I live in a brick house, and am interested in understanding whether it is brick or brick veneer, as a way to understand what kind of risks it (and we) may face during an earthquake.
I hear that brick veneer is essentially a wood frame house with a brick facade and fares better in earthquakes than a pure brick home.
Our house is in the Pacific Northwest of USA, was built in the early 1930s, and is a 1½ story home. Any advice on how I would know one way or the other?
The foundation is bracketed to the wood framing that sits on top of. I assume this means it's a veneer, but would love to confirm.
Best Answer
One way is by looking at the bond of the bricks. Your bricks are arranged in a running bond or stretcher bond, which is always one brick thick:
To be a structural brick wall it would have to be more than one brick thick, or have multiple wythes, and you would see headers, like this:
It's likely your walls are wood-framed with single-wythe brick veneer on the outside. But to really know what was on the inside, you would have to see inside them. The easiest way is to remove some outlet covers and look behind the electrical box. If you see an open void, it's a wood-framed wall. If the area around the box is completely solid, you might have concrete blocks making up the structure of the wall.
Beautiful house, by the way.