It is great that you are in Texas and understand our foundation problems. We have several subdivisions that were built on what were once rice paddies. Some homes have had foundation work every decade! Its sad that people pay so much for these homes and the foundation cracks. I really enjoy your videos. I feel like you honest as you always give pros and cons.
I thought I was upset that my home is over a crawlspace instead of a concrete slab or basement until I watched this video. I forgot all about the nightmares of plumbing repairs with a slab. This was a very informative video, thank you. You are quite a pleasant narrator to listen to.
I found Pier and beam to be the best for super-insulated homes. It allows for monolithic connections between walls and floor. You can achieve a perfect fluid-applied wrap, as well as a near-perfect insulation connection. Also: As mentioned in another comment: You don't need to go down to bedrock, you just need to get your footer below the frost line by X amount, and have an engineer sign off on loads. And lastly: Pier and Beam is very Do-It-Yourself friendly.
So I am not a builder nor do I plan on getting a house built. But your videos are so instructive and easy to digest. Thanks fo re all your hard work. Slab basements would be a cool topic.
I really enjoyed this video! I'm an construction/engineering student in the netherlands. 👷👷♂️I love to see every time that the culture in the usa is wildly different. Here in the Netherlands mostly we make a foundations very different because the soil everywhere is entirely made out of clay in the ground with sandlayers instead of bedrock. Thanks for al this content i can enjoy every day! 😃😄
Some thoughts on your information about pier foundations: In my area they do not need to reach bedrock unless the load design requires it. The engineer will evaluate local soil conditions, and the pier will be designed to provide support to the building through friction between it and the local soil. It is in fact rare for them to reach bedrock in valleys with deep alluvial soil. The piers will be the correct size and spacing to meet the loads and uplift of the building given the local conditions. I once worked on an interesting home that had a slab on grade foundation, but then had a post and beam crawl space built on top of it. Best rat slab ever!
Correct. Soil exerts pressure on piers/piles, and that pressure means friction that supports the weight of the structure. Driving piles into the ground instead of drilling holes and cementing means more soil pressure, more friction, and more support. How far to drive a pile is simple in that if you apply as much force to it as the structure (weight, environmental loads, etc.), then when the pile stops moving, that's deep enough. Piles like this are able to resist millions of pounds of force and anchor massive offshore oil rigs--all in soft silty/muddy soil without cement.
@@theevermind My engineer brother explained to me that the same principles apply to poured in place piers, indeed to any foundations. Edit: While poured piers are set in the ground rather than driven in like piles, they are still effective for the same reasons.
Wanted to echo this to make sure it is heard. Piers do not need to reach bedrock. There are very simply calculations for knowing the area of a footer required at the bottom of a pier to accommodate the live and static load from the planned building. The frost line is also important as freezing soils can push piers up if they are not below the frost line.
@@johnmellesmoen2202 Echo received, and bounced back! While the method of installation is different for poured or precast piers, and driven pilings, the same is true for all. Even if you are lucky enough to have bedrock close to the surface, all of the the other factors will still be accounted for, especially if uplift is a major factor.
Yep, maybe that's regulation in some places, but in the three places I've lived around the world, piers do not need to reach bedrock, if, as you say, there's sufficient friction and load-bearing capacity.
I would really enjoy a video on basement foundations! A video explaining about the ways the pitfalls of a particular foundation type can be navigated would be really good as well. I am thinking of building my own house one day and videos like these are very useful.
I'm also curious if there's much difference between the slab/pier/basement for private homes and the foundations for a larger institution like a school or ten story office building.
You can insulate crawlspace with fiberglass rolls between the joists (source: helped my dad insulate our crawlspace when I was a teenager, it was huge pain in the ass). The moisture will eventually degrade the insulation, but the immediate improvement was apparent. Regarding termites, they build mud towers in the crawlspace to reach wood, so maybe that's a wash, too. I live in earthquake country and once owned an on-slab home that had been damaged in the 89 Loma Prieta quake. The plumbing cracked beneath the concrete and had to be rerouted above the living space. Upshot is, nothing works, and we should all move back into pole lodges :).
yes but with pier and beam you can see the termites wherever they come up. if you have a crack on the interior of a slab you will have to rear out drywall and pull up flooring to find where the termites are getting through.
@@mtadams2009 I'm no expert on that, but I would expect EPS (guessing this is what you mean by foam) to risk trapping water above it, and causing rot. AFAIK EPS is commonly used for flat roof insulation, but in that circumstance being water impermeable is a useful property.
Slabs that settle unevenly can be hydraulically jacked back to level. The process is drill a hole in the slab near its low point then pump concrete mix under the slab until it gets level again.
I just discovered your videos and love how thoroughly and succinctly you break things down. I'm a foundation repair, waterproofing, crawspace encapsulation and concrete lifting and stabilizing professional in MN so would love to see more related content for us northeners!
Maybe something to add, I'm not sure if this is more a european style of concrete slab contruction, but that is what I'm familiar with: It is kind of a combination of the two you mentioned, but relates more to the frost line and going down to bedrock is not possible in many areas in Europe: A perimeter rebar reinforced concrete stripe going down into the ground below the frost line in winter with a thick gravel drainage below (that was 2 meters deep minimum in total in my case). The slab is then poured either at the same time or later, the perimeter concrete is water insulated by tar (there are various products, but essentially it is a water barrier on the outside). This prevents any damage to the concrete foundation due to moisture, prevents movement in the foundation due do expansion and contraction of soils due to frost, doesn't need to go to bedrock, avoids movement due to moisture below (due to the drainage gravel) and only cracks with very extensive movement of the soil (if you are on a slope and the whole ground starts moving for instance). This adds higher upfront cost due to more concrete and more preparation work being needed, but these kind of constructions typically don't need any maintenance at all, as the perimeter concrete stripe goes deep enough to not be effected by soil movement. I always wondered how these (from my experience in my country) weak foundations made in the US hold up over time, your mentioning of constant repair being needed clears that: Not very good it seems.
Just discovered your channel, Wow, what a wealth of knowledge and useful information! And your unbiased opinion is much appreciated. Thank you for your hard work, I am sincerely grateful.
Thank you for this video. The topic was very well explain and I'm sure you spent a lot of time preparing for this video. Great job. I live in a home that was built in 1958 in California. The house sits on a pier and beam. My family and I moved into the house in 2018. There was no gas line installed for my wife to have a gas stove in the kitchen. We hired a plumber to install the gas line and was able to enter the crawl space and installed it within 2 hours. I gladly paid the bill of $475 and my wife and I now have a gas stove. I really like the easy access to the pipes underneath the house, but I'm sometimes annoyed with the floor squeaking in some areas in the house. Thanks for reading my experience.
