Cutting through a rebar in suspended concrete ceiling

[vonny232]

Hi,

I have a recently built (2007) steel framed semi-detatched house.

I have gutted the upstairs ensuite bathroom (2.4m x 0.85m), partly to retile it and partly to fix a botched quasi-wetroom which had not been properly tanked.

The wetroom plumbing (trap, drain etc) is set into the reinforced concrete floor, with the waste pipe approx 3 or 4cm below the surface of the screed.

I need to relocate the shower trap about 8cm to the right (so its central to the shower enclosure), but I have encountered a couple of pieces of rebar.

This was my worst fear, as I am very uncomfortable about cutting through any sections of rebar for obvious reasons, but I was curious whether its possible to cut out a very small section (only about 25cm needs removing)?

Also, Is it possible to reposition and then weld the rebar 10cm further along its length to compensate for the section that was removed?

 

[tony1851]

No one can say definitively if that is OK; but if your house is steel framed, it is likely that the floors will be pre-cast planks.
In these, the reinforcing wires are often pre-stressed, which means you cannot - nay, must not - cut them.

 

[vonny232]

Well I dug around the existing shower trap and can see 2 pairs of re-bars have already been cut to allow for the installation of the trap. This was presumably done by the housebuilder during construction. I will try and work around the existing re-bars and not cut through anything else.


In terms of the construction method of the ceiling. It appears like the re-bar lattice was manually wired in and poured over a corrogated steel structure (at least thats how it looks to me),

 

[stuart45]

No one can say definitively if that is OK; but if your house is steel framed, it is likely that the floors will be pre-cast planks.
In these, the reinforcing wires are often pre-stressed, which means you cannot - nay, must not - cut them.

Even worse if they are post tensioned.

 

[tony1851]

ther

Well I dug around the existing shower trap and can see 2 pairs of re-bars have already been cut to allow for the installation of the trap. This was presumably done by the housebuilder during construction. I will try and work around the existing re-bars and not cut through anything else.


In terms of the construction method of the ceiling. It appears like the re-bar lattice was manually wired in and poured over a corrogated steel structure (at least thats how it looks to me),

So a cast-in-situ floor?
The steel trays with upstands act as permanent shuttering/reinforcement. Maybe the mesh you see is just light-guage anti-crack mesh rather than structural?
What is the diameter of the bars, and are they in 200 x 200 squares?