ᐅ Installation of Juliet Balconies in Front of Floor-to-Ceiling Windows

Hello everyone!

I live in Lower Saxony and own a detached house built in 2017. On the upper floor, there are four floor-to-ceiling windows. French balconies have been installed as fall protection. Since I do not like the appearance of the French balconies, I would like to replace them.

While looking for a replacement, a metalworker pointed out to me that the balconies must always be anchored in the actual masonry (in my case, Poroton blocks). Installation only in the outer brick cladding would be inadmissible. Is this correct? Would that mean that all balconies anchored only in the brick cladding or in the window recess (which is also part of the cladding) are not allowed?

Is there, for example, a DIN standard that precisely describes how the fastening should be done?

Thank you very much and best regards!
Peter

Is it officially required? No idea. Only on the brickwork? Not a great idea; if an adult leans heavily against it while drunk, they could end up on the ground floor and you’d lose a piece of the facade.

Well, you don’t need any standards here. The brick facade is not load-bearing according to calculations, so nothing can be anchored to it. It’s basically the Siemens air hook principle.

Thank you, Nordanney and Lumpi_LE, for your quick responses!

Yes, I was thinking along those lines as well, but such solutions are seen quite often. Some homeowners even have just one or two horizontal bars or pipes running inside the reveal—from one facing brick to the other. How is that possible? Are all regulations simply ignored here (not to mention the railing heights, spacing of the balusters, etc.), or do such regulations not even exist?

So, are there no regulations that specify that the fixings must withstand a minimum force X, that special wall anchors have to be used, or that the fixings need to be tested or certified by an authorized body like TÜV or similar?

Sometimes the anchoring to the masonry is not visible at all. For example, you can drill through to the masonry or use a flat tie for the brick veneer.

That is certainly possible; I hadn’t considered that. I will simply focus on a solution that reaches the load-bearing masonry – and that’s it.

Thanks again!