@@izziereal2010 yeah mowers and lawn too but I thought Newsome wanted to have 100% electric houses to reduce "greenhouse gas" ( as if electricity production is pollution free🤔)
Hello Belinda, Well done, as usual. My parents built a house in North Dallas in 1953. It is still standing but not for long. Every house in the area is now a teardown because the land value and taxes are too high to merit a house so small. It was built on what was called pier and beam. But, the foundation was really a floorplan of the house with concrete forms indicating the exterior edges and the interior walls of the house. Forms were built a few feet deep along those lines--they may have hit a limestone base but the limestone is very soft. You can see it along the sides of the North Dallas Toll Road as it dips below grade at underpasses. To this day, there are no cracks from shifting. And the right angles of the walls and ceilings have always amazed wallpaper hangers. One of the main issues is that it was not built on fill dirt.
Great video. I love comparing US and Australian building techniques and practises Traditional construction in Queensland was wooden piers with houses 1.8m above grade. When we renovated our place we had 43 100x100 RHS steel posts that were founded into 1.8 X 450 dia concrete piers. But most new houses here are slab on ground. But we also have highly reactive soils. And people plant eucalyptus too close to the house and the tree roots sap moisture from below the slab that can't be replenished. Common for 80's era slab on ground to crack from the foundation to the soffit.
I’d love to hear more about vented vs unvented pier and beam construction. Whether and how to take a vented version to unvented. Thank you, I love learning from your channel.
Watching your content is helping me study for the exams to become a residential energy advisor. So informative. Keep it up. You’re killing it. Getting more of this information out there to everyday people is going to be key to the future of greener living.
Wonderful content as always! PLEASE DO BASEMENTS PLEASE! I'm in New England and am going to build my own home. It seems more information I get the more confused I am. So please cover basement so I have all the bases covered. Thank you for all your amazing work!
I have lived in 2 areas that have tornadoes often, and in both places, few homes had basements. I want to know why basements are not common in places where they seem to make sense.
@@freethebirds3578 There ar a few reasons why. Slab foundations are less costly than slab. Some parts of the country have high water tables which prevent full-depth basements from being done. Florida is a prime example. And lastly, construction techniques are influenced by historical trends. South Carolina is loaded with red brick homes build over crawlspaces even though full basements might be feasible in areas where the soil conditions & water tables are compatible.
I actually clicked on this videos to go to your channel to see if there was something more akin to my interests but this actually ended up being very insightful, great job. Also I support everything that has anything to do with basements.
Thank god. Without this video, I would be unable to identify the type of foundation used in my ex-wife's home. Thanks to Belinda Carr, I can now comfortably live in the crawlspace within her walls.
Another excellent video! G.L. Hunt did "repair" on our pier & beam foundation; though, even being fully paid (over-paid, actually) they cracked an undamaged part of the foundation in many places, never finished leveling the floors so they sink towards the middle of the house, never did a plumbing test and never had their engineer rubber-stamp their mess, so did not close the permit they opened: forty thousand thrown away!
In my area ( mid south), the most common foundation is a perimeter wall of concrete blocks set on a complete perimeter footing that extends below the frost line, which is relatively shallow.
Yup, I work on foundations in Missouri and this is how all of the old homes are done, and if you have to redo a basement wall you have to block up the top couple feet because you can't form and pour concrete all the way up to the floor joist.
Monolithic slabs on a 600mm fill of sand over substrate has been a constant footing / foundation since the 1960s in Western Australia as a precaution against earthquake zone as well as protection against clay swelling
Loved every second of it!!! Awesome video!!! I love inspecting foundations here texas, and to me piers is the way to go! Worth every penny from my observation.
thank you Belinda. I'm curious about perimeter T footings which are very common...they create a raised floor (similar to pier and grade beam) without drilling piers...just excavating to proper footing depth and pouring a stemwall. How does this system work in clay? better than slabs?
An interesting type of foundation to cover would be the insulated slab foundation for northern climate. Not popular in North America, this system is widely used in Europe. It seems to be one of the best solutions to meet passive house standard due to its ability to isolate the building g from the ground. 15 inches of Styrofoam are used, and 11 inch slab is poured on top with reinforcement. Optionally a heating system can be embedded in the slab. The thermal mass would mitigate day and night temperature fluctuations. Exposing some floor to southern sun can also act as energy storage. I suppose the key to its longevity us in the subsurface preparation. Plumbing repairs would be a nightmare. Thanks for the video!
Thank you for another wonderful video. I'm from The Netherlans, and we mostly have a different kind of foundation, called "pole foundation", where poles are driven in the ground and mostly just float on the ground. Fun fact: My grandfather was a water engineer, and in his building days (around the Second World War), they drove the wooden poles in the ground with sledge hammers. They would measure how far the pole would get into the ground with each hit, and when this became smaller than a certain number (depending on the situation), they would consider it deep enough, and the remaining part of the pole, would be cut off
@Belinda Carr To re-level a tilted slab I wonder if it could be done by slab jacking to lower the costs of interior piers? Core drill a pattern of small diameter holes where needed and then pump in the lifting medium. Cheaper? Less disruptive than trying to install precast piers?
I love your videos. So illustrative. Very pleasant speaking voice as well. As I plan and build out my tiny home/adu, I need information like this on a daily basis. Have you already made a video on converting a tough shed into a home? I feel your perspective would have a big impact on those of us who are struggling with the constraints of budget/which materials not to go cheap on/space/insulation/ventilation/semi off-grid appliances etc. Doing the best I can to make this a home for myself out here in California lol.
Just sharing.. Where I live in the Caribbean, we have generally have either rocky or a commonly occurring type of heavy clay soil (referred to as Sapate). Though we don't have winter, we do have Rainy and Dry seasons. In the "rainy season" (approx 6+ month of the year) heavy rains saturate the clay, causing significant heaving (soil expansion), whereas in the dry season, it dehydrates it, resulting is significant shrinkage. Both of which have significant movement and put stresses on the foundation. The solutions to the clay areas, are typically use of a monolithic raft foundation or Strip-footing atop Piles. The pies range from "Augured Piles" to "Driven Piles" and typical start at a 15' depth and increase based on the data from a Geo-technical survey, building design and structural requirements.
Having worked in Construction, when given the chance I will ALWAYS choose Pier and Beam. However, I also feel a deep underside is important. A tight crawl space just isn't worth it. Get some space under there if you are going with the Pier and Beams.
we're building in the circle of fire region using a pier and beam and base isolation between the piers and house. I wish someone had information on base isolation for lightweight structures. very scant offerings on the interwebs...
It's amazing how common slab construction is in floodplains now. It is cheap to build there, but expensive to stay, and slabs are a big part of this. The height of floods is inversely proportionate to the frequency, so even small gains in height make a noticeable difference in the regularity of water damage. The public costs of natural events go up every year, because we put more infrastructure in harms way.
Hi Belinda I found your videos are very informative. Could you please make a video explaining Polished Concrete and Epoxy flooring with complete details. Thank you.
My current house has an uninsulated crawl space. I have been investigating how to insulate it best. I'm leaning toward a layer of closed cell foam (mainly to stop the air leaks) and then Rockwool. The major issue that I am having is for me being my size and time, and then source; so I will contract the job out... and everybody has jumped onto the inflation-of-the-prices-bandwagon (for reasons... greed also)... (argh).
