s50 vert progress and 9000 lb lift

[jeffnhiscars]

To reinforce it without to much effort/cost you could use steel cable with steel plates.A hole would need to be drilled thru the top wall plates for the cable to pass thru and the the steel plates on the exterior to spread the loads.Our building codes up here require the wall ties(by whatever means used)be spaced no further than 4 feet apart,obviously that won't work well for the lift section.
Even a couple of ties of some type(simply use 2x8 lumber,needs to be really well anchored though) before/after the area needed for the lift would make me feel better.

Good advice. A thought I had would be to sister 2x8's, assuming thats whats there now to the cutoff joists since they should already be tied to your outside walls (so no need to go through the shell). Check that tie in though.

I'd try to get 2 rows of 2-3x 8d nails at each overlap. In the open section, Id double the front and back cross ties by sandwiching 2 around the cut off joists that outline your opening and sandwich some 2x8 blocking between the 2 pieces along their length to make it a fairly stout beam. Again make especially sure the tie in to the wall is stout.

Then I would take a double 2x8 and use it as a header along the outside edge of the opening, tying its ends to your first and last double sandwich beams as described AND to the cut off stubs (in T fashion) for the full length of the opening. This is pretty much how a stairwell is framed out and I suspect if done right would even pass code (ie simpson T ties where the front to back double header ties to the cutoff joists) since it is taking the spreading stress from the opening and transferring it to the double sandwichs.

Just sayin"