supporting a 26 inch overhang on tier of kitchen island
mshahmd
9 years ago
Hi,
I am planning a generous overhang on the second tier of my island so we could use the space to layout platters etc for entertaining because our main kitchen counter tops are relatively lacking. Right now its planned for about 26 inches at the peak of the arc. Any ideas on how to support this without a post in the middle (the granite installer was thinking thats the best way)....or is 26 inches crazy?
Installer said if we used 12 inch corbels we could get to about 20 inches.
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Neet help on 12' granite overhang support on kitchen island
Comments (13)I know this is not going to help the original questioner posted in 2007 and I sure wish I had found this question back then... But for those of you looking for "THE" answer... hear you go. The Amastin Company, Corryton TN, has been providing steel support bars in supporting hard surface counters to the East TN market since 1995. In this particular case, which is a common one, Amastin offers a 31" long x 2-1/2" wide x 1/2" thick steel support bar that would bump and mount into the back of the front face frame, notch and recess flush across the back cabinet mounting strip. This support would overhang 8" leaving it approx 4" from the counter edge making it virtually hidden. Amastin has the overhang support thing figured out and if you have any questions or in need of custom support advise... Amastin is place to find the answers. Here is a link that might be useful: The Amastin Company- Steel Support Bars...See MoreSupport for 18 inch Granite Peninsula Overhang
Comments (10)cawfee, I've seen large tables made of 2cm granite, without any plywood. (!) They've never cracked. I've seen many renovators who overkill things, just to be sure. Most do. In fact, they all do. Otherwise things would crack or move later. How many simultaneous dancing 200-pounders do you want to support on your countertop, this is the question. I've seen kitchens that were more solid than the walls and the house. How many future earthquakes and foundation cracks will your house live through before your countertop also cracks, this is the question. At some point you have to let go of the wish to overkill, and call it good enough. This is up to you. Sooner is usually the best time. Otherwise you go crazy trying to do ever better. So, "... Obviously, this needs supports ..." is true, to an extent, but what to do next is up to you , and up to your sense of overkill -- Part 2. "... seen mention of 2x1 rectangular steel pipe as supports (12-16 inches apart)..." Search on the term box girder to reassure yourself about "... rectangular steel pipe..." It's the strongest. For its size. But, this following statement isn't knowledge: "... I know I need to support at least 12 inches of the overhang (13-14 to be safe)..." It's a judgement call or a hunch, like most other rules of thumb. You choose "... plywood sit on top of these metal pipes or are the pipes routed into the plywood..." You choose because it doesn't matter. "... screwed down to the cabinets or is the weight of the slab sufficient to hold them in place..." golly, is the weight of the slab a lot of weight? do you want to drill a hole and screw it down just for greater overkill? -- Here it appears you want to save 0.75": " ... lower profile of the 2x1 over the 1 3/4 ..." I'm not sure what you are referring to. I read a lot. I remember a lot. If I don't know what you are referring to, I'll bet that the other readers also don't. I'll bet that most pro installers don't. I think you need to be more diligent about your descriptions. For your slab, nobody knows " ... how much deflection can granite handle ..." Therefore, nobody knows "... What wall thickness ..." But, in my estimation, there is nothing wrong with getting heavyweight wall thickness tube ("square pipe") since overkill is the objective. But, not much is lost if you get lightweight wall thickness tube. All you lose is a bit of the excess overkill. In Engineering, it's called a margin of safety. But it's the same thing. If you are willing to crack a few slabs under very tightly controlled conditions you will know factually how much weight cracks them (and how much microdeflection they will take). It's just a stone from a quarry. It's not a processed material from a factory made and "scientifically studied" material with "known" properties. Don't ask for answers that won't be good numbers. Anyone can invent a numerical answer for you if keep insisting on having numerical answers. How much overkill is enough? Hard to tell, not seeing anything from my keyboard here. Do you know anything about the flex in your floor? This is a big thing. This is the one thing that I recommend you to go look into before proceeding....See MoreSupport for Granite Island Overhang
