If your home is like most new homes sold today you will likely find your basement un finished and in order to take full advantage of your living space a basement framing project will likely be your first required renovation project. With traditional lumber prices on the rise there are a few different options for your basement framing project to help separate rooms and establish a comfortable living space.
Steel framing has been used in basement framing for many years as partition studs in both commercial and residential construction. Heavy gauge steel framing has been more attractive in bearing wall studs, floor and even roof framing because of higher lumber prices. Assuming that your home is already structurally sound your basement framing project will likely consist of hiding ugly duct work and cold air returns along with creating interior walls to establish living space from small office’s, bathrooms and laundry rooms. In these cases you will likely be able to use a lighter gauge steel framing that will enable bends around duct work and still create solid bases to hang drywall.Steel members are manufactured by a cold forming process in which various thickness of sheet steel are put through a series of roll forming dies that form the sheets into desired widths, lengths, thickness and shapes. These steel membranes can be used as individual framing members in much the same way wood would be used for your basement framing project.
A foam-core structural sandwich panel is another possible option for your basement framing project where sound proof walls may be of high concern for your living space. Often people working shifts or with alternative uses for their basement such as music rooms may like to use this form of building materials in their basement framing project. These panels are often referred to as foam-core panel which are built from foam materials sandwiched between two facings. The foam often used in these panels are made from molded-bead expanded polystyrene, extruded polystyrene, urethane, or polyisocyanurate. The materials that are used to sandwich this foam establish the panels structural strength and commonly consist of oriented strand board, wafer board and plywood. Typically these panels are 4’x8’ and weigh approximately 100lbs which don’t make them very particle for interior wall use unless sound proofing is a top priority for your basement framing project as the extreme weight will likely ad addition expenses in labour to your basement framing project.
Last of all is traditional lumber which is still the most popular choice by builders today for your basement framing project. Traditional lumber is not only very familiar to most builders today but also allows you to have evenly spaced wall studs to hang pictures, build shelving with traditional nails while being readily available at most every building material store in Canada. Traditional lumber is pre cut to standard lengths which are most likely considered by designers when building your home reducing the number of cuts your builder will likely need to make when working on your basement framing project. Even when using lumber framing you may still want to consider a combination of steel framing as an alternative to building lumber boxes to cover duct work and covering electrical panels while maintaining all building codes and standards. Lumber framing makes hanging drywall on both sides of the wall very easy for any drywall company and also works good with most pre hung interior doors.
Considering all of your options in building materials while comparing prices to alternative options is critical prior to starting your basement framing project. Often using a combination of several different materials will save you the most while reducing headaches and getting the results you want with your new basement.
You can view a sample basement framing contract to use when hiring a contractor to finish your basement and help get your basement finsihing job started on the right foot.
