Foundation footings holding up the post and beam structure of your home may sink and cause severe and costly home foundation support problems.
Groundwater is the major cause… of foundation footings that sink, other than ones not poured on compacted bearing soil.
No quality hand excavated french drains will be installed in almost every case of groundwater in the crawl space.
Pumping groundwater after it has saturated the crawl space, homeowners having made no professional to solve it with hand excavated french drains on the outside of the foundation walls, in the area that corresponds to the interior groundwater crawl space or basement groundwater entry, prior to ever considering a sump pump installation, is madness from my perspective.
I am spending my own money, as a home drainage contractor, and I would never do that.
You may remember seeing an old farm house, sometime in the past perhaps, built on post and pier footings, like the old feed store, with sloping floors, or that old antique barn you loved so much.
That old example building likely never had hand excavated french drains installed around it, and therefore the groundwater ran under it, instead of around it.
Some of these buildings are still standing, yes, but damaged, you bet.
These homes and buildings have lost their subjacent and lateral support.
From a geological standpoint they are sinking into the ground.
They have lost support from under the foundation spot footings, as well as from the sides of the foundation footings, which will tilt to the side in time in many cases, dropping the post all together, leaving the beam hanging in that area, requiring a new post and spot footing at the very least.
This is something no homeowner should attempt without experience.
Once this happens, seldom will the home ever be able to be jacked back into place without doing further damage to the homes infrastructure and cosmetics.
You can pour new footings, after the home is picked up with bottle jacks or hydrolic jacks, but the original grade is best to stick with, unless you really know what you are doing as a professional, have a specific goal in mind, down to the 1/2″, and are not afraid of replacing windows, doors, cupboards, mouldings, sheet rock, and others.
You pretty much have to live with sloping floors once it has been that way for decades, as the lumber sags and takes a new shape.
Consider these important tips for the health of your foundation.
Spot footings support the post beam structure of your home.
Hire a professional mason contractor with home drainage experience to review the health of your interior crawlspace spot footings, and inspect the post and beam structure of your home, as well as the entire foundation and the overall drainage plan of your home.
A contractor that is a professional home drainage contractor, as well as a mason, is really your best bang for the buck.
Spot footings should be new solid concrete, poured as a block, with a minimum depth of 8″ and at least 18″ square.
Many times I see deck piers and cinder blocks used for spot footings. These attempts are not to code, and must be replaced by spot footings as described above.
The lender will most likely have a problem with these crawl space footing write ups, when you sell the home, if they are cinder block or deck piers.
When a home buyer makes application for a loan the pest-dryrot and structural inspection will most likely identify these types of, not to code footings, as a repair issue, and demand correction of this situation as a contingency of the loan being given to the buyer.
I have seen many cases where a home was bought and sold under different types of purchase and financing, many times, and over and over, and every time the lenders and inspectors did not find and report the home drainage problem, because they just did not know what has going on with the ground water entry, or did not care.
Most often an experienced pest, dryrot and structural inspector, and/or buyer, will know the difference.
Deck piers and cinder blocks do not have enough strength to support the home unless filled, and then perhaps, and will cause settling and sloping of the homes’ floors, jammed doors, tight or stuck windows, and/or perhaps even buckled floors, from the constant moisture below the homes floors.
After the new spot footings are poured it is a great idea to place a square of composition asphalt shingle under the new post to assure there is something between the post and the pad, so the post beam structure lasts as long as possible.
If this is not done, the post will eventually dryrot where it meets the concrete spot footing, as moisture affects the bottom of the post first.
Never put pressure treated wood in your crawl space to replace regular kiln dried lumber.
The toxins can kill the health of your home, especially in homes with poor foundation ventilation.
You do not want to use pressure treated lumber in a crawlspace, because of the chemical nature of this lumber.
Yes, pressure treated lumber will rot less, but also the smell and chemicals invade through the floors into your home, and this is not good to breathe.
Not to mention the toxic environment that is created within the crawl space itself, in which you must eventually go.
Gusset, the posts to the beams with plywood squares that are screwed or nailed to attach the post to the beam, creating an added insurance that in the event of a earthquake, the post will not jump off the pad, and away from the beam.
This is what a gusset is: a piece of lumber or plywood that secures the post to the beam. This is the best way to protect your homes’ spot footings and post-beam structure during the unexpected “shaker”.
Pull the moisture barrier over the top of the foundation footing to further protect the spot footing and post from moisture.
Open your foundation vents, located in the outside foundation stem wall, in the summer, to allow air to pass through the foundation crawlspace area. Fans are used with the foundation vents open to dry out the saturated crawl space. This will help to remove moisture from accumulated winter wetness within your crawlspace.
Close the foundation vents before the end of fall, prior to the winter snow and/or rain.
Install hand excavated french drain groundwater removal systems on the outside of the homes’ foundation walls, approximately 18″ away from the foundation wall, after installing a compacted and raised splash block of clay type soil, if possible, to run rain water hitting the homes siding, away from the foundation and into the newly installed hand excavated french drain groundwater removal system.
And you didn’t spend a dime on a worthless sump pump installation either.