Just got off the phone with insurance co to adjust value of house, actually.
Fire protection – we are losing our wood siding and replacing with stucco. We also have barricade gel if we have time to use it. Adding ember resistant vents. And good brush clearance.
We are on solid bedrock which minimizes issues in quakes. A couple of houses in the neighborhood went down after Northridge, but overall the neighborhood had almost no damage. (This from residents back then, I was on the east coast at the time.)
Plus our brand new foundation.
By sister a 2x6… you mean add additional posts under the joist beam?
Interesting thread, and I assume some of the photos were added after the OP.
The splintering from the toenailing is probably trivial; looks like that was done only to hold the ledger board in place while it was being secured to the studs with lag bolts. Those are little 8# nails and not structural where the edge is splintered. (Those pictures are posted sideways, by the way)
A second beam was lagged into place under the main ledger board to provide additional support. Looks like blocking was put in between studs, both for fire and structural integrity. Overall the job looks neat and tidy.
I assume this peculiar strategy of anchoring the ledger board to existing studs with lag bolts is what has caused your gut reaction, and what has triggered some of the skepticism noted above. Ledger boards are commonly anchored with lag bolts into concrete or brick, or even other beams, and that construction is very standard and very sturdy. I haven’t seen studs used that way; normally a second wall would be constructed.
Still, I think you could get by with this if the construction is done very neatly and very carefully. You are basically utterly dependent on the actual carpenter getting the studs exactly on center and pre-drilling for the lag bolts to avoid splitting the stud, as well as using a long enough lag bolt so that the attachment is secure. In such a scenario, I don’t think the lag bolts will so weaken the stud that it becomes dangerous. It looks like the ledger board has a pair of lag bolts into every stud. It looks like there is a neat and careful pencil line demarcating the exact center. The lag bolts are properly washered and the whole job looks tidy. It does not look like a shoddy, half-assed job. I do see some slightly split studs in 2 and 3, and that’s what I’m talking about when I say you have to see the whole job in person.
I know there are structural engineers looking at standard methodology, including ones looking at this thread. I popped in to suggest that this sort of slightly off-standard construction is exactly where the onsite expertise–both for the engineers and the carpenters–makes all the difference. If the wood is sound and the technique is excellent, the vertical load is not an issue, and a pair of 5/8" lags properly placed into a sound stud (in this case, two vertically-stacked pairs of lag bolts) is not going to overly weaken that stud’s load bearing capacity.
Thanks Chief. I’m finally comfortable with the whole thing, having spoken to the contractor (who I’ve used many times in the past and who is very honest) and the engineer at length. Plus all the insight here.
Yes pics were in 2 stages. Before OP and the rest came later. I took them mid-job, they werent done but I wanted to be proactive in looking into it.