Comments (30)I review the plans of everyone working on my house. [...] My general contractor and the granite fabricator/installer will warrant their work, and like everything else going into my house, I want to double check, and I want them to justify their plans if they differ from what I have learned from Professor Google. We don't have their plans though, if that sketch was given to you as their plan for support, then you are in trouble and need to hire another professional. To evaluate their plan we need to know what system they plan to use to limit flex. Make a wall beyond the cabinets, or close in the ends. for additional support. I am not a huge fan of walls that dissect long pieces of granite unless the people building the walls really understand what they are doing. I think the post is a much better idea that accomplishes substantially the same thing as a wall. ----------------------------------- When we talk about supporting granite we are talking about one thing. Limiting the tensile pressures. Granite, just like concrete, has great compressive strength and rotten tensile strength, when granite flexes you get compressive force on the concave side and tensile force on the convex side. Moving from theory to reality in granite we really have to do three things, (1) limit flex, (2) limit movement and (3) avoid isolation. Many inexperienced people will address movement and flex while ignoring isolation and when that happens you get the result that Joseph posted above. If we look at the brackets that are often used for granite islands we can see that their real purpose isn't to stop movement but to avoid creating a fulcrum so that the entire sheet of granite moves together. http://www.countertopbracket.com/countertop-island-support-brackets-hidden-p/ib.htm I guarantee you that something heavy placed on that overhang will cause the countertop to tip slightly in that direction, but the brackets ensure that the movement is carried past the edge of the cabinets so that the entire piece moves rather than creating a fulcrum at the back of the cabinets that isolates the overhang from the cabinets. Too much movement must be avoided because then you get the shock of the cabinets moving which can be bad so walls in long islands may be necessary but when they are you must avoid isolating them. In other words, in Joseph's example above had the brackets been extended and tied into the cabinets in such a way that the entire piece was tied together or tied to the cabinets sufficiently that everything moved together, the break is unlikely to have occurred. Technically the brackets in Joseph's post above did exactly what they were designed to do. They eliminated breakage at the fulcrum...They just created a new fulcrum because their designer didn't understand the problem. From a physics stand point, a post is nothing but a very short wall. You can get substantially the same results from a post that you can from a wall, by adding cost. Essentially the white arrows would be a wall while the red arrows will be a post. So long as the post doesn't flex more than a wall (which it will compress less than a wall), mechanically you can achieve the same thing. However, you create more isolation points, all of the red arrows need to either have very little movement at all, or be tied together in such a way that they move together (note the arrows actually form a circle). Achieving no movement is much harder than tying them together in such a way that the limited movement extends through the area. A 2" tubular frame under the entire granite surface would absolutely be preferred, as that is the best way to carry movement to the entire counter. My original advocacy for plate was in opposition of L brackets rather than a tubular frame, to avoid isolation. I think you can achieve much the same result with a steel plate (a 36" steel plate is roughly equivalent to about 20 brackets) but I am not opposed to a tubular frame, especially if you are going as deep as 2". Anyway, this is just my 2 cents. In the end, to evaluate the solution that your contractor is using we need to know that....See MoreMax overhang WITH SUPPORT for quartz on island??
Comments (10)I already have an island cabinet. I want to use what I have because it matches my kitchen cabinetry. I just want to make sure I am doing enough to support the overhang. Or do I need to not add the entire addl 12 inches? Currently, my countertops are laminate and there is a 12-inch overhang, but I have plenty of room to make my island deeper when I add my quartz.. So my desire is to extend it an addl 12 inches past what I already have....See More
mshahmd
9 years agomshahmd
9 years ago
PROJoseph Corlett, LLC
9 years agolast modified: 9 years ago
That short video was made when I got a call to fix a failed seam in a granite island raised bar. The supporting wall was made of metal studs, but the partition kind, not the structural type. The sound you hear in the video is the metal stud crinkling under the pictured plywood. It all had to come out, of course there was a stray electrical box that had to be reattached, blocking and plywood installed. I was able to keep the bill under 1K, more than a properly detailed metal frame would have cost initially.
mshahmd thanked Joseph Corlett, LLCbeachem
9 years ago
Fori
9 years agomshahmd
9 years agoBuehl
9 years agosjhockeyfan325
9 years agoFori
9 years agomshahmd
8 years agoUpdate:
After the advice on this thread, We went with the single tier. The island back was built out a little more to give us more room behind the sink. Everything turned out great. The Granite is Lennon which has whites, browns, greys, and some copper/bronze.
Also, there have been a few posts lately about granite costs/overages and trying to reduce budget by going with limited slabs. If you want a nice uniform look, I would suggest picking out multiple slabs so you can get a nice match/book match. See below how my granite vendor accomplished this. Other experts on here can go into other details. I love the way everything turned out. Can't notice the seam in the middle of our island unless you broke out a magnifying glass.
There is a seam right in the middle but you cant see it.
mshahmd
8 years ago
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