There were several generalizations that I wasn’t expecting. Texas is a large state and the soil isn’t the same everywhere. It can be significantly different in just a matter of miles. It’s important to get a geotechnical core drilling sample and report done and evaluated by an structural engineer in order to determine what would be best for any given area. In some instances the geotechnical report could recommend piers under a slab on grade, void forms or that soil be brought in to stabilize existing soil or some combination. The engineer would design the slab and what beams would be needed and how much rebar would be needed based on the soil test recommendation and the loads required by the specific structure being built.
Another great video thank you. IMHO, I would always build with pier and beam versus slab as I would want to do it right the first time no matter the cost. Stability of the home is most important to me and I would be able to deal with the other ancillary issues that come with this type of foundation. But, in the long run I think it’s a better investment.
All information on foundation types would be greatly appreciated! You might as well plan out a series, explaining one facet of house design and construction at a time, roofing, plumbing, electrical, etc., with a special section on new and emerging technologies and innovations. Thanks, always good stuff!
Something to look forward to with great anticipation. :) Pier and beam, as well as materials used in construction, is one of many reasons I bought an existing home built in 1983.
Can you do slab on piers? I am in the process of renovating a house with a crawl space but I want concrete as floor surface( not overlay) and I am wondering what I'd have to do to the existing subfloor to 10:13 pour concrete on top of existing subfloor. Approx 2-3" of light weight( expanded shale instead of gravel) concrete.
I just found your channel - you seem to cover a lot of my interests like building and planned obsolescence of durable goods ( stop blaming consumers solely for this problem, I agree). For this topic, I want to build a small house on a gentle slope in Western NC. I asked a builder about using a pier foundation and he clearly was biased against piers based on his reaction. I suspect he doesn't have the talent available to build this. He raised the concern over wildlife nesting under the house. I like pier because of the ability to get to plumbing/electric after our experiences repairing/remodeling houses built on slab. After remodeling, I agree that houses should come with schematics and a lot more documentation! On our last remodel, we could not find a GC who wanted to work with us. They were ALL busy. I don't think they liked that we had a budget - they moved on to those people who knew much less and would pay much more. Anyhow, the original builder (1989) poured a concrete slab in the middle of our house 2 inches lower than the sides in order to put a full 3/4 inch wood floor system in. ironically, the wood floor was not even level with entry way tile? So much for using match to calculate this offset!!! This made it very challenging to put in one uniform floor system. We ended up removing all flooring and adding new concrete on top. We researched and used correct concrete and bonding but still, it is a cross your fingers kind of thing.
I loved the music at the beginning! I've noticed that (especially for explainer videos like these) it really helps my attention when there is comfortable music in the background. I've love to see it throughout your videos! (Although as long as I'm not on my phone, I can usually add my own, to be fair.)
Pier and Beam is the way to go in Texas. So much easier to repair if needed. If I every building anything, I will seriously consider a P&B foundation. My current home was built in 1985 and had foundation problems.
Thanks for the interesting and informative video, I appreciate watching these. As a Canadian living in the prairie of southwest Manitoba I would love to see a video on the northern climate and foundations.
You did an amazing job. Wish I would have finished my Architectural Degree back in 2008 but ended up getting my cdl license and now own my own truck. I might go back to finish it in a few years. Although I do enjoy driving my own truck.
@1:39, where anchor bolts are embedded into top of caisson/ pile for the purpose of carrying a structural load, three #3 rebar hoops or 2 #4 hoops shall surround the anchor bolts. This ensures ductility of the connection.
I live in the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia. It's a really weird spot. We get really cold Winters that would make me worry about pipes freezing in a crawlspace, and around town, every year some underground pipe bursts down on Main Street. The consistency actually makes me wonder if they're doing crappy repairs on purpose to have work every year. Anyways, at the same time, basements are awful because they humidity is so high here during the Summer, and it rains enough that everyone's basement is muggy and damp. My house is a split-level with a walk-out basement, the back side of my house is level with my backyard and the front is buried up to the window sills. For both those with any kind of basement or slab-on-grade, there's also the worry of Radon gas seeping up through the concrete and settling in the bottom of your house, so we have to have passive or active systems on a pipe that runs underneath the slab (including/especially a basement's slab) to bring the gas up through the house and out the roof. If I decide to stay here whenever I go to build a house, I think I want pier and beam, and I'll just have to take preventative measures to prevent freezing of external plumbing. I think one nifty solution might be, if I'm able to be a geothermal system in, to just have an extra couple lines wrapping around my drains and well inlet (spaces far apart from each other of course) and then heavily insulate around that - maybe even with concrete in a kind of "false pier." As far as critters go, I suppose there's space for something to exist, but the underside /should/ be sealed up just as well as the sides are, albeit differently, and not particularly "more vulnerable."
The UK switched to slab on grade a couple of decades ago for new builds and there's been nothing but trouble. I've seen entire sites demolished before getting to the second story to be swapped over to pier and beam or the slab thickness increased to deal with the soil conditions in what is predominately a rainy climate. On the same instance when I was in Texas I saw many slab on grade foundations dip only slightly and due to the incoming water main being laid in or below the slab, it had broken and released thousands of litres of water (in one case 90,000 ie 90 metric tonnes) eroding what soil was under the slab and tilting it even further out of level. It has benefits used in the right climate with decent though put into services beforehand but too many times there isn't enough forethought and planning.
I have done the pier and beam, with an adjustment I pour concrete after the piers are poured, I learned this from another builder then you can either have brick on the outside. There is so many different things you can do to improve the loss of heat , Thor cold air from the a/c in the summer. The poured slab you can now dig down just a little deeper and they have foam insulation that can have concrete pour on it which will help with temp control in the house. This two she talks about are simple foundations, that if you add to them can make your home so much better in the long run.
Quite a bit different in Ohio. Trench foundations, below the frost line, are the norm here, even if the house uses a slab floor. Crawl spaces here are about 38 inches high or more on newer homes, depending on local codes. Thanks for the content. 👍👍
Trench foundations are a variation on pier and beam. They are used in colder climates to get the footing below the frost depth. This video was prepared in Texas where geound freezing is not an issue.
I am fortunate that in the 10 1/2 years I've lived in my slab foundation house, we've not had foundation problems. And to my knowledge, there hasn't been any in the home's 57 years existence. I always thought pier & beam was ugly and a welcome mat for critters, but at least now I know why they are used. Thanks for the video. :)
Here in south Florida lots of people live in manufactured homes. The homes are positioned over a string of concrete block piers under each long steel beam. Tie downs are generally diagonal steel straps attached to the beams and then extended down to earth auger/anchors. There are different tie down specs for each specific wind zone. Much of FL soil seems to be a free flowing type sand (fairly compaction resistant), it's not uncommon that a Florida mobile home will move or settle slightly over time, however mobile homes can be easily/inexpensively releveled/realigned on the piers as needed. It's advisable to have plenty of air movement under the mobile home to prevent moisture buildup. This free-air-flow 'skirting' can be screen or slats. BTW, under the home is a good space for geckos and common black snakes to do their thing (bug and rodent 'getters'). As with any home, it's important that the mobile home site is well drained, and the soil beneath the home needs to be covered with an effective vapor barrier.
