[00:00:00] Eric Goranson: It's around the house. And so we've been talking about going through. And dealing with cracks and stuff in the foundation. And we were talking about it as we go to break. You know, carbon fiber is a great way to do it. But there's one thing you can do, especially with horizontal and even vertical cracks, in your foundation.

[00:00:22] Eric Goranson: And I'll tell you how I've repaired these in the past. And this was a engineered solution that we did at the time. So always consult your engineer to make sure that that solution is right for you. But here's how we did it. So we would go through and take the crack and clean it up, get all the loose stuff out of it.

[00:00:40] Eric Goranson: Sometimes that crack gets to be really big, especially with deteriorated foundations. And so what we do is we go through and do that. We'd actually wet the, wet the foundation wall down with a sponge and get it. So it's soaked the water in because anything we put on it, When it comes to remodeling and renovating your home, there is a lot to [00:01:00] know, but we've got you covered.

[00:01:02] Eric Goranson: This is around the house. Welcome to the round the house show. This is where we help you get the most out of your home through information and education. Thanks for joining us today. Well, I'm going to talk about something that I've spent a lot of time working on over the years, basements and crawl spaces and how to fix them the right way.

[00:01:22] Eric Goranson: If you have problems now, a little bit about me and uh, you've probably heard me talk about this before if you're a long time listener, but uh, I used to work for a foundation company. So I was, uh, Really well spoken on having to go in and problem solve issues, how to fix them, how to take care of them, and sometimes getting engineers involved to make sure that we have the right system.

[00:01:49] Eric Goranson: And so this is something that I've worked with the best of the best on and it's something that I know a lot about. So I thought, hey, this is a great time to give you guys some tips on this because this really starts to happen as [00:02:00] people come in inside, they start to realize that they have issues. Uh, especially in areas that get wet in the wintertime, you know, or you've got issues like that.

[00:02:09] Eric Goranson: So these are things that, um, my tips. And let's start out with one of the big ones. Water in the crawlspace or basement. Now I have seen water in the basement where they had a foot. I've seen water in the crawlspace where I popped open inside the house a vent cover and there was water floating in the vents.

[00:02:32] Eric Goranson: So I could see that the water was up within inches of the floor. So they had a pretty good swimming pool going in their crawl space. And so these are all things that I've seen the worst of the worst. So we're going to talk about it here. Now, when I see water in a crawl space or basement, the first thing I do is take a look at where the gutters are draining into the downspouts and where those are going.

[00:02:55] Eric Goranson: And here's why about 60 percent of the time in my [00:03:00] experience, I have seen. Those crawl spaces and basements get affected by rainwater because you think about it. You have all that square footage and there's 1, 2, 3, maybe 4 places around the house where the water is coming down and point loading right next to that foundation.

[00:03:17] Eric Goranson: So that is just asking that is just asking for it. And so here's what happens. So you want to think about that water coming to those downspouts really like. When it hits the ground, it's like an upside down cone. So every foot that that goes down, that cone gets about a foot wider, for instance. So if you use that as a visual.

[00:03:39] Eric Goranson: You can be eight feet, 10 feet away where that's draining onto the ground in it potentially with rodents, with roots, with anything else, even underground, um, places where they have dug, you know, to put in a sewer line or things like that. That can hit clay layers and send that right back to the house [00:04:00] again.

[00:04:00] Eric Goranson: So that's why I say those gutters need to go at least 10 to 12 feet away from the house and downhill. So be very careful if those are going right next to the house. Generally that means it's going to be causing a foundation damage and getting the water into that. So make sure first, before you do anything on that foundation, get the water well away, get it into a system.

[00:04:20] Eric Goranson: Really all you have to do is, um, depending on what your soil conditions are, what I like to do is put them into a three or four inch ABS pipe. And get them all into that, put it underground, you can bury it and get it well away from the house and you can either surface drain it down a hill, uh, follow your local building codes for that or go into a dry well system.

[00:04:40] Eric Goranson: Um, you know, some places it goes out to the street and that's completely legal. So make sure that that's working. So many people don't pay attention to where those systems are. And you could even have gutters going into a downspout system and going into a storm drain and it can be broken and it can be causing that issue because you go, oh, no.

[00:04:59] Eric Goranson: [00:05:00] When was the last time you had a camera run down those things? Those things should be cleaned out every couple of years. And if you've got trees, probably even sooner without gutter cover. So make sure yours is working really, really well. And, uh, that's really going to stop a lot of those issues from happening.

[00:05:17] Eric Goranson: So that's the first thing I say, make sure you get that taken care of, and you're going to be in a better position when it comes to water in the crawl space. So make sure you get that. Now, here's the thing too. Sometimes you've got that under control and you could have a spring, you could have a high water table.

