# Forum Home Renovation Structural Renovation  What holds bearers to piers and joists to bearers?

## Watters

The following framing diagram shows the construction methodology we are considering for a granny flat:  https://imgur.com/Xvv5K0L 
From the diagram it looks like the bearers just sit on the brick piers? Surely there would be something holding the bearers down on to the piers?
Also, how are the floor joists held on to the bearers?

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## SilentButDeadly

Joist hangers or skew nails for the bearer/joist connection.  
Bearers on brick piers have a couple of options. One is a bolt or hook embedded in the pier, another is a bolt or hook strapped to the pier and another is to utilise the awesome power of gravity. I don't have much time for brick piers.

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## phild01

> I don't have much time for brick piers.

  The preference being?

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## joynz

> The preference being?

  I am interested in why you don't like brick piers?

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## phild01

> I am interested in why you don't like brick piers?

  No, not me, I am also wondering what is wrong with brick piers!

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## joynz

Ooops, sorry Phil, edited the quote wrong.  
 I meant I was wondering why SBD doesn't like brick piers.

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## Snipper

Well I like brick piers.  My house is proudly perched up on them.  All external stumps are now concrete after replacing the old timber stumps that were used for the ease of baseboard installation I think.  All the brick ones are still perfect and well over a hundred years old. 
If laying the brick piers yourself, you could lay some hoop iron (strapping) down a few courses to wrap and tie in place or even lay a bolt sticking out the top.   Would be far easier to box up over your foundation holes and pour a concrete foundation rising up the height you want.   You could simply dynabolt the bearer down then.

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## jimfish

I'm not a fan of brick piers. Down here the brickies use a plasticiser in their mortar instead if limil and it leaves the piers brittle and very easily knocked over sideways. My preference is for concrete stumps but nobody has them in Tassie. Where did you get yours from Snipper ?
To tie down bearers to brick piers we use hoop iron set into the concrete pad then brought over the bearer and nailed with hardened coil nails

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## sol381

can you not use steel posts.. much cheaper and easier...

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## phild01

Plenty of houses with brick piers and no tie down.....haven't blown away.  But I am meaning those in southern states.

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## METRIX

Brick piers are good, Uni piers are also good,

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## intertd6

> Plenty of houses with brick piers and no tie down.....haven't blown away.  But I am meaning those in southern states.

   I haven't done one for a few years but for N2 enclosed subfloor piers normally don't need any tie down, I prefer a tie down system that doesn't penetrate antcappings

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## SilentButDeadly

> The preference being?

  Steel or timber.  Preference is personal but if you live in a saline area (like we do) then the last thing you want is a brick or concrete pier...

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## phild01

> but if you live in a saline area (like we do)

   :Confused:   :Wink:

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## plum

> Well I like brick piers.  My house is proudly perched up on them.  All external stumps are now concrete after replacing the old timber stumps that were used for the ease of baseboard installation I think.  All the brick ones are still perfect and well over a hundred years old. 
> If laying the brick piers yourself, you could lay some hoop iron (strapping) down a few courses to wrap and tie in place or even lay a bolt sticking out the top.   Would be far easier to box up over your foundation holes and pour a concrete foundation rising up the height you want.   You could simply dynabolt the bearer down then.

  G'day Snipper, I've got a great builder mate that moved to Glenorchy a couple of years ago, can you let on where you purchased your concrete stumps? I've just had a chat with him, and he reckons there may be someone doing them, but he's not sure where.

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## ringtail

> I am interested in why you don't like brick piers?

  I just hate bricks full stop. HDG posts all day. Some really, really old bricks are ok as a feature but for anything structural I don't rate them. Just my 2 cents and I like working with steel  :Biggrin:

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## phild01

Brick piers offer a bracing element.

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## ringtail

Really ? How ? 
I would say one 100x100x5 HDG column embedded 1500 into a deep mass concrete pier would more than likely offer more bracing than an entire house full of brick piers. Maybe a slight exaggeration but.... :Tongue:

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## r3nov8or

> G'day Snipper, I've got a great builder mate that moved to Glenorchy a couple of years ago, can you let on where you purchased your concrete stumps? I've just had a chat with him, and he reckons there may be someone doing them, but he's not sure where.

  Check with restumpers/reblockers. some make their own concrete stumps.

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## barney118

I like brick piers, in N2 classification no tie down needed, the weight of the building holds the place down. I also like them as no cross bracing is needed between piers as you go higher.  
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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## phild01

> Really ? How ?

  In a nutshell:  

> I also like them as no cross bracing is needed between piers as you go higher.  
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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## Bros

> Check with restumpers/reblockers. some make their own concrete stumps.

   I can't see who in their right mind would buy concrete stumps. They have the mounds and pour the stump in situ. My previous house was on concrete stumps and weren't they rubbish.
My mother had her house restumped several years ago and the restumped used 100 x 100 SHS. Seen many houses restumped and raised in NQ and they are all SHS. Concrete stumps are a thing of the past like carpenters sharpening their own saws.

