Framing Headers for Dummies

door header schematic

The freelancers who penned how-to content for the late, lamented (ha!) eHow.com¹ tended to fall into three groups. One was the small group of people who actually knew what they were talking about; the second a larger group of people may have done the task in question, or perhaps watched it being done. The third and regrettably largest group usually just performed a copy-reword-paste job on one of the first results in their Google search on the "title." We aren't certain whether eHowian Laurie Brenner (aka Laurie Reeves) fits in the second or third group. Based on her HomeSteady.com post, "How to Install a Header Beam," it's probably group two.

Brenner wrote this one before she changed her name from Reeves and started calling herself a (licensed) contractor (and then stopped again). That may be why she seems a little hazy on what a header is and how builders size them. We allow that she got the installation instructions right, but the rest of it? Not so much. Take, for instance, Laurie's somewhat understated definition of a header:

"A header extends over the top of a door or a window and adds support."

Actually, Laurie, a header doesn't "add support," it replaces the support that would otherwise be provided by the framing in the area left open. Along with the king and jack studs, a header transfers the weight of the overlying structure to the foundation. In other words, a header doesn't "add" anything.

Brenner/Reeves also told her readers to,

"Review the plans to ensure the header beam for the window or door opening is the correct size. A house built with standard 2-by-4 framing may call for two 2-by-6 boards joined or two 2-by-10 boards joined and used as the header, depending upon the engineering structure of the wall."

Utter bull, that: first, the business about "the engineering structure of the wall" makes no sense; and second, the required dimensions of a header are dependent on several factors including the width of the opening, the species of lumber, and whether the opening is in a load-bearing wall or not. Maybe that's what Laurie meant by "the engineering structure of the wall"; in which case, she should have said so!

As an aside, we know that the DMS² content editors forced everyone to slap nouns on the end of otherwise commonly-understood dimensional lumber terminology; e.g., "1-by-4 'plank'" or '2-by-6 'beam.'" On the other hand, most people just call this thing a header, not a "header beam" – unless the OQ was asking about either the I-beam style engineered header or the LVL (laminated veneer lumber) type of engineered wood. We think Brenner/Reeves blew it by not mentioning the possibility. Instead, our Dumbass of the Day decided that she needed to warn people to wear a hard had and to get a helper in case the header is "too unwieldy for one person to handle." Oh, yeah, and use a ladder if you need to. Jay-zuz: how stupid does she think people are???  Sorry: rhetorical question...

¹ eHow's not gone, it's just fragmented into a whole slew of niche sites
² DMS was Demand Media Studios, parent company of eHow, now called "Leaf Group."

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