Thanks for the video! Some perspective from a resident/owner … My previous house was pier on beam, current is slab. I will NEVER buy a house with a slab foundation again, for two reasons. First, the cost and complexity to repair or remodel anything to do with the plumbing is massively higher with slab. Second, flooring on top of concrete is less comfortable, unless you are doing wall to wall carpet.
Great Videos. Detailed and Informative. My house has piers and due to efflorescence these piers are cracking. How do I fix this and avoid further decay. Please suggest.
As a retired builder/ex-pat living in the Philippines, post & beam construction is very common. In building residential 3 story concrete structures 1) I do not use hollow block to fill-in between the post & beams, but instead pour 4”+ walls at the same time. 2) Use fiberglass entrainment throughout the pour along with the desired earthquake standard as set forth by P.E. My hopes are to avoid the common cracks in the rendering/stucco coats seen within 3 to 5 years of build. I also thought that the fiber will help to adhere more securely the finish coats, but as the projects are underway, can’t back-up my hopes with evidence. Are my hopes of a better job fool hardy or not? Thank-you for your blogs, love em!
Crawl spaces are nothing more than stinky wet holes in the ground that breed mold which gradually takes over your living space. I will NEVER build a crawl space house. Slab houses are cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter with that large flat stone doing temperature control for free all year round. Most new houses in the Midwest are built on slab. I've never heard of anyone having any cracking problems.
In th eUK residential buildings are usually built on trench and concrete foundations. A meter deep trench about 450mm wide is dug and filled with concrete so that these foundations support the perimeter of the building where the mass of the building is concentrated. The interior ground floor is then insulated and concret poured on it and levelled off. 100mm of insulation is presently the required amount with about 100mm of conrete on top. A damp proof membrane is applied under the insulation at the start.
Great video. In Australia we have to put piers under our slab on ground houses as we have reactive clay soils too. Perhaps the USA should do that on reactive soils
In Washington State most of the homes of the past were built on a wall foundation with piers. They worked well in allowing the home owner to work on any plumbing issues. Most of the houses in the California area are slab on grade for new construction but the older homes are similar with wall foundation and pier. If you have any shift in the ground it has caused plumbing issues with the breaking or cracking of pipe or electric conduit. I like the old method because it also allows you to insulate the bottom of the structure and allows repairs.
Another issue that comes from slab on grade is try repairing a electric conduit or plumbing when the framers don't follow the blue print perfectly and you have to jack hammer out the conduit, cut it and extend the conduit to be within the frame work of the wall. Try repair and broken plumbing pipe and your carpet or wood floor is soaked with water because the slab on grade shifted.
A house I lived in year ago was supported on old cedar cut rounds. They lasted 40+ years and were eventually replaced with new cedar and small slabs. They’re still there as far as I know. Mind you, I live in a remote small village on Canada’s west coast and there’s a dearth of building inspectors around here.
I'm in SoCal, and what you call pier and beam for residential purposes doesn't have to hit anywhere near bedrock. The piers and footings simply need to be embedded into (usually 12-24") stable soil capable of carrying the predicted load.
Will you consider helical anchors or screw piling for residential use? I recently saw an excavation program in which Colorado soil is excavated to a depth of 20 feet (!) and then compacted in lifts of one foot before slab on grade foundation is placed. The cost must be very high.
Has anyone heard of a combination of a pier and beam/slab foundation using the piers to stabilize the slab to avoid problems in the future? I like the simplicity of the slab, but a house that isn't designed to last 100 years, much less 20, without major repairs is just a poorly designed house.
I thought I had seen all foundations, and I thought the list was defined.....then a few years ago, I saw a house sitting hillside on river stones. The house sits on stones, small enough to skip across the water, and was secured in the middle of the house. the house was 100+ years old. If you were to look under the house, you'd see the stones. I've also seen a house sitting on a single rock (the rock is the side of the mountain). it's a wow, when you go into the basement, and see it's a single rock, sloping down greater then 45 degrees.. Also 100+ years old. No company would do something unconventional like that today. I've also seen a "rubble foundation!". Quarry rubble, is loaded in a mound, and the house sits on the rubble. the house is a stone house. It was housing built by the quarry workers. (they used the stone from the quarry, and shipping crates.). So many diffrent types of foundations, and so many unconventional foundations.
hay Belinda.... video was informative, thanks.....i have one question, i live in Indianapolis and i have plan to build the house next year, my question to you is do you have any strong solution for strong unbreakable roof to prevent from robberies /burglary done by cutting roof?, I am not interested in cement slab, my house would be brick house with roof, no basement, no second floor? ......thanks
The first 1,000 people to use this link will get a 1 month free trial of Skillshare: skl.sh/belindacarr03221
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i was 1300, too slow for free stuff!
It is great that you are in Texas and understand our foundation problems. We have several subdivisions that were built on what were once rice paddies. Some homes have had foundation work every decade! Its sad that people pay so much for these homes and the foundation cracks. I really enjoy your videos. I feel like you honest as you always give pros and cons.
Would love to hear about basement foundations!
I thought I was upset that my home is over a crawlspace instead of a concrete slab or basement until I watched this video. I forgot all about the nightmares of plumbing repairs with a slab. This was a very informative video, thank you. You are quite a pleasant narrator to listen to.
6:22 Belinda, after the 1971 Sylmar Quake, new state law requires all new houses and buildings to be bolted to their foundations.
Knowledge and modesty is rare, this is why viewing this channel is a pleasure. Cheers from Australia
I found Pier and beam to be the best for super-insulated homes.
It allows for monolithic connections between walls and floor. You can achieve a perfect fluid-applied wrap, as well as a near-perfect insulation connection.
Also: As mentioned in another comment: You don't need to go down to bedrock, you just need to get your footer below the frost line by X amount, and have an engineer sign off on loads. And lastly: Pier and Beam is very Do-It-Yourself friendly.
I’m getting ready to build a pier and beam house and she made me nervous. I have quite a bit of clay soil and I don’t know how far down bedrock is.
So I am not a builder nor do I plan on getting a house built. But your videos are so instructive and easy to digest. Thanks fo re all your hard work. Slab basements would be a cool topic.
I really enjoyed this video!
I'm an construction/engineering student in the netherlands. 👷👷♂️I love to see every time that the culture in the usa is wildly different. Here in the Netherlands mostly we make a foundations very different because the soil everywhere is entirely made out of clay in the ground with sandlayers instead of bedrock.
Thanks for al this content i can enjoy every day! 😃😄
Some thoughts on your information about pier foundations: In my area they do not need to reach bedrock unless the load design requires it. The engineer will evaluate local soil conditions, and the pier will be designed to provide support to the building through friction between it and the local soil. It is in fact rare for them to reach bedrock in valleys with deep alluvial soil. The piers will be the correct size and spacing to meet the loads and uplift of the building given the local conditions. I once worked on an interesting home that had a slab on grade foundation, but then had a post and beam crawl space built on top of it. Best rat slab ever!
