A strut is a structural support post that's used to hold
something or provide additional reinforcement. It's common to find
struts used in floors and roof framing. The picture below provides you
with an excellent example of a strut that is used to reinforce a
structural stair stringer.
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Struts And Home Repairs
Sometimes it really makes a big difference to hire someone who knows
what your doing, instead of someone who thinks that they do. About half,
of all of the home repairs I've done, in my lifetime are directly
related to, what I like to refer to as lack of knowledge. This often
leads to problems in the future.
I've seen struts supporting roof rafters that are sitting directly on
top of one ceiling joist. This in turn, starts to put pressure on the
ceiling and it isn't long before there's problems with the roof and the
ceiling.
However, I think the most common place I've seen people use struts and a
structural supports is underneath a raised foundation. Someone is having
problems with a sagging floor so they go underneath the home, place a
couple of blocks or even a concrete pier on top of the soil.
They jack up the floor and position the structural supports, only to
find out later that it didn't work. They can't figure out why, so they
jack the floor back up and cut longer struts.
After a while, they're back to the original problem, but still can't
figure out why or maybe they actually do this time. Eventually they're
going to realize that the concrete pier or blocks they placed on top of
the soil are just sinking into the ground.
If I could just provide you with one tip, it would be to avoid
supporting structural framing members with other structural framing
members or anything else that wasn't designed for that purpose.
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