RSJ and Steel Beam Installation Woolwich

GS Renovation installs RSJs and steel beams across Woolwich, from the post-war and newer riverside flats near the Thames, which make up most SE18 homes, to the Victorian and Edwardian terraces off the older streets. We prop and install steel safely to the engineer's sizing, and building control inspects and signs it off.

In Woolwich, a steel beam for one opening typically costs £1,500 to £4,000 fitted and signed off, or £2,500 to £6,500 or more for a full knock-through with the engineer's fee and making good (indicative London ranges, MyBuilder and Checkatrade, 2026). GS Renovation Ltd, a building contractor based in Potters Bar, does the work in Woolwich.

How the job runs

1. Free site survey at your Woolwich address and an itemised quote.
2. The engineer we appoint sizes the beam, and the work is registered with the Royal Borough of Greenwich building control or an approved inspector. On a shared wall you serve the party wall notice as building owner; we supply the drawings.
3. Props go in, the opening is cut and the beam is set on padstones, packed tight above.
4. Building control inspects the steel before it is covered. We make good, and the completion certificate follows.

Removing load-bearing walls in Woolwich terraces

Many Woolwich houses are Victorian and Edwardian terraces with a solid dividing wall between the front and rear reception rooms and another between the kitchen and the rear closet wing. These walls usually carry the floors above, and sometimes part of the roof, so opening them up needs a steel beam rather than a simple lintel. The structural engineer we appoint calculates the span, the section and the padstone sizes, we install them, and building control inspects the work at each stage before it is signed off.

Before any brickwork comes down we install proper temporary propping to hold the structure while the wall is removed in a safe, staged sequence. The RSJ is then lifted into position, seated onto concrete or engineered padstones and packed tight so the load transfers cleanly. In older SE18 stock we frequently find soft mortar and uneven bearings, so we make good the surrounding masonry and leave the opening ready for finishing.

Housing in Woolwich

Roughly 21,990 dwellings sit on the valuation list for Woolwich. 26% are houses and 74% flats, and by age 24% predate 1919, 2% are interwar and 75% post-war. Where most homes are flats, a beam in a leasehold flat in Woolwich needs the freeholder's licence for alterations, since the lease usually keeps the structure with the freeholder.

Steel in a Woolwich flat: when full plans beats a building notice

In Woolwich 74% of homes are flats and 26% are houses, so a new beam here is more likely to go into a flat than a terrace. Royal Greenwich says a building notice should only be used for simple work, and its examples are a through room, chimney removal or drainage alteration. A beam in a flat can carry the floor of the flat above and bear on walls that belong to the freeholder. That is a design worth having checked on paper before any steel is ordered, and checking it on paper is what a full plans application does.

The freeholder is the second reason. Before consenting, the freeholder's surveyor is likely to ask for the engineer's calculations and drawings, and a full plans approval hands them a design building control has already examined. Royal Greenwich splits the full plans charge into a plan charge and an inspection charge, so the design check comes first and the site visits follow. Allow for that order in the programme. In a Woolwich flat the approval, the freeholder's licence and the steel order follow one another, and running them side by side risks steel cut to a design nobody has yet agreed.

Party wall steelwork on SE18 shared walls

Because Woolwich terraces are joined on both sides, the dividing wall to next door and the chimney breasts often sit within a shared party wall. When a beam needs to bear into that shared structure, the Party Wall Act applies and you, as building owner, serve formal notice on the neighbouring owner, or your surveyor does. We flag this early and give you the drawings the notice needs, so the notice period runs alongside the design work rather than holding up the build.

Chimney breast removal is another common request in these homes, and it is genuinely structural work. The stack above still needs support, so we install a steel beam to carry it, or gallows brackets only where the engineer and building control accept them, all to the engineer's design and inspected by building control. We work cleanly in occupied houses across SE18, protecting floors and managing dust while the propping and steelwork are in place, then hand back a sound, open space.

The old footing left under the floor

When a wall is removed, its foundation stays in the ground. In a Woolwich terrace with a suspended timber floor that means a brick sleeper wall or a strip footing sitting under where the wall stood, usually a few courses below the boards. It does no harm left in place, but it has to be accounted for when the floor is made good, because the joists that ran up to the wall on each side now need something to bear on.

On a solid floor it matters more. A footing left just below a new screed can telegraph through as a hard line or crack a run of tiles above it, so it is either broken out to a sufficient depth or the floor build up is designed to bridge it. We decide which when the wall comes down rather than when the tiler arrives, since it is half a day of work at one stage and a floor to relay at the other.

• Building control applications and inspection sign-off
• Concrete and high-density padstones at every bearing
• Goalpost frames where two walls meet at a corner

VOA Council Tax stock of properties, March 2025, for all 6 statistical areas in Woolwich. Counts rounded by the VOA.

Alongside RSJ and steel beam installation in Woolwich, the pages that usually help next are home renovation in Woolwich, RSJ and steel beam installation across Greenwich, London builders who fit steel, the Party Wall Act when a beam bears on a shared wall, our London RSJ and steel beam installation page and Lintel Replacement Cost.

Why Choose GS Renovation in Woolwich

Woolwich homeowners choose GS Renovation because we treat steelwork as the structural job it is, not a shortcut. Engineer-designed beams, correct padstones, safe propping and building control sign-off come as standard, and we give you the drawings for any Party Wall Act notice you serve on your shared SE18 walls. Our founder's 30+ years on the tools means we know these terraces inside out.

Reviewed jobs near Woolwich

1 MyBuilder review from Woolwich, with each customer's own job title:

• Replace kitchen extractor hob, Woolwich, 27 Apr 2024 (5 out of 5)

Read all 31 on our reviews page.

Checked by Abdelaaziz Saaid, founder and director of GS Renovation Ltd (Companies House no. 14611254). Structural design is by the consulting engineer appointed to your project.