Correct. Soil exerts pressure on piers/piles, and that pressure means friction that supports the weight of the structure. Driving piles into the ground instead of drilling holes and cementing means more soil pressure, more friction, and more support. How far to drive a pile is simple in that if you apply as much force to it as the structure (weight, environmental loads, etc.), then when the pile stops moving, that's deep enough. Piles like this are able to resist millions of pounds of force and anchor massive offshore oil rigs--all in soft silty/muddy soil without cement.
@@theevermind
My engineer brother explained to me that the same principles apply to poured in place piers, indeed to any foundations. Edit: While poured piers are set in the ground rather than driven in like piles, they are still effective for the same reasons.
Wanted to echo this to make sure it is heard. Piers do not need to reach bedrock. There are very simply calculations for knowing the area of a footer required at the bottom of a pier to accommodate the live and static load from the planned building. The frost line is also important as freezing soils can push piers up if they are not below the frost line.
@@johnmellesmoen2202
Echo received, and bounced back!
While the method of installation is different for poured or precast piers, and driven pilings, the same is true for all. Even if you are lucky enough to have bedrock close to the surface, all of the the other factors will still be accounted for, especially if uplift is a major factor.
Yep, maybe that's regulation in some places, but in the three places I've lived around the world, piers do not need to reach bedrock, if, as you say, there's sufficient friction and load-bearing capacity.
I would really enjoy a video on basement foundations! A video explaining about the ways the pitfalls of a particular foundation type can be navigated would be really good as well. I am thinking of building my own house one day and videos like these are very useful.
I'm also curious if there's much difference between the slab/pier/basement for private homes and the foundations for a larger institution like a school or ten story office building.
You can insulate crawlspace with fiberglass rolls between the joists (source: helped my dad insulate our crawlspace when I was a teenager, it was huge pain in the ass). The moisture will eventually degrade the insulation, but the immediate improvement was apparent.
Regarding termites, they build mud towers in the crawlspace to reach wood, so maybe that's a wash, too.
I live in earthquake country and once owned an on-slab home that had been damaged in the 89 Loma Prieta quake. The plumbing cracked beneath the concrete and had to be rerouted above the living space.
Upshot is, nothing works, and we should all move back into pole lodges :).
yes but with pier and beam you can see the termites wherever they come up. if you have a crack on the interior of a slab you will have to rear out drywall and pull up flooring to find where the termites are getting through.
Mineral wool insulation will survive much better in this role, particularly regarding moisture.
@@microcolonel How do you think foam would work?
@@mtadams2009 I'm no expert on that, but I would expect EPS (guessing this is what you mean by foam) to risk trapping water above it, and causing rot. AFAIK EPS is commonly used for flat roof insulation, but in that circumstance being water impermeable is a useful property.
@@microcolonel thanks
Slabs that settle unevenly can be hydraulically jacked back to level. The process is drill a hole in the slab near its low point then pump concrete mix under the slab until it gets level again.
It messes with your plumbing 9 times out of 10 though....
I just discovered your videos and love how thoroughly and succinctly you break things down. I'm a foundation repair, waterproofing, crawspace encapsulation and concrete lifting and stabilizing professional in MN so would love to see more related content for us northeners!
Maybe something to add, I'm not sure if this is more a european style of concrete slab contruction, but that is what I'm familiar with: It is kind of a combination of the two you mentioned, but relates more to the frost line and going down to bedrock is not possible in many areas in Europe: A perimeter rebar reinforced concrete stripe going down into the ground below the frost line in winter with a thick gravel drainage below (that was 2 meters deep minimum in total in my case). The slab is then poured either at the same time or later, the perimeter concrete is water insulated by tar (there are various products, but essentially it is a water barrier on the outside).
This prevents any damage to the concrete foundation due to moisture, prevents movement in the foundation due do expansion and contraction of soils due to frost, doesn't need to go to bedrock, avoids movement due to moisture below (due to the drainage gravel) and only cracks with very extensive movement of the soil (if you are on a slope and the whole ground starts moving for instance).
This adds higher upfront cost due to more concrete and more preparation work being needed, but these kind of constructions typically don't need any maintenance at all, as the perimeter concrete stripe goes deep enough to not be effected by soil movement.
I always wondered how these (from my experience in my country) weak foundations made in the US hold up over time, your mentioning of constant repair being needed clears that: Not very good it seems.
Just discovered your channel, Wow, what a wealth of knowledge and useful information! And your unbiased opinion is much appreciated. Thank you for your hard work, I am sincerely grateful.
Thank you for this video. The topic was very well explain and I'm sure you spent a lot of time preparing for this video. Great job.
I live in a home that was built in 1958 in California. The house sits on a pier and beam. My family and I moved into the house in 2018. There was no gas line installed for my wife to have a gas stove in the kitchen. We hired a plumber to install the gas line and was able to enter the crawl space and installed it within 2 hours. I gladly paid the bill of $475 and my wife and I now have a gas stove. I really like the easy access to the pipes underneath the house, but I'm sometimes annoyed with the floor squeaking in some areas in the house. Thanks for reading my experience.
Isn't Cali outlawing gas appliances?
@@willbass2869 I believe you are referring to outdoor gas power tools.
@@izziereal2010 yeah mowers and lawn too but I thought Newsome wanted to have 100% electric houses to reduce "greenhouse gas" ( as if electricity production is pollution free🤔)
@@willbass2869 In not too sure about appliances. I'll need to look into that.
Hello Belinda, Well done, as usual. My parents built a house in North Dallas in 1953. It is still standing but not for long. Every house in the area is now a teardown because the land value and taxes are too high to merit a house so small. It was built on what was called pier and beam. But, the foundation was really a floorplan of the house with concrete forms indicating the exterior edges and the interior walls of the house. Forms were built a few feet deep along those lines--they may have hit a limestone base but the limestone is very soft. You can see it along the sides of the North Dallas Toll Road as it dips below grade at underpasses. To this day, there are no cracks from shifting. And the right angles of the walls and ceilings have always amazed wallpaper hangers. One of the main issues is that it was not built on fill dirt.
Great video. I love comparing US and Australian building techniques and practises Traditional construction in Queensland was wooden piers with houses 1.8m above grade. When we renovated our place we had 43 100x100 RHS steel posts that were founded into 1.8 X 450 dia concrete piers. But most new houses here are slab on ground. But we also have highly reactive soils. And people plant eucalyptus too close to the house and the tree roots sap moisture from below the slab that can't be replenished. Common for 80's era slab on ground to crack from the foundation to the soffit.
I’d love to hear more about vented vs unvented pier and beam construction. Whether and how to take a vented version to unvented. Thank you, I love learning from your channel.
Watching your content is helping me study for the exams to become a residential energy advisor. So informative. Keep it up. You’re killing it. Getting more of this information out there to everyday people is going to be key to the future of greener living.
I live in Minnesota and would love to see a video on basements.
