Closing in my porch

[Deadsquiggles]

So I want to close in my porch and make the basement accessible from the inside and put the washer and dryer in there. Then open up the kitchen wall and make it a bigger, although somewhat oddly shaped, kitchen. That's the easy part for me. The part I'm unsure about is put down the plate. The porch is concrete but the edge of the porch where the plate will go is brick and I'm not sure how to go about installing the plate. Also, should I cover everything ina vapor barrier or plywood and then build up from that. I've added a few pictures so that maybe this'll make sense.

This is if you walk out the back door and look right. This is where we want to make the basement accessible.


This is the floor of the porch in the same spot. You can see the brick border.


This is wall we would want to remove to open everything up.


This is the outside edge of the porch. You can see through the railing the back door that we plan to get rid of.


Just more porch pictures here.





If anyone has any ideas or input, it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Tom

 

[Shawn S]

Is that porch footed?

 

[Deadsquiggles]

Yes I believe so. I'll have to go under there tomorrow to be 100% sure, but I'm 99% sure it's on a concrete footer. IIRC, it looks like there was a pad poured as with the driveway and they built the porch on that.

 

[Deadsquiggles]

So here's a picture of what's under my porch. It appears to be pieces of 2x4 on bricks like piles.

 

[ducksface]

You're asking the wrong group.
You need to ask your municipality about things like vapor barrier and enclosing something held up with poorly sistered 2x4.

 

[Mike.VA]

From what I see at this point:
The porch appears to be added after house was built, at some point, it may begin to pull away due to your "one Brick" footers". You will need to strengthen this and secure porch it to the house.

Up on the porch floor, I suggest running your new wall on the inside of the brick border, which it looks like it would match up with the wall of your house.

Add insulation in the craw space also. You can add your vapor barrier under the porch slab and them install whatever floor covering you desire.

Are you going to have your washer on the house wall for plumbing?

 

[kbs2244]

This is going to be a major project.
You are going to need a foundation for the new outside walls.
Those bricks are just there for looks.
The posts are carrying the weight..

 

[Deadsquiggles]

Yeah my heart kinda sank when I looked under there this morning. After seeing what's actually under there and y'all confirming it, I'll probably have to pour a footer and build from that. I guess that'll be an "eventually" kind of project. Thanks guys

 

[ishiboo]

My guess is the concrete actually sits on the brick wall, which has a foundation, and the 2x4s and wood were just there to form the concrete. The brick work looks decent and I think you would remember about that pad being poured. The pictures are not quite clear enough to tell though.

You will need to get rid of it if theres no footer.

Attaching to the brick plate is the same as if it were concrete... use a foam sill gasket, and some sort of physical fasteners for your treated bottom plate.