Say Dan, Is this beam parallel with the joists or do the joists sit on it?
Would it be practical to go over the top of it rather than through it? Drilling quarter of an inch of steel like that with a hand drill doesn't sound like much fun to me. Mark the point well with a good sharp punch and fix yourself a really good platform if you must. ----- Original Message ----- From: Dan Rossi To: [email protected] Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 2:23 PM Subject: Re: [BlindHandyMan] perforating an I beam. Brice, I am at work and so am just guessing at the dimensions of the i beam. The web is probably six inches high at least, I'm not sure I've ever groped it completely, I can only touch the bottom flange when standing on the ground. It is probably a quarter inch thick. This is a pretty structural member of the house. The basement of the house extends beyond the front wall of the house and under the front porch. There are two stub walls in the basement about three feet wide. The i beam sits on these walls and supports the front wall of the house above it. So, when you walk from the main basement, between the two stub walls, and under the beam, you are then standing in the part of the basement that is actually under the front porch. My ultimate goal is to move the main water line, and one set of pipes for a radiator up closer to the ceiling. If I am ever going to build a shop and finish the basement, moving these closer to the joists will give me more head room. The only pipe that would have to penetrate the i beam would be the one Copper water pipe, I think it is 3/4 inch. The water pipe comes in at the front of the house, up close to the ceiling. It then turns 90 down, drops below the i beam, then turns 90 to run horizontal again, to the back of the basement. In theory, I could put two mor 90s so that it does a U around the i beam, but I think that would end up acting like a trap and collect junk and be a problem. -- Blue skies. Dan Rossi Carnegie Mellon University. E-Mail: [email protected] Tel: (412) 268-9081 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
