When building a house, the issue of window lintels is very important. You can buy ready-made elements, since it is not difficult to find them on the market, but you can go the other way - do it yourself. Moreover, hand-made production will help not only save finances, which disperse quickly during construction, but also make the necessary parts of a more suitable size.
Manufacturers or intermediaries offer their customers window lintels, the price of which varies greatly depending on their type. So, a jumper 3PB-16-37p will cost about 900 rubles, and 3PP-16-71 of the same length is already around 2700 rubles. Therefore, before talking about how to make them yourself, you must first understand what they are and what their differences are:
- Bearing, also called reinforced beams. They take the load from the plates.
- Not bearing, or just beams. They take the load from the walls built above.
- "Pencils". This type of jumper is the thinnest, and therefore the weakest. They are used in thin partitions, i.e. where there will not be much pressure on them.
- Running. This name refers to ordinary jumpers of huge sizes.
- Riegel. These are the same purlins, but with a special groove for laying slabs or other reinforced concrete structures.
Runs and crossbars are almost impossible to make on their own due to their large dimensions. But it is quite possible to make window and door lintels (ordinary and reinforced) on your own, which will be discussed later. "Pencils" are even easier to make.
Window lintels can be made both on the street and directly at the place of their future deployment. If this is done outside the house under construction, then it is a little easier to do the work of making them, but at the same time you need to think about the fact that then they will need to be dragged, lifted and installed. And that's hard work. If you do them right on the wall, then you can get rid of such hard work.
The general plan of activities that must be completed in order to make window lintels is as follows:
- Production of formwork panels. For these purposes, you can use an edged board with a thickness of 20-25 mm. It is best to fasten lumber with self-tapping screws and a screwdriver, then assembly and disassembly will be easier.
- Setting the bottomhorizontal shield.
- Installation of props. Under the installed lower formwork shield, it is necessary to install props. If this is not done, then the formwork may not withstand the mass of concrete and break through.
- Reinforcement. A prerequisite is knitting a reinforcing mesh. The stronger the future reinforced concrete structure, the better.
- Installing the vertical formwork panel. After the reinforcement is laid, the vertical formwork panels can be fixed. It is also better to do this with self-tapping screws, so that later it would be easier to disassemble.
- Filling. Well, at the last stage, concrete is poured.
In such a simple way, you can independently make both window lintels and door lintels. Moreover, if everything is done correctly, they will serve for a long time.
