Swedish Element House / AB-Elementhus Renovation vs Demolition

Hello SEH residents/owners,

I have a dumb question again :rolleyes: : Our electrician was surprised when studying the construction plans and the upper layer of the intermediate ceiling in the attic, asking if there were no load-bearing beams installed? (He wants to lay cables in the ceiling at two points.) In the documentation I have, there is actually no mention of load-bearing beams anywhere. The wooden ceiling structure seems to rest only on the walls and consists of plywood or spruce boards and compressed sawdust. And that is stable? According to the report, the ceiling should be able to bear a load of 200 kg/m2 with a maximum span of 6 m. That sounds fishy to me – what discoveries have you made in this regard?
Best regards
Christoph

Hello SEH residents/owners, I have a stupid question again :rolleyes: : Our electrician was astonished when studying the construction plans and the upper layer of the intermediate ceiling in the attic, asking whether there are no load-bearing beams installed? (He wants to lay cables in the ceiling at two points.) In the documentation I have, there is actually no mention of load-bearing beams anywhere. The wooden ceiling construction seems to rest only on the walls and, in our case, consists of plywood or spruce wood boards and compressed sawdust. And that is stable? According to the expert report, the ceiling should be able to bear a load of 200 kg/m2 with a maximum span of 6 m. That seems fishy to me – what discoveries have you made in this regard? Best regards Christoph

Hi Christoph well... depending on which house type you have, you may possibly have the wooden stud variant from SEH. (I have this variant.) There you have the studs in the walls, and they in turn support the wooden beam ceiling at various points. But in my opinion, this is nothing special and should be the same for current wooden stud constructions. Maybe people were a bit more daring in the past when it came to safety factors and reserves. But maybe I have misunderstood your question. Ceiling beams without multiple supports or long spans are surely only used when there is no other option. In that case, very large rectangular cross-sections would be required.

these in turn support the wooden beam ceiling at various points.

Hello Hanina,

my current understanding problem lies in the term "beam". With a wooden BEAM ceiling, I actually pictured rectangular beams as load-bearing elements on which floor or ceiling covering is attached above and below. This is how the ceiling to the attic is constructed in our still-inhabited house.
In the SEH it seems to be different. I can't find any indication of a load-bearing wooden beam construction anywhere. Instead, the ceiling elements seem to function like wooden beams themselves, made of chipboard strips or spruce wood with sawdust filling. Am I seeing this correctly? Or have I just not yet discovered the beams in the ceiling?

Hello Hanina, My current understanding problem lies in the term "beam". With a wooden BEAM ceiling, I actually imagined rectangular beams as load-bearing elements, on which floor or ceiling coverings are attached above and below. In our still inhabited house, the ceiling to the attic is constructed like this. In the SEH it seems to be different. I can't find any indication of a load-bearing wooden beam structure anywhere. Instead, the ceiling elements seem to function like wooden beams themselves, made of chipboard strips or spruce wood with sawdust filling. Am I seeing this correctly? Or have I just not yet discovered the beams in the ceiling?

I don't think this would work at all. The panels have to rest somewhere on a substructure. Especially since these particle boards do not have any significant bending strength.

Please remember that the construction has changed MASSIVELY over the years. The example from page 1 of my house has nothing to do with classic timber frame construction. Regarding the question from , I assume he has such a house. There it is exactly like this: there are no beams, the individual elements are the "beams". The elements are both load-bearing and cladding in one. Somewhere here is the reference to the building approval. Everything is described there. For your electrician: Either set down (installation level) or ducts on the wall (e.g., as a ceiling finish). Although I would prefer setting down, because otherwise you have to work everywhere with surface-mounted boxes. And this construction works, I even find that it has significantly more charm than the later variants. We have these ceiling elements spanning 4.5m freely in the living room, no problem and it holds.

I don't think this would work at all. The panels have to rest somewhere on a substructure.

Exactly that is my point. But in the documentation of our Borgholm 89 there is nothing mentioned about this. That is why I wanted to ask other SEH owners if they could give me a tip on where to look in the ceiling? Have you come across such beams in your house and could, for example, say at what distance from the outer wall they are located?