Loft loading limits - strengthening the truss

[Jawbkk]

We have roof trusses similar I think to the 'Fink' in 3 places within the 17' space between the party wall and gable end wall. I have shown a 47 x 200 timber whish is notched into diagonals where I have shown a blue rectangle. These are pocketed into both end walls and mortared.

These 'Fink' ones are doubled.

All other trusses inbetween are single members and just a triangle with no intermediate diagonal supports.

I decked out the loft where shown (purple) which is 40mm x 16mm thick strips running across the truss, then I put tongue and groove panelling type boards on top.

I also added soundproof plasterboard and soudproof lagging.  Given that I have stored quite a lot of junk / tools, books, up there, have I overloaded the allowable design limit? Each storage box is quite heavy and some are stacked on eachother.

We are about to have a major clearout, plus a bedroom makeover, so thought I need to address this issue. 

The soundproofing never worked so would go back to the lighter weight grey boards.

It is worth noting that putting the boards up was a nightmare. The beams on the truss were either a bit twisted or just not in line. In my kitchen, similar scenario but as the kitchen area is only 1.9m x 3m, I ran furring strips which I levelled / packed using a laser. I have never put boards up so easily. I want to do the same in the bedroom but don't want to risk overloading the trusses.

Any suggestions?

 

[Mr Punter]

They will not be designed to take much loading.  I would restrict it to Christmas decorations.  Nobody wants to climb up and crawl around a hot dusty loft to retrieve a book.

[Jawbkk]

Thanks Mr Punter, my suspicions obviously correct.

Seems like a wasted effort decking it out when I should not have been considering any kind of access in the first place. I will remove it all.

Except for the Christmas decorations that is!!

And remove the soundproof boards do you think?

Edited July 29 by Jawbkk

[Iceverge]

Had this discussion with a neighbour recently.

 

After some thought we decided that an attic needs a little door in the gable wall directly above a skip. 

 

That way you can tell your wife:

 

"It's safe in the attic darling, for sure you're right ,it'll come in handy any day now, it'd be silly to just bin it"

 

and domestic bliss continues unabated. 

 

 

Personally I store lots of insulation up there. The cellulose helps with the noise. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited July 29 by Iceverge

[joe90]

I have moved from my self build with a huge boarded loft as storage to a little cottage with no loft, had a garage sale and feel liberated 😇

[Dave Jones]

if you have anything in the loft sitting on the bottom cord you definately dont have anywhere near enough insulation. IT should be a bare minimum 300mm deep on top the trusses.

[steveoelliott]

Not that it makes it correct / advisable but some of the lofts I've seen (even on modern new build houses with very thin trusses) very clearly overloaded and they've been OK. They would be built presumably with quite considerable margin.

 

In one of my previous homes built ~1995, I had boarding which was suspended on lengths of CLS between the W trusses. They were screwed into which is a big no no. Goodness knows how much weight was up there but the boards and timbers alone would be ~300KG. It lasted the 10 years I was there with quite some weight up with no side effects.

 

Would I do it now? No, but plenty of folks do.

Edited July 31 by steveoelliott