Is this normal?

No, usually lath and plaster was used for internal, non-load bearing walls where plasterboard would be used more recently.

That wall behind the stairs looks very odd. What's on the other side? presumably it's an internal wall as the plaster has been applied from the other side. It's strange to have what appears to be lath and plaster at the bottom, then a band of concrete blocks and then studwork on top that looks as though it once had lath and plaster that has since been replaced with plasterboard. What are the blocks resting on? It would be odd to have concrete blocks supported by timber studwork I think.

Dedekind

The wall is internal, dividing the landing from the bathroom. Plasterboard at the top was put there recently when refurbishing the bathroom, but we never saw this side of the wall until now

Dedekind

Also the blocks seem to be supported on the floor? That wood thing between the blocks and the laths is at the floor level

ed110220

Dedekind wrote: »

Also the blocks seem to be supported on the floor? That wood thing between the blocks and the laths is at the floor level

So there's a floor on the other side of the wall behind that horizontal band of timber? Looks like a timber suspended floor... which would be odd to build a concrete block wall on top of. Unless there is an RSJ or concrete lintel behind that horizontal wood band?

Dedekind

I think it's just a suspended timber floor. Definitely no RSJ

Dedekind

Before refurbishing the bathroom had tiling up to the middle of the wall which may coincide with that strip of blocks. Maybe they were put there to have tiling hold onto something. Can't confirm if they line up exactly since that tiling is gone