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## r3nov8or

> I can't see who in their right mind would buy concrete stumps. They have the mounds and pour the stump in situ. My previous house was on concrete stumps and weren't they rubbish.
> My mother had her house restumped several years ago and the restumped used 100 x 100 SHS. Seen many houses restumped and raised in NQ and they are all SHS. Concrete stumps are a thing of the past like carpenters sharpening their own saws.

   Gee, that's a bit rough.  
Half of Geelong has been restumped over the past 25-30 years by a guy here who makes his own and he has a great reputation. I'm talking 'normal' height homes for the area, and I'm sure there are other options if you are raising a QLDer above your head 
Anyway, to each their own, and if concrete is what you prefer, go to a restumper as they will have lots of lengths to choose from (100mm increments) and will be far cheaper than the low volumes held by the likes of Mitre 10 (held here anyway)

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## Bros

> Gee, that's a bit rough.

  My stumps were they cracked and I had to replace some with SHS   

> Anyway, to each their own, and if concrete is what you prefer, go to a restumper as they will have lots of lengths to choose from (100mm increments) and will be far cheaper than the low volumes held by the likes of Mitre 10 (held here anyway)

  Do you mean you can buy stumps to length rather than having them cast in situ?

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## r3nov8or

> Do you mean you can buy stumps to length rather than having them cast in situ?

  Yes. Buy them like you would timber. Pour a pad, place the stump in some more concrete, backfill the rest. That's the way it's done here. Haven't heard of them cast in situ for residential, except for very big jobs I suppose

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## Bros

> Yes. Buy them like you would timber. Pour a pad, place the stump in some more concrete, backfill the rest. That's the way it's done here. Haven't heard of them cast in situ for residential, except for very big jobs I suppose

  Well there you go learn something every day. Not common in Queensland and they would be bugger to handle so SHS is more convenient.

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## Snipper

> I'm not a fan of brick piers. Down here the brickies use a plasticiser in their mortar instead if limil and it leaves the piers brittle and very easily knocked over sideways. My preference is for concrete stumps but nobody has them in Tassie. Where did you get yours from Snipper ?
> To tie down bearers to brick piers we use hoop iron set into the concrete pad then brought over the bearer and nailed with hardened coil nails

  I'm originally from SA and have been here for about 8 months.  It was already done when I moved in but was only recently I think by the unpainted newish baseboards.  Things are a bit different here.  What are the alternatives?  Great business to start up down here maybe.

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## jimfish

> I'm originally from SA and have been here for about 8 months.  It was already done when I moved in but was only recently I think by the unpainted newish baseboards.  Things are a bit different here.  What are the alternatives?  Great business to start up down here maybe.

  A lot of builders use pvc pipe or cardboard former tubes and pour onsite.  Some use treated pine and of course brick piers. Built quite a few houses in Victoria using 100x 100 conc stumps. An engineer I dealt with when working in Hobart looked into getting a business going making stumps but most builders he spoke to said they wouldn't use them. One thing I've found with builders since I've been here is they are very set in their ways .

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## ringtail

> I like brick piers, in N2 classification no tie down needed, the weight of the building holds the place down. I also like them as no cross bracing is needed between piers as you go higher.  
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

  
Pffft, no bracing. Says it all. Bloody bricks.  :Tongue:

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## Marc

There is nothing wrong with brick piers providing they are done properly and not minimum standards. You only need to look at old fibro houses built on brick "piers", where all the piers lean at random and not one is still plumb. Poor footings, no steel, one brick wide such a pier does not cut it not even if 300 mm high. Do it properly and you can make brick columns 2 m high. Its the same story with brick fences, most of them made in the 70ties, lean or have fallen down. Only one reason. Inadequate strip footings.

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## ringtail

> There is nothing wrong with brick piers providing they are done properly and not minimum standards. You only need to look at old fibro houses built on brick "piers", where all the piers lean at random and not one is still plumb. Poor footings, no steel, one brick wide such a pier does not cut it not even if 300 mm high. Do it properly and you can make brick columns 2 m high. Its the same story with brick fences, most of them made in the 70ties, lean or have fallen down. Only one reason. Inadequate strip footings.

  Witnessed by the recent death of a child west of Toowoomba the other day when a brick fence fell over on him and all of the other brick walls that fell over in Sydney and Melbourne over the last 2 years. Bricks suck.  :Tongue:

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## intertd6

Those darn Romans!..............apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh-water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?..................bricks n mortar.
inter

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## r3nov8or

Nice one, Brian  :Smilie:  
( I know it wasn't Brian but I don't remember and it's getting late...)

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## intertd6

> Nice one, Brian  
> ( I know it wasn't Brian but I don't remember and it's getting late...)

  i don't mind bricks n mortar, its practical & in the right place it looks ok, when I visited the collosseum in Rome it appeared to be stylish & lasts a good while too.
inter

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## ringtail

> Those darn Romans!..............apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh-water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?..................bricks n mortar.
> inter

  Yeah well, they also poisoned their own people by passing drinking water through lead pipes.

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## intertd6

> Yeah well, they also poisoned their own people by passing drinking water through lead pipes.

