Site built beam drop at midspan

[jim baird]

A contractor hired to begin improvements on a recent purchase of a 45 yr old home called me after he noticed front and back walls standing 2+ inches out from vertical.
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He removed covering from the big center beam spanning 28 ft to find evidence of concealment by prior owner.
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Beam is stacked spruce 2x4 that deflects 2+ inches at center. Disguise artist wrapped bottom edge with spruce 2x that hides deflection at bottom edge.

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An engineer is supposed to be following my visit.

Anyone see this much effort at flimflam before?

[kristin morgan]

Wow!! Would like to hear more on this house.

[Thom Huggett]

Looks like a glulam beam without the glue! It's just a problem of shear flow. As it didn't fall down I would say your engineer could probably make it work as a beam by propping it up to take out the deflection, nailing or screwing the layers together and adding plywood on both sides.