How Much Weight To Put In An Attic

An uninhabitable attic designed for limited storage can handle 20 pounds per square foot live load.

How much weight to put in an attic.

Attic floors often are built to accommodate only a maximum dead weight load. Dead weight essentially means an attic that is only used for storing boxes and for very limited traffic. Spacing between each beam is 14 4. The joists are what support the weight.

As a very general guide if the joists are only 2x4s don t plan on storing much in the attic other than very lightweight items. Hard to measure since i already have a lot of stuff in the attic but i think that they are. Length of the beams. I m guessing you don t have the plans and don t know what live load the attic was designed for.

Joists that are 2x8 or larger can likely support more weight. I want to know how much weight i can put in the attic. If they are 2x6 you can probably get away with some boxes filled with relatively light stuff. An uninhabitable attic not designed for storage can handle a 10 pounds per square foot live load.

How much weight your attic will hold depends a lot on the floor structure. A floor structure supported with 2 4 joists cannot bear much weight. Size of the beams supporting attic floor. If your attic joists won t bear the weight necessary to finish out a living space but the engineer cleared them to support floor decking for light storage you can install inch plywood or.

A floor structure that is not solid enough cannot hold up much weight and the floor structure can only be sturdy enough if strong and large joists support it.