An Interesting Problem Exposed

 
When this window was installed by the builders, we were aware that it was offset to one side of the original window location.  The original window was imperial size and the replacement window was metric, so there was a slight size difference. Once again the builders did not fit a lintel, upon removing the window etc., and some of the bricks from the wall which had been supported by the window etc., did fall down.  I had been told by our builders that the existing beam above the window had been examined by them and was more than adequate. 
 
They had obviously not examined the beam and had not discovered a problem, which had been created by a previous builder more than fifty years ago.  The original cottage windows, had been installed some two hundred years previously and subsequently replaced with a larger window.  Some fifty years ago these windows were replaced again and with an even larger window, but the person doing this, when they cut out the aperture, did not check the length of the concrete lintel fitted on the inside wall above the window, so the window aperture actually aligned with the ends of this lintel; all that was holding this lintel up were a few tacks in the wooden beam behind it and the strength of the cement filling between this and the lintel.  Over the years cracks had appeared directly above this lintel, as it had settled; it was carrying no weight from the structure but the structure was carrying it.  The hole in front of the wood beam visible at the top of the picture, is where this steel reinforced concrete lintel was hanging, which was an accident waiting to happen and which has now been avoided.  In addition to this I discovered that the wood beam extends only about four or five inches into the brickwork on the left-hand side, so had I cut this out as the builders suggested I would have had the end of the kitchen around my ears. 
 
What is now there, is safe for the moment and actually safer than what was discovered by me yesterday.  What I now intend to do is support the wooden beam at its centre, while I cut an aperture in the wall in front of the ends of this beam, sufficient to take an adequately sized L section of steel, which I shall attach to the wooden beam and which on its own would be sufficient to carry the weight of the wall above it.  I shall do this to both sides of the wooden beam, before cutting away the section of wall, which is currently supporting one end of that beam, after this it will simply be a matter of making good and filling in the odd spaces in the process.  I did not expect to find any of this problem before I started on this window, but I nevertheless had some odd suspicions, although I am not quite sure why.  Every time I start on another bit of this job, the job gets bigger; the work continues!     
 

Subsequent to getting to this situation, I cleaned up and went for my appointment, for treatment at Addenbrookes.