Firewall Questions

I've been trying to find out some exact information about fire separation for dual occupancy and what I've found is sketchy at best.

Has anyone successfully done one and lived to tell the tale?
Is there a square meter rate for fire rated gyprock?
What are the requirements and who am i meant to speak to about it?
Certifiers? Builders? Council?

I'm looking at doing a vertical wall seperation between the main house and an existing extension on the back of the house.
I'm planning on living in the extension side and rent out the main house for a while. In the long run we'd either connect them back up or sell as a dual occ depending on what was the more lucrative option.

The common wall is about 7 meters across with a kitchen on the house side and bedroom/living on the other.
The extension is single story on a concrete slab whilst the house is 2 storeys on piers.

Is this something DIY or can only a builder perform it?

From some of the $$$ ive seen thrown around with firewalls it would almost seem easier/cheaper to cut the extension off from the house and leave a 2m gap?

thanks in advance :)
 
Fire rated gyprock is called FYRCHEK and is 16mm thick.

You generally need 2 layers per side of the firewall plus insulation to pass in a framed scenario.

It also has to be fitted exactly as per recommendations or it wont pass (ie overlapped joints etc).

All firewalls have to run up to the underside of the roof cover. All supporting structures must be protected from each other and the wall that is 2 storey and seperating the two occs must be strong enough to support itself under heat stress. The only allowable piece to cross the firewall is a batten.

Other than that, its generally pretty straight forward to build but for goodness sake, get an individual engineers appraisal of the exact situation!!!
 
aww, here I was about to bring up Checkpoint and Fortinet

Yeah, I thought only Windows needed firewalls.

Are firewalls required at all if the purpose is only for renting? While they would definitely be required for splitting the title, they may not be required for subletting.

You should check with your local council- even to determine if you are allowed to split a property for rental purposes.
 
If you are going to rent it to an unrelated party you legally need a firewall.

I wouldn't do it if you are thinking of taking it down. It costs a lot and is a LOT of mucking around (how much depends on which council).

You can do it with bricks also.

The kitchen may be a problem. You can't have pipes running through the wall. You would need to run the pipes in front of it???

google firewall. There are specs available
You could do it yourself but it needs to pass inspections along the way.

Depending on council you may need an engineers certificate.
 
thanks for replies!

yes its a bit of a weird one
we're trying to live rent free for a while to get a couple more IP's under the belt
we want to live in it but it was only ever going to be for a few years tops
ideally we'd build a granny flat in the mean time but I can't see me having a spare 100k any time soon, thats IP money =p

is there another way especially if its only temporary?

on the otherhand if we rented it out as flat mates/share house whats the difference?

Sounds like $1500 for 4 layers of fyrchek
kitchen plumbing all goes into the floor

i've had a certifier go through yesterday saying it's not a complex case we just had to decide if it was worth it or not
 
It depends....

You will need to see what the regulations are in your area.

For instance, a couple of years ago someone I know was strata titling Queenslanders converted to flats and selling them off. In his area that was OK, but not in mine (also in Queensland). No firewalls at all.

If you can avoid it you don't want to go down that path. At first glance, yes going up to the roof is not that difficult. But think about what happens at your ceiling level. This has to be physically separate - in other words you can't have anything (ceiling joist, truss, rafter) running between the two compartments. If you have a truss roof, this is only possible if your firewall is parallel to the trusses.

You will find a diagram showing more detail about how to separate walls/ceilings here: http://www.gyprock.com.au/Pages/Resources/Red-Book.aspx
 
This is a Building Code question. The Building Code of Australia lists the requirements for minimum fire-separation - BCA (Part 3.7.1).

A fire rated wall (for residential buildings) must be structurally adequate to withstand fire for 60 minutes. It cannot contain openings; although there are various 'deemed to satisfy' solutions which need an Engineer and BCA Report- very expensive so usually not worth it for residential purposes.

A fire rated wall for most uses is either brick/masonry; otherwise an Engineered system such as Boral Fire-Stop or James Hardie equivalent. As long as they're installed by a qualified builder you should be o.k. BUT it's best to get an Engineer to check it as well.

Brazen.
 
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