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What is it?
By adamg on Thu, 06/29/2006 - 8:49am
Brick buildings along the waterfront often have these bolt things. Are they earthquake bolts? Or something else?
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Comments
The stars are at the ends of
The stars are at the ends of tie rods, which keep walls from going out of plumb and are usually found at the lower levels of brick buildings.
Well that's disappointing...
Here I was thinking it was some sort of marker for secret Soviet enclaves from the 80s...
Shaky Ground
Those iron rod/star bolts are common not only on coastal buildings, but also where earthquakes -- even small ones -- are common. Charleston, South Carolina, has both conditions and many commercial and residential buildings use them as reinforcements.
It was also a relatively rare architectural device for 18 and 19th Century roofs. I have seen one fairly large church that used the system.
It is odd to look up an see the rods. It makes it look like a makeshift repair.
Ah, Charleston!
Yeah, that's where I first saw earthquake bolts, but I remember them as pretty boring, not like our starry, if now revealed as mundane, plumb protectors.
Nuts
These are nuts screwed onto the ends of rods that run through the building to keep the walls from sagging outward. They used to be added to older buildings to bolster the structure. I think.
Nuts
The overweight throwing star I lost?