Love your work, always watch your videos :)
Wonderful content as always! PLEASE DO BASEMENTS PLEASE! I'm in New England and am going to build my own home. It seems more information I get the more confused I am. So please cover basement so I have all the bases covered. Thank you for all your amazing work!
Yes! My first question was: What about basements?
I have lived in 2 areas that have tornadoes often, and in both places, few homes had basements. I want to know why basements are not common in places where they seem to make sense.
@@freethebirds3578 $$$$
@@freethebirds3578 There ar a few reasons why. Slab foundations are less costly than slab. Some parts of the country have high water tables which prevent full-depth basements from being done. Florida is a prime example. And lastly, construction techniques are influenced by historical trends. South Carolina is loaded with red brick homes build over crawlspaces even though full basements might be feasible in areas where the soil conditions & water tables are compatible.
+1 for basements.
I actually clicked on this videos to go to your channel to see if there was something more akin to my interests but this actually ended up being very insightful, great job. Also I support everything that has anything to do with basements.
Thank god. Without this video, I would be unable to identify the type of foundation used in my ex-wife's home. Thanks to Belinda Carr, I can now comfortably live in the crawlspace within her walls.
🤨
😂
Where you probably belong
😂😂 stay strong in the crawl space buddy, you got this
Isn't that how this whole situation started in the first place?
Another excellent video!
G.L. Hunt did "repair" on our pier & beam foundation; though, even being fully paid (over-paid, actually) they cracked an undamaged part of the foundation in many places, never finished leveling the floors so they sink towards the middle of the house, never did a plumbing test and never had their engineer rubber-stamp their mess, so did not close the permit they opened: forty thousand thrown away!
In my area ( mid south), the most common foundation is a perimeter wall of concrete blocks set on a complete perimeter footing that extends below the frost line, which is relatively shallow.
Same here, not an architect but it feels like it's the best of both worlds
Yup, I work on foundations in Missouri and this is how all of the old homes are done, and if you have to redo a basement wall you have to block up the top couple feet because you can't form and pour concrete all the way up to the floor joist.
This is sooo perfect thank you! I'm building a home and have looking at this exact thing. Peer & beam it is!
Monolithic slabs on a 600mm fill of sand over substrate has been a constant footing / foundation since the 1960s in Western Australia as a precaution against earthquake zone as well as protection against clay swelling
Loved every second of it!!! Awesome video!!!
I love inspecting foundations here texas, and to me piers is the way to go! Worth every penny from my observation.
Love your videos. Informative and to the point without idle chat in between. Keep up the good work.
thank you Belinda. I'm curious about perimeter T footings which are very common...they create a raised floor (similar to pier and grade beam) without drilling piers...just excavating to proper footing depth and pouring a stemwall. How does this system work in clay? better than slabs?
I see most of the houses in the Bay Area are using this. The piers are just sitting on top of the ground. Most of the problems are piers will move.
I just dig your videos. Its really my type despite knowing nothing about it.
An interesting type of foundation to cover would be the insulated slab foundation for northern climate. Not popular in North America, this system is widely used in Europe.
It seems to be one of the best solutions to meet passive house standard due to its ability to isolate the building g from the ground. 15 inches of Styrofoam are used, and 11 inch slab is poured on top with reinforcement. Optionally a heating system can be embedded in the slab. The thermal mass would mitigate day and night temperature fluctuations. Exposing some floor to southern sun can also act as energy storage. I suppose the key to its longevity us in the subsurface preparation. Plumbing repairs would be a nightmare.
Thanks for the video!
Thank you for another wonderful video. I'm from The Netherlans, and we mostly have a different kind of foundation, called "pole foundation", where poles are driven in the ground and mostly just float on the ground. Fun fact: My grandfather was a water engineer, and in his building days (around the Second World War), they drove the wooden poles in the ground with sledge hammers. They would measure how far the pole would get into the ground with each hit, and when this became smaller than a certain number (depending on the situation), they would consider it deep enough, and the remaining part of the pole, would be cut off
@Belinda Carr To re-level a tilted slab I wonder if it could be done by slab jacking to lower the costs of interior piers? Core drill a pattern of small diameter holes where needed and then pump in the lifting medium. Cheaper? Less disruptive than trying to install precast piers?
Wonderful video! Great info and simple, straightforward delivery. Thank you for putting so much work into these!
Basements would be a great topic!
I love your videos. So illustrative. Very pleasant speaking voice as well. As I plan and build out my tiny home/adu, I need information like this on a daily basis. Have you already made a video on converting a tough shed into a home? I feel your perspective would have a big impact on those of us who are struggling with the constraints of budget/which materials not to go cheap on/space/insulation/ventilation/semi off-grid appliances etc. Doing the best I can to make this a home for myself out here in California lol.
very thorough information - impressed at how much balanced the comparisons were. good work
Just sharing..
Where I live in the Caribbean, we have generally have either rocky or a commonly occurring type of heavy clay soil (referred to as Sapate).
Though we don't have winter, we do have Rainy and Dry seasons.
In the "rainy season" (approx 6+ month of the year) heavy rains saturate the clay, causing significant heaving (soil expansion), whereas in the dry season, it dehydrates it, resulting is significant shrinkage. Both of which have significant movement and put stresses on the foundation.
The solutions to the clay areas, are typically use of a monolithic raft foundation or Strip-footing atop Piles.
The pies range from "Augured Piles" to "Driven Piles" and typical start at a 15' depth and increase based on the data from a Geo-technical survey, building design and structural requirements.
Having worked in Construction, when given the chance I will ALWAYS choose Pier and Beam. However, I also feel a deep underside is important. A tight crawl space just isn't worth it. Get some space under there if you are going with the Pier and Beams.
we're building in the circle of fire region using a pier and beam and base isolation between the piers and house. I wish someone had information on base isolation for lightweight structures. very scant offerings on the interwebs...
I have a new appreciation for my 114 year old pier and beam house in Pensacola. Thanks for the video.
Is there something like a slab pier, hybrid?
It's amazing how common slab construction is in floodplains now. It is cheap to build there, but expensive to stay, and slabs are a big part of this. The height of floods is inversely proportionate to the frequency, so even small gains in height make a noticeable difference in the regularity of water damage. The public costs of natural events go up every year, because we put more infrastructure in harms way.
Hi Belinda
I found your videos are very informative.
Could you please make a video explaining Polished Concrete and Epoxy flooring with complete details.
Thank you.
My current house has an uninsulated crawl space. I have been investigating how to insulate it best. I'm leaning toward a layer of closed cell foam (mainly to stop the air leaks) and then Rockwool. The major issue that I am having is for me being my size and time, and then source; so I will contract the job out... and everybody has jumped onto the inflation-of-the-prices-bandwagon (for reasons... greed also)... (argh).
There were several generalizations that I wasn’t expecting. Texas is a large state and the soil isn’t the same everywhere. It can be significantly different in just a matter of miles. It’s important to get a geotechnical core drilling sample and report done and evaluated by an structural engineer in order to determine what would be best for any given area. In some instances the geotechnical report could recommend piers under a slab on grade, void forms or that soil be brought in to stabilize existing soil or some combination. The engineer would design the slab and what beams would be needed and how much rebar would be needed based on the soil test recommendation and the loads required by the specific structure being built.
