… starting a new phase of life.
Since we are doing all the prep work ourselves for the slab foundation, we also did the installation of the rebar for the foundation. We did get some help from a couple of local construction workers who worked with us for an hourly wage. That helped a great deal and made the work go much more quickly. The entire family did learn how to wire rebar and how to insert support rebar for the footers. Here are a few photos of the process:
This week has been a very hot and tiring week of plumbing work. After trenching the main lines for the plumbing plan (6″ wide and up to 59″ below the surface of the slab as the trenches sloped toward the septic tank) the real work could begin.
We began by taking the difference between the elevation of the slab and the depth of the entry pipe into the septic tank. That difference was 59″. Since the ground slopes toward the septic tank, there was a natural slope that required us to dig less deep trenches on certain parts of the foundation.
The distance from the farthest fixture to the septic tank was approximately 140 feet. Using a combination of 1/4″ slope for the 2″ pipes and 1/8″ slope for the 3″ pipes, we were able to lay the initial pipes fairly deep below the slab and then slope the drain and branch drains toward the septic tank.
Using a riding trencher ditch witch with a 6″ wide trencher, we dug the trenches. It is critical to lay out the trenching plan to avoid driving over trenches and collapsing the sides. It is also critical to use string lines and exact measurements on the form boards to insure your trenches are placed in the proper locations. We further used intersecting string lines (again with exact measurements) to mark the locations of fixtures within the foundation. Failure to locate these exactly will result in toilets placed too close or too far from walls or waste and drain pipes that do not exit the foundation in the center of a wall. This is extremely critical; measurements should be taken multiple times, string lines placed and rechecked before and after placing fixture location.
A few things we learned…
To avoid leaks, you cannot kink pipes at intersections and no pressure can be placed on a fitting. Blue glue can help with sealing minor seapage during the pressure test (apply, let dry for 2 hrs; reapply), but will not stop a leak. A leak will require you to cut out the offending fitting and replace. (Don’t ask how we know this — ).
Make sure when you are building your fittings, make sure you don’t work yourself into a corner and find that you have two sections that need joining and no room to pull the lines together for the joint… leave yourself room for mating up different branches of the system by working in the best sequence to allow room to maneuver.
The good news was that, with a few changes, our rough-in plumbing inspection was a success. The local inspector came out and did the inspection with the water test yesterday. He complimented the work, but required us to make some changes on the design because we used the wrong code book. Apparently, the international standards (which we used) are not acceptable. The local inspectors use the universal standards, which required us to completely rip out the fittings for one of the bathrooms (and a couple of other individual fittings) and lay it out differently. Finding out this information in advance would have saved time and fittings…
After this final work to finish the changes, we’ll be able to cover the plumbing ditches and begin work on the rebar for the foundation. This makes us very happy.
I’m a bit slow in posting updates (we’ve been really busy!), but here is a panorama shot of the house with form boards in place.
This summer has already brought huge forest fires to New Mexico. The nearest fire, near Ruidoso, altered the sky even 70 miles away… The following three shots were taken from our land toward the northwest turning toward the west…
I immortalized the final bit of footer cleanout with this video:
Just a quick post to let you see how the footers looked just after digging with the Ditch Witch. Since then, they’ve been completely cleaned out and form boards are cut… another update picture to come.
We decided to tackle our own foundation. The estimates we are receiving for much of the work on the house are in most cases double the cost of doing doing it myself. The cost for labor is very high, and sub contractors are adding a percentage on top of the cost of materials. As a result I have decided to manage my own monolithic foundation pour. I will do everything except the actual pouring of concrete. I have a sub who will inspect the pre-work, make recommendations for improvements, if any, and bring a crew to mash the mud into the holes and smooth it all out.
Lacking an experience in concrete work other than to watch it done several times, I turned to literature to learn as much as I could. I found the book, Foundations and Concrete Work, published by the editors of Fine Homebuilding, to be an excellent reference and source of information which ultimately boosted my confidence in tackling the job.
The book has sections dealing with; the basics of concrete, the basics of foundations, working with rebar, concrete tools, and information on various types of foundations. The book is more geared towards the northern tier where footers, stem walls and floor joists or basements are built. There was little on the peculiarities of the monolithic pour which is prevalent in southwest residential construction. I found the basic information to be be very useful. The section on the use of rebar and how to tie the various portions together was a great help. In addition the discussions of compacting soil was helpful with building the pad. Many of the techniques discussed in the section had a bearing on how we built up the foundation pad. I would recommend this book for the novice homebuilder and give it 4 out of 5 stars.
Now that the Ditch Witch work is complete, there is quite a bit of hand work still to be done on the footers. Cleanout of the remaining loose dirt, redistribution of all the augured dirt on the pad and cutting a 45 degree bevel on the inside top of each edge of the footer require some sweat.
Here is a drawing to illustrate the footer/slab plan:
Photos of non-cleaned out section of the footer:
Photos of cleaned-out sections follow. Note the 45 degree bevel on the inside edge. Adding that bevel increases the amount of concrete on the edge of the footers and reduces the stress points where the slab and footers meet.
The pad was so solid that a pickaxe was required to clean out the corners adequately. The key is to get the bottom of the footers cleaned out down to rock or virgin soil. Any non-compacted dirt in the footers can result in eventual settling and cracking of the foundation. Since the pad is already leveled, we are moving the augured dirt to the inside of the foundation to build the pad up evenly. We probably will not require any crusher fine fill, since we have enough fill dirt to build the pad up the 1″ or so needed. The form boards will be 5 1/2″ above grade, so building up the interior of the foundation another inch will still yield a 4 1/2″ thick slab. 4″ is the nominal thickness… any extra adds additional rigidity.
We will be using a long, straight board to pull the dirt on the slab level by putting a lip on the board and dragging along the form boards to achieve a level surface. We plan to sink several pieces of vertical rebar into the slab with the tops level with the form board. These will serve as a pivot point on the interior of the slab for anchoring the long board when pulling the dirt level on the slab. Photos to follow when we get to that point.
After a few weeks’ delay, we are back on track with preparation of the foundation. Friday and Saturday we were able to get all the footers dug with the help of a rented Ditch Witch. This machine will dig the 24” x 12″ footers using modern building methods.
Through planning the order of the cuts, we were able to minimize the amount of hand work that will be required to fully prepare the footers to support the foundation. We had to go through a slight learning curve as we began the work. Discovering the best way to keep the lines straight, using a two-person team to help with start and stop points, keeping the string lines free of the dirt piles and assisting with raking level the start points for each dig made the work go more easily and enjoyably.
We took a video of the first cut… the cut for the entry door of the house:
Lessons learned:
Now that the footers are rough-cut, we are in the process of hand-cleaning the ditches and evening out the additional fill-dirt from the cleanup.
As we arrived home one evening, we spotted something moving… upon closer examination, we discovered this:
Tarantulas are not deadly; in fact, you can read more about them at this website that has lots of interesting facts about tarantulas. We like the idea of them eating pests around our place and find them very entertaining.