Gable end - glazing... can it be done? Cost?

[OliBad]

Hi there,

I am new to this forum....

We are in the process of purchasing a house and one of the downsides to the house is that the main bedroom that looks out of the rear gable end elevation has only a very small cottage like window and makes the room very dark.

The room directly downstairs is very similar too.

Our idea is to do as illustrated in the picture and to (possibly) using a comnination of wooden beams and decent glass - glaze the entire gable end top to bottom - and on the bottom to have bi-folding doors out to the garden.

Obviously we are aware we would need to check with planning control as it is a fairly major job - but as it overlooks no one and is not listed or conservation hopefully this wouldn't be a problem.

What we have absolutely ZERO idea on is cost.... now i'm not looking for penny to penny estimates, but really a case of do we think £3-5k?? or more like £10k?? upwards for this kind of job? And would a normal builder be able to do this or would it be a specialist?

We think it would give it a proper wow factor and really flood the house with natural light - which would transform the space inside.

Any thoughts or ideas welcome... be gentle!!

Gable end design

• OliBad
• 11 Aug 2014
• 1

Untitled

• OliBad
• 11 Aug 2014
• 1

 

[garyo]

The gable wall will be supporting that end of the roof and possibly the first floor joists. You're talking about replacing most of the entire gable wall with steels and then over-cladding with timber/glass really.

If you don't go nuts on the bi-folds, triple glazing, etc, then maybe you could squeeze it in to £20k.

Does the bedroom already have a vaulted ceiling, or are you also including knocking through in to the loft so that people walking past aren't looking at your dusty Christmas decs?

 

[OliBad]

Thanks for the reply.

The bedroom already has a vaulted ceiling as it is a coachhouse there is no loft at all.

Ok.... so 20k is a bit out of reach!! - perhaps we could look at lesser options?.... maybe without any of the downstairs section....?

We were thinking like 5k as budget for some sort of glazing solution...? Not sure what that will buy me!!

 

[garyo]

Are you thinking of DIY-ing this at all? A good set of supply-only bi-folds will be £2k so by the time you've taken care of a wide lintel for them, got them fitted and made good that's already a huge dent in your budget if you're going to get a builder to do it.

If you forget the triangle of glazing in the vaulted area then that's a lot of complexity gone. You're then talking about two lintels, one over a large rectangular bedroom window and one over the bi-folds.

The bedroom window will need some scaffold and careful thought about how you'd prop it while the lintel goes in, depending on how ambitious a span you want to go for, you may still need some steel.

It's tight but if you do the work yourself you might just do it.

 

[OliBad]

I think it could be a little out of reach for my DIY skills!

Perhaps on the down stairs we could keep it as french doors with window's either side - and not have BI-FOLD doors? To save cost?

Equally with the upstairs if we went with a larger window instead of the triangular glazing etc?

I have no idea how much a builder would charge for this type of job - someone told me to re-build a gable end wall it could cost around £2k so I figured - perhaps nievely that adding a window as apposed to re-building would be around the same money?

 

[maltaron]

The cost of all that glass would be prohibitive. It will have to be minimum double glazed units Fensa approved to comply with building regs, and with the cost of structural engineer to design the steelwork, the cost of the steelwork and labour to carry out all the work you would be lucky to come in at less than 25k.

 

[JohnD]

Try Velux instead.

 

[OliBad]

Do you mean velux in the roof? Or in the wall?

Any idea what roof velux windows cost? Average? Installed?

 

[JohnD]

Roof.

Nowhere near as much as your gable idea.

 

[OliBad]

Any idea on cost per window? Are we talking hundreds or thousands?

Would probably have 2 windows either side of the roof....

 

[leewallbank]

we're doing something very similar with our loft conversion, I can't give you an idea on labour cost as I'm doing all of the work myself but the steel is calculated to span 6m and will be made from 2 x 180x90x26kg PFC welded back to back, I've had a price for around £1k to supply/fabricate. I've also had a price of around £2800/3000 to make the windows/doors in double glazing from a local window company.

Untitled

• leewallbank
• 12 Aug 2014
• 1

 

[Cbag30]

Hello all,
I'm embarking on a similar project to the ones mentioned above, ours is a bungalow which we plan to conver the loft into an upstairs. We would like to have a glazed gable with bi folds on the ground floor, we are planning to completely rebuild the roof to allow for a wider span and higher ridge so my question is does that make the gable an easier and hopefully cheaper process than in the other project in this post? The figures quoted here of 20/25000 are a bit above what I was hoping to come in at. As a rough idea I think it's about a 6m span with a ridge height of about 5m. Thanks.