Excellent video and info. I have Foundation repair company in Fort Worth Texas, this is just perfect.
I'd appreciate your report on modern basement foundations here in the Pacific Northwest.
I'm here in the Great Lakes region would love a vid on basements too.
Are basements in your region typically below grade?
Another great video thank you. IMHO, I would always build with pier and beam versus slab as I would want to do it right the first time no matter the cost. Stability of the home is most important to me and I would be able to deal with the other ancillary issues that come with this type of foundation. But, in the long run I think it’s a better investment.
Yep, you can always level up a house easily, have access to your services and have a place to store your junk.
All information on foundation types would be greatly appreciated! You might as well plan out a series, explaining one facet of house design and construction at a time, roofing, plumbing, electrical, etc., with a special section on new and emerging technologies and innovations. Thanks, always good stuff!
Something to look forward to with great anticipation. :) Pier and beam, as well as materials used in construction, is one of many reasons I bought an existing home built in 1983.
Can you do slab on piers? I am in the process of renovating a house with a crawl space but I want concrete as floor surface( not overlay) and I am wondering what I'd have to do to the existing subfloor to 10:13 pour concrete on top of existing subfloor. Approx 2-3" of light weight( expanded shale instead of gravel) concrete.
I just found your channel - you seem to cover a lot of my interests like building and planned obsolescence of durable goods ( stop blaming consumers solely for this problem, I agree). For this topic, I want to build a small house on a gentle slope in Western NC. I asked a builder about using a pier foundation and he clearly was biased against piers based on his reaction. I suspect he doesn't have the talent available to build this. He raised the concern over wildlife nesting under the house. I like pier because of the ability to get to plumbing/electric after our experiences repairing/remodeling houses built on slab. After remodeling, I agree that houses should come with schematics and a lot more documentation!
On our last remodel, we could not find a GC who wanted to work with us. They were ALL busy. I don't think they liked that we had a budget - they moved on to those people who knew much less and would pay much more. Anyhow, the original builder (1989) poured a concrete slab in the middle of our house 2 inches lower than the sides in order to put a full 3/4 inch wood floor system in. ironically, the wood floor was not even level with entry way tile? So much for using match to calculate this offset!!! This made it very challenging to put in one uniform floor system. We ended up removing all flooring and adding new concrete on top. We researched and used correct concrete and bonding but still, it is a cross your fingers kind of thing.
Been watching your vids since the beginning. Love seeing the dedication and growth keep it up
I hit play ready to watch with my criticism mode on but this video covered just the right amount of every single topic! Pure great content.
I loved the music at the beginning! I've noticed that (especially for explainer videos like these) it really helps my attention when there is comfortable music in the background. I've love to see it throughout your videos! (Although as long as I'm not on my phone, I can usually add my own, to be fair.)
Thanks!
Thank you, Lewis!
Great content. This information is timeless. Thank you for sharing
Pier and Beam is the way to go in Texas. So much easier to repair if needed. If I every building anything, I will seriously consider a P&B foundation. My current home was built in 1985 and had foundation problems.
Thanks for the interesting and informative video, I appreciate watching these. As a Canadian living in the prairie of southwest Manitoba I would love to see a video on the northern climate and foundations.
I don’t own a home yet but thought I always wanted the slab foundation…good to know the drawbacks. Thanks
Good stuff, thank you for explaining it in a easy to understand way for all of us non builders and architects
You did an amazing job. Wish I would have finished my Architectural Degree back in 2008 but ended up getting my cdl license and now own my own truck. I might go back to finish it in a few years. Although I do enjoy driving my own truck.
@1:39, where anchor bolts are embedded into top of caisson/ pile for the purpose of carrying a structural load, three #3 rebar hoops or 2 #4 hoops shall surround the anchor bolts. This ensures ductility of the connection.
I'd like to see a video on basements made with ICF vs Pre-Cast concrete panels, like Superior Wall vs conventional poured concrete.
I live in the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia. It's a really weird spot. We get really cold Winters that would make me worry about pipes freezing in a crawlspace, and around town, every year some underground pipe bursts down on Main Street. The consistency actually makes me wonder if they're doing crappy repairs on purpose to have work every year. Anyways, at the same time, basements are awful because they humidity is so high here during the Summer, and it rains enough that everyone's basement is muggy and damp. My house is a split-level with a walk-out basement, the back side of my house is level with my backyard and the front is buried up to the window sills. For both those with any kind of basement or slab-on-grade, there's also the worry of Radon gas seeping up through the concrete and settling in the bottom of your house, so we have to have passive or active systems on a pipe that runs underneath the slab (including/especially a basement's slab) to bring the gas up through the house and out the roof.
If I decide to stay here whenever I go to build a house, I think I want pier and beam, and I'll just have to take preventative measures to prevent freezing of external plumbing. I think one nifty solution might be, if I'm able to be a geothermal system in, to just have an extra couple lines wrapping around my drains and well inlet (spaces far apart from each other of course) and then heavily insulate around that - maybe even with concrete in a kind of "false pier." As far as critters go, I suppose there's space for something to exist, but the underside /should/ be sealed up just as well as the sides are, albeit differently, and not particularly "more vulnerable."
Yes please do the video on the foundations you duggested.thank uou for your well presented videos.im learning a lot
Great information and video! Please provide more videos on different types of Piers, thank you.
Excellent info. Thank you for the edification and as always stay safe and please continue to share with us.
The UK switched to slab on grade a couple of decades ago for new builds and there's been nothing but trouble. I've seen entire sites demolished before getting to the second story to be swapped over to pier and beam or the slab thickness increased to deal with the soil conditions in what is predominately a rainy climate. On the same instance when I was in Texas I saw many slab on grade foundations dip only slightly and due to the incoming water main being laid in or below the slab, it had broken and released thousands of litres of water (in one case 90,000 ie 90 metric tonnes) eroding what soil was under the slab and tilting it even further out of level.
It has benefits used in the right climate with decent though put into services beforehand but too many times there isn't enough forethought and planning.
👍🏽👌🏾👌🏾👌🏾how to plan columns and beams on a site which has hard rock layer just 2-3 feet below the top soil layer?
I have done the pier and beam, with an adjustment I pour concrete after the piers are poured, I learned this from another builder then you can either have brick on the outside. There is so many different things you can do to improve the loss of heat , Thor cold air from the a/c in the summer. The poured slab you can now dig down just a little deeper and they have foam insulation that can have concrete pour on it which will help with temp control in the house. This two she talks about are simple foundations, that if you add to them can make your home so much better in the long run.
Quite a bit different in Ohio. Trench foundations, below the frost line, are the norm here, even if the house uses a slab floor. Crawl spaces here are about 38 inches high or more on newer homes, depending on local codes.
Thanks for the content. 👍👍
Trench foundations are a variation on pier and beam. They are used in colder climates to get the footing below the frost depth. This video was prepared in Texas where geound freezing is not an issue.