   There must be something in that, at a guess half the old houses in London still have lead pipes delivering their domestic water supply from the street to the brick houses & beyond. Darn Romans 
inter

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## Marc

> Witnessed by the recent death of a child west of Toowoomba the other day when a brick fence fell over on him and all of the other brick walls that fell over in Sydney and Melbourne over the last 2 years. Bricks suck.

   Well ... you are missing the point, bricks don't suck, they must be used appropriately. Fences have typically footings that are way too narrow, since the bricky is used to dig footings for houses and does the footings for fences the same way. So perhaps bricks don't suck but some brickies do  :Smilie:  
As for piers, I am positive I can make a brick pier to last 150 years and beyond. No steel or wooden pier can come even close. I can also make a brick pier that will fall over in the next 20 years. The brick has nothing to do with it.

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## r3nov8or

> Yeah well, they also poisoned their own people by passing drinking water through lead pipes.

  Flint, Michigan right now (lead poisoning). Murder City is dying in a different way.

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## ringtail

> As for piers, I am positive I can make a brick pier to last 150 years and beyond. No steel or wooden pier can come even close.

  I don't doubt a brick pier can last that long but to say steel or timber can't even come close. Both will last as long as brick without any problem. As for missing the point, you have made my point for me. Bricks per say may not suck but as you say, some brickies suck. Eliminate the bricky by not using bricks.

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## phild01

I'm confused, rare that brick piers are redone but keep hearing about re-stumping!  Is Victorian soil unstable?

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## Marc

MM gee ... someone is having a bad day?

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## r3nov8or

> I'm confused, rare that brick piers are redone but keep hearing about re-stumping!  Is Victorian soil unstable?

  Pretty much every home I've seen being restumped started life with red gum stumps cut wet out of the Otway ranges 50-60 years ago and have simply rotted away. Most I have seen rotted just below the earth surface. When the ones that haven't yet fully failed are pulled out they look like hour glasses, if you get the picture.

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## ringtail

> MM gee ... someone is having a bad day?

  
No, not at all.  Nothing to do with having a bad day.  :Biggrin:  See, i've put a smiley there to show I'm not having a bad day  :Biggrin: . I hate bricks, you love bricks. The end.

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## Marc

It's a love brick hate brick kind of world... mm that reminds me of something but not sure what ...  :Smilie:

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## ringtail

That is true. Some build with nothing else. Personally, I would build with anything else, even straw bale  :Tongue:

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## havabeer

my brick vaneer house is sitting on piers (from 2m high to about 500mm) not attached to the piers in any way, just sitting there. 
but as mentioned before its enclosed and exterior walls are on cement footings

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## Optimus

> my brick vaneer house is sitting on piers (from 2m high to about 500mm) not attached to the piers in any way, just sitting there. 
> but as mentioned before its enclosed and exterior walls are on cement footings

  
Like every brick veneer I've ever worked on... (have to be between 500-700 houses)

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## JonoRustyRuss

> I like brick piers, in N2 classification no tie down needed, the weight of the building holds the place down. I also like them as no cross bracing is needed between piers as you go higher.  
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

  I have a question about your comment re "no tie down"...
AS1684.4-2006 says nominal tie-down is; 
"1/M10 bolt or 1/50 × 4 mm mild steel bar fixed to bearer with M10 bolt and cast into masonry (to footing)" 
I am building a timber clad, sheet roof, single storey in an N2. There are no Specific Fixings nominated in Table 9.6, so I assume the nominal tie-down is required. 
Is this correct?

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## ringtail

> I don't have much time for brick piers.

  That's still a lot more time than I have for them

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## phild01

Again I say, I would have them for the better bracing, & compare the re-stump/re-brick pier events!

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## ringtail

Better bracing than what ? Paddle pop sticks ?  :Biggrin:

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## phild01

> Better bracing than what ? Paddle pop sticks ?

  That's what I thought stumps are :Tongue:

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## ringtail

HDG column in deep mass concrete footing. Only way to go. Minimal paddlepoppyness  :Biggrin:

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## Marc

HDG does not do very well in concrete if there is moisture. For a steel pier to last in concrete it needs to be painted, and the paint covered with bitumen. No one that I know does that.

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## intertd6

> I have a question about your comment re "no tie down"...
> AS1684.4-2006 says nominal tie-down is; 
> "1/M10 bolt or 1/50 × 4 mm mild steel bar fixed to bearer with M10 bolt and cast into masonry (to footing)" 
> I am building a timber clad, sheet roof, single storey in an N2. There are no Specific Fixings nominated in Table 9.6, so I assume the nominal tie-down is required. 
> Is this correct?

  you have to do a complete wind uplift & bracing calculation to know exactly what is needed.
inter

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## ringtail

> HDG does not do very well in concrete if there is moisture. For a steel pier to last in concrete it needs to be painted, and the paint covered with bitumen. No one that I know does that.

  HDG is fine in concrete and will certainly exceed the design life of the structure 10 fold.  Supagal, duragal and any other "gal" is not FFP regardless of paint or bitumen.

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