[AT] Continuing "What to do"
Cecil R Bearden
crbearden at copper.net
Tue Jan 12 17:19:34 PST 2016
When I built my house in 1985, I did not have the soils engineering
experience that I have now. I also did not have the experience with
this crappy soil that I have. I picked an old house site on the farm
and found the highest spot and cleaned off the topsoil before digging
the footing. Then we poured a monolithic slab on top of the footing.
The slab is sitting on top of 18inches of sand. I dug through the sand
to install the ductwork and plumbing. This way we should never have a
problem with water in the ducts. The footing has settled approximately
4 inches over the past 30 years, based upon satellite surveying with
State Plane coordinates. There is always the possibility that the
USCGS disc has settled, but if so then my house should have raised.
The monolithic slab and stem walls are tied to the footing. The entire
slab floats on top of the ground.
Let me say that my job was to review and approve the design of dams both
concrete and earthfill in the state of Oklahoma. This included all the
structures needed to operate the dam. I was required to be able to
design both earth and concrete structures in order to review the designs
submitted. In 1997 we built a 40 x 100 building with a concrete slab
with piping in the floor for floor heat. A 6 in waffle type slab sets
on 8 inch piers 6 ft deep into shale every 8 ft with a waffle type slab
construction. 6 inches of compacted wetted sand with the pipes in the
sand, over 10 mil plastic sheeting for water stop. We used 1/2 in
reinforcing 18in. on center each way. Contractor and Dad tried to tell
me that we did not need that much reinforcing. My calculations said it
was a minimum. I had 6% air entrainment with polymers added to make
things easier for the cement workers. When the concrete arrived, a local
septic tank contractor arrived to help the cement contractor. He
started adding water to every truck. When I said it was not needed, Dad
said everybody adds water. The slab cracked every 8 ft across the 40
ft length. The contractor blamed it on the concrete. The concrete
company came out and looked at it and presented us with copies of the
delivery ticket that was signed. Every ticket stated that the
specifications are not guaranteed if water is added to the mix. When I
told Dad we were up that old creek without a paddle, he said Everybody
adds water. I had advised the contractor that he did not need to add
water since I had ordered the polymer. He was in agreement with me at
the start, but the guy who added the water was his buddy..... Dad did
not want to get into a lawsuit because he drank coffee with the contractor.
I ended up with the reputation in this community as the Engineer who
did not know s@@t about concrete! I think that i why engineers do not
do work in their own community. The slab did not separate, it is
just cracked and it will take on water when you wash the slab. It burns
my butt every time I sweep across one of those cracks.
When I look at a set of plans, I don't necessarily look at the design as
much as I look where the contractor can screw it up!! Then I relate my
findings to the engineer. So far I have received many referrals for
construction inspection jobs.
We have a development a half mile away that I grade the road annually.
I cut hay on shares for several years there. I offered to build the
pads and do the slab design for the builders there. I was told by 3
builders that they pay $275 for site preparation. If I could do it for
that, I could do whatever I thought was needed as long as it was not
over $275. Also the slab design was one that they used for everything
and that is what their warranty insurance carrier had approved and they
were not going to change it.
The first house ( approx 150K ) built in this development was built on a
site that was scraped off and it was a level 5 acres before it was
scraped. 1 year later, the buyer spent over 70K on french drains and
landscaping and grading. I was asked if I would grade the site to
drain away from the house, and I just refused to get into it. Another
house across the road from this one was built in the middle of a terrace
waterway that was cut to build the site. We had the 2007 hurricane come
through here during framing construction, and water went in the garage
and out through the side of a bedroom!!!!! I was asked to build a
new road through the development and was too high. I was asked by the
contractor to size the culverts. I specified 3 ea 18 x 36 flat bottom
culverts due to the low fill available. I was told I did not know
anything about water, and they installed 2 ea 12in culverts. I spent 35
years designing waterways and water structures I almost got into a
fight, but shut up and walked away. 2 months later we had one of
those monsoon rainstorms, and the culverts were 200 ft downstream of the
road. They now have 5 12in culverts!!
This is just typical Okie..........
I get pissed when I think of these idiots that just throw away money
because they think proper design costs money.
Cecil in OKla
On 1/12/2016 2:21 PM, Mike M wrote:
> We had gophers get under our barn floor (I didn't build it) and it
> caused a lot of cracks and eventually heaving. The cracks I can
> partially blame on the cement installer who I think put the relief cuts
> too far apart. The cement pad in front of our garage is the same way,
> cracked and heaving. I will NEVER have concrete installed without
> re-bar, or some sort of steel reinforcement.
>
> Mike M
>
>
> On 1/12/2016 2:21 PM, Dennis Johnson wrote:
>> Charlie, Cecil,
>>
>> My main loader project is trying to prepare a site to build a 36 x 44 or 48 pole building. Got a few trees down that were too close or in the build site, and now need to work Building poles will be set in dirt, and the floor will be "floating" without stem walls. Plan to do hydronic heating in the slab.
>> My entire property is a small hill. The soil is sandy, and the location I have for the building was where there used to be a small shed. Gophers dug tunnels all though the site. Loose sandy soil runs though the gopher holes and comes out further down.
>> The soil where I am has a lot of sandstone. So water may go down between 6" and 30" and hit a sandstone layer and then try to move more horizontal than vertically down. It is not the nasty gumbo (grew up in Kansas - remember gumbo very well) type soil Cecil was talking about, but it is still soft and nasty especially when you end up on top of one of the gopher tunnels. As. I recall the definition of quicksand is sandy soil where water is flowing though it......