@@rogerhodges7656 you don't say.
I am fortunate that in the 10 1/2 years I've lived in my slab foundation house, we've not had foundation problems. And to my knowledge, there hasn't been any in the home's 57 years existence. I always thought pier & beam was ugly and a welcome mat for critters, but at least now I know why they are used. Thanks for the video. :)
I've seen pier and beam where the crawlspace was gravel rock with plastic to control the moisture as well as radon seepage.
Could you do a video on passive house build standards? Much appreciated. Thanks
Here in south Florida lots of people live in manufactured homes. The homes are positioned over a string of concrete block piers under each long steel beam. Tie downs are generally diagonal steel straps attached to the beams and then extended down to earth auger/anchors. There are different tie down specs for each specific wind zone. Much of FL soil seems to be a free flowing type sand (fairly compaction resistant), it's not uncommon that a Florida mobile home will move or settle slightly over time, however mobile homes can be easily/inexpensively releveled/realigned on the piers as needed.
It's advisable to have plenty of air movement under the mobile home to prevent moisture buildup. This free-air-flow 'skirting' can be screen or slats. BTW, under the home is a good space for geckos and common black snakes to do their thing (bug and rodent 'getters'). As with any home, it's important that the mobile home site is well drained, and the soil beneath the home needs to be covered with an effective vapor barrier.
Thanks for the video!
Some perspective from a resident/owner …
My previous house was pier on beam, current is slab. I will NEVER buy a house with a slab foundation again, for two reasons. First, the cost and complexity to repair or remodel anything to do with the plumbing is massively higher with slab. Second, flooring on top of concrete is less comfortable, unless you are doing wall to wall carpet.
i am very interested in helical piers. I have seen a brief video but have no other information - just curiosity!
Great Videos. Detailed and Informative. My house has piers and due to efflorescence these piers are cracking. How do I fix this and avoid further decay. Please suggest.
As a retired builder/ex-pat living in the Philippines, post & beam construction is very common. In building residential 3 story concrete structures
1) I do not use hollow block to fill-in between the post & beams, but instead pour 4”+ walls at the same time.
2) Use fiberglass entrainment throughout the pour along with the desired earthquake standard as set forth by P.E.
My hopes are to avoid the common cracks in the rendering/stucco coats seen within 3 to 5 years of build. I also thought that the fiber will help to adhere more securely the finish coats, but as the projects are underway, can’t back-up my hopes with evidence.
Are my hopes of a better job fool hardy or not?
Thank-you for your blogs, love em!
Crawl spaces are nothing more than stinky wet holes in the ground that breed mold which gradually takes over your living space. I will NEVER build a crawl space house. Slab houses are cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter with that large flat stone doing temperature control for free all year round. Most new houses in the Midwest are built on slab. I've never heard of anyone having any cracking problems.
Great info. I love how thorough you are and clear explanation.
I'd be very interested in seeing a video on Basements vs. Frost Protected Shallow Foundations for cold climates.
In th eUK residential buildings are usually built on trench and concrete foundations. A meter deep trench about 450mm wide is dug and filled with concrete so that these foundations support the perimeter of the building where the mass of the building is concentrated. The interior ground floor is then insulated and concret poured on it and levelled off. 100mm of insulation is presently the required amount with about 100mm of conrete on top. A damp proof membrane is applied under the insulation at the start.
Great video. In Australia we have to put piers under our slab on ground houses as we have reactive clay soils too. Perhaps the USA should do that on reactive soils
Thank you as always.
You bring so much to the table with your videos.
thanks for the video i found it very informative and useful to help me decide which type of foundation i want to use.
@1:39, caisson/pile needs longitudinal rebar and shear rebar reinforcements.
Love your videos! If you have not covered the topic already, a video on some irrigation subject matter would be interesting! Thank you!
In Washington State most of the homes of the past were built on a wall foundation with piers. They worked well in allowing the home owner to work on any plumbing issues. Most of the houses in the California area are slab on grade for new construction but the older homes are similar with wall foundation and pier. If you have any shift in the ground it has caused plumbing issues with the breaking or cracking of pipe or electric conduit. I like the old method because it also allows you to insulate the bottom of the structure and allows repairs.
Another issue that comes from slab on grade is try repairing a electric conduit or plumbing when the framers don't follow the blue print perfectly and you have to jack hammer out the conduit, cut it and extend the conduit to be within the frame work of the wall. Try repair and broken plumbing pipe and your carpet or wood floor is soaked with water because the slab on grade shifted.
A house I lived in year ago was supported on old cedar cut rounds. They lasted 40+ years and were eventually replaced with new cedar and small slabs. They’re still there as far as I know. Mind you, I live in a remote small village on Canada’s west coast and there’s a dearth of building inspectors around here.
I'm in SoCal, and what you call pier and beam for residential purposes doesn't have to hit anywhere near bedrock. The piers and footings simply need to be embedded into (usually 12-24") stable soil capable of carrying the predicted load.
HiBelinda, so glad to find you on YT. Have you done a video on geothermal heating?
An episode of augercast piles would be very cool. Not having a casing brings speediness but also challenges
Will you consider helical anchors or screw piling for residential use?
I recently saw an excavation program in which Colorado soil is excavated to a depth of 20 feet (!) and then
compacted in lifts of one foot before slab on grade foundation is placed. The cost must be very high.
I'd love a presentation if ICF. Thank you for making these. They are very informative.
I have 2 videos on the product: ruclips.net/video/J5hF72FIcxQ/видео.html
ruclips.net/video/3LDsj8ZZvD8/видео.html
Has anyone heard of a combination of a pier and beam/slab foundation using the piers to stabilize the slab to avoid problems in the future? I like the simplicity of the slab, but a house that isn't designed to last 100 years, much less 20, without major repairs is just a poorly designed house.
For a PB foundation, can you to steel beams instead? or do an FCI home ontop of that?
I thought I had seen all foundations, and I thought the list was defined.....then a few years ago, I saw a house sitting hillside on river stones. The house sits on stones, small enough to skip across the water, and was secured in the middle of the house. the house was 100+ years old. If you were to look under the house, you'd see the stones. I've also seen a house sitting on a single rock (the rock is the side of the mountain). it's a wow, when you go into the basement, and see it's a single rock, sloping down greater then 45 degrees.. Also 100+ years old. No company would do something unconventional like that today. I've also seen a "rubble foundation!". Quarry rubble, is loaded in a mound, and the house sits on the rubble. the house is a stone house. It was housing built by the quarry workers. (they used the stone from the quarry, and shipping crates.). So many diffrent types of foundations, and so many unconventional foundations.
Is there the same issue with plumbing repairs for an elevated house as a one story house on the slab foundation?
hay Belinda.... video was informative, thanks.....i have one question, i live in Indianapolis and i have plan to build the house next year, my question to you is do you have any strong solution for strong unbreakable roof to prevent from robberies /burglary done by cutting roof?, I am not interested in cement slab, my house would be brick house with roof, no basement, no second floor? ......thanks