>> I need to move some dirt to level out the site, and also do some drainage to make sure water drains around it. I have a few places where there is build ups like a ditch edge are too steep and I need to move dirt from there to the building site. There is also some fill at site of an old house that burn down in wildfires where I need to remove some dirt.
>>
>> Thanks
>> Dennis
>>
>>
>> Sent from my iPad
>>
>>> On Jan 12, 2016, at 12:38 PM, charlie hill <charliehill at embarqmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> Cecil, I'm going to pick on you a bit because I think you will agree with
>>> me.
>>> After a 40 year career in construction and then real estate appraisal it
>>> still
>>> amazes me that people pay so little attention to foundation design and
>>> finish
>>> landscaping prior to construction compared to what you see with commercial
>>> and industrial buildings. It's become a pet peeve of mine so please indulge
>>> me.
>>>
>>> It seems like folks build a house in a hole and then
>>> try to figure out how to drain the hole after the house is finished. Given
>>> your
>>> background I'm surprised you made the mistake of not considering soils but
>>> anyone can make a mistake.
>>>
>>> I bet if you had been designing a foundation for a commercial building on
>>> your
>>> site you would have not only put piles under it but you probably would have
>>> preloaded the site with good compactable soil that you later graded down
>>> leaving a solid, compacted base to "float" the slab on and at the same time
>>> gaining enough elevation to allow for settling. Or you might have even
>>> mucked it out to a solid base and filled the hole with compactable fill.
>>> Of course when you have to write the check yourself for all of that site
>>> prep
>>> it is easy to see the temporary merit of doing it the other way.
>>>
>>> Near where I live is a piece of property that is not low but it's wet and it
>>> does
>>> not have good drainage to anywhere. It's about 25 acres and the folks that
>>> own
>>> it moved up to Chicago and made a bunch of money. They retired back home to
>>> build their dream retirement home. They cleared off a corner of the
>>> property and
>>> built the house with a conventional floor system and after the fact realized
>>> they were
>>> in a hole. In the past 3 or 4 years they have completely graded and
>>> re-graded the
>>> entire 25 acres and dug two large ponds to try and dry the yard up and get
>>> the water
>>> out from under the house. I think they finally have it fixed as long as it
>>> doesn't rain
>>> enough to flood the ponds and at normal water table they only have about 2
>>> to 3 feet of
>>> bank before they flood. Now I notice that their outfall ditch seems to be
>>> flooding some
>>> of their neighbors slightly. Had they simply shot grade on the site they
>>> would have seen
>>> that all they needed to do was build on the other corner of the site.
>>>
>>> I'm writing all of this not to pick on you exactly but so that others that
>>> might read it and
>>> not know better can be warned. Think of the final elevation, grading and
>>> landscaping FIRST
>>> not last. I guess this sounds like I'm trying to be a smart A$$ but as I
>>> said it's a pet peeve.
>>>
>>> Charlie
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Cecil R Bearden
>>> Sent: Tuesday, January 12, 2016 11:04 AM
>>> To: Antique tractor email discussion group
>>> Subject: Re: [AT] Continuing "What to do"
>>>
>>> In Dennis' defense, this Oklahoma mud is really something else. It
>>> is about as sticky as super glue and as slick as greased owl S**T ! (
>>> My Dad's favorite expression ). You can get stuck in a truck with mud
>>> grip tires in as little as 2 inches of this stuff. It is a very
>>> sticky and slick clay. To drive in our mud, you have to have aggressive
>>> tire tread and enough power to spin the mud out to take another bite
>>> when the tire comes around again. A friend has a pickup with a high
>>> speed rear end but with only a 350 engine, and it cannot spin the mud
>>> out of the tires.
>>>
>>> On a tractor, the mud will build up in front of the front tires and then
>>> stick you. If you put any load in the bucket, the tires will sink. You
>>> have to keep moving fast enough over the ground to stay on top of the
>>> mud. When it dries, you need a pick and hammer to get it loose. When
>>> you wash the last of it you need a detergent to loosen the last film
>>> that is left.
>>> If I park a truck on a dry place and it sits without moving for a year,
>>> it is down to the axle. If I park it on boards to hold it up, it lasts
>>> another year. We have to design foundations with piers down as much as
>>> 6 to 8 ft to hit a shale layer. My house was built in 1985 when I was
>>> not really familiar with this soil, and has a conventional 12 x 18
>>> footing with no piers. It was also poured monolithic. It has sunk
>>> nearly 4 inches in the 30 years since it was built. That is an entire
>>> structure 34 x 66ft and functions as a solid slab!
>>>
>>> Just FYI about the mud in most of OKla.
>>>
>>> Cecil in oKla
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> On 1/12/2016 8:19 AM, Ralph Goff wrote:
>>>>> On 1/12/2016 1:01 AM, Dennis Johnson wrote:
>>>>> Ralph, Larry,
>>>>>
>>>>> Maybe I need to practice being stuck more to develop that. Tried it
>>>>> earlier without a lot of success.
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks
>>>>> Dennis
>>>> Hope this picture is not too big for the list. I took it last June
>>>> while filling in a muddy crossing with sand. Loose sand on
>>>> top of mud and water so the Massey sunk almost to the front axle as I
>>>> pushed into it with the bucket. I thought it was
>>>> worth a picture before getting backed out of there using the bucket.
>>>>
>>>> Ralph in Sask.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
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