[00:05:34] Eric Goranson: You could have a lot of things like that. And these are things that I just want you to, to really take into account. These things are huge issues. When you're trying to deal with that. So sometimes you have to put in like in a, um, you know, under the crawl space or, or even in the basement. Sometimes you have to dig up the floor and put in a D watering system.

[00:05:58] Eric Goranson: And what's that? So what [00:06:00] I do on those is I go around and put in a French drain system in the basement. Now, there's a couple of things you got to be careful with. Sometimes in a basement's designed so that concrete floor is actually keyed in to keep the walls from pushing in. So you can have weak foundations or situations where if you go to remove that, you need to really plan ahead.

[00:06:24] Eric Goranson: So always consult an engineer before you just rip up that crawl space. Or that more so even that basement floor, but really, when you get into that, um, what I do is I'll go around and, um, use a concrete saw and we'll go around and cut around the perimeter. Basically, give ourselves a place for a French drain system right at the base of that foundation wall because so many times you'll have water in a basement.

[00:06:50] Eric Goranson: It's coming up between. The foundation wall in the floor. So it's that bottom corner. So if you look down at the corner where the wall meets the floor, that's a dry [00:07:00] joint right there because those were poured at 2 different times. So that dry joint is always a place that likes to leak and that hydraulic pressure pushes the water up to the soil and does that.

[00:07:11] Eric Goranson: That is something that it's almost impossible to stop without putting in a lower point for that water to go now if you have a Crack in the wall. We'll talk about that a little bit later if that's leaking that's an easy fix But really controlling that water that's down under the slab is your issue so what I recommend here is to go ahead and take a Is to take that French drain system and put up beneath the soil.

[00:07:37] Eric Goranson: Now, if you've got a lot of surface area down there, like a big basement, you might want to put a couple cross ones that go across the center of the floor to grab that as well, because we want to create a low point for all the groundwater to seep into. Instead of pushing into the garage, you want to put it into that pipe.

[00:07:55] Eric Goranson: So that way a sump pump can grab it and take it away. So you're going to [00:08:00] create that perimeter drain and, uh, with a French drain down there. So that's like a six inch pipe. With gravel that's perforated, you know, and you're going to embed that in gravel around there and then you can pour that across the top again and seal that floor back up.

[00:08:14] Eric Goranson: So I like that versus the traditional gutter system that there's people that put these kind of gray gutters and then they leave that exposed around there. I don't like to keep that exposed. I like to have the concrete down there. So I don't want to do that. So I like to make it so, you know, that is working well, but not creating.

[00:08:33] Eric Goranson: Thank you. Not having a place that's sealed up is not a good idea down there either. So make sure that that concrete gets poured in all the way. And that way you've got that floor locked in. It makes for a stronger house. So really making sure that you've got that French drain watering system in there.

[00:08:46] Eric Goranson: And that's a big project guys. That's. You can spend 20 or 30 grand pretty quickly having somebody come down and do that. And that's a lot of work because they're down there digging. They have to, you know, you got a day with somebody down there and a concrete cutter cutting up the [00:09:00] floor. And then maybe an engineer involved as well.

[00:09:02] Eric Goranson: But that is kind of the only foolproof way of getting water underneath that slab and dealing with it. Because you can't really seal, there's nothing you can put on there to seal that cold joint between the... The foundation or the foundation wall in the floor. So those are things that you're just going to be stuck doing, but that's a, that's a good way to do it.

[00:09:20] Eric Goranson: And then you have that sump pump that's going out and getting the water well away from the house, you know, I'd say 20 feet away and going into your gutter system. So it just goes away. If you can get into that storm drain system, you're golden. All right, we come back. We're going to talk about some of the things you should be looking for with your house.

[00:09:36] Eric Goranson: Just as soon as around the house returns.[00:10:00]

[00:10:09] Eric Goranson: What's up? This is Dixit in you and Satchel from Steel Panther and you are listening to around the house with Eric G. Yeah, we love Eric G and you should too.

[00:10:27] Eric Goranson: Welcome back to the around the house show. This is where we help you get the most out of your home through information and education. Thanks for joining us today. We're talking about basements and crawl spaces, kind of my complete guide to them and how to fix them and fix them right. And we've been talking about, uh, water in the crawl space or basement, how to deal with that.

[00:10:45] Eric Goranson: And, uh, really, you know, a sump pump is going to be one of your better ways after you've dealt with a gutter system. So, if you've got your gutters working correctly and the water's going away, that's a good way to go inside. Now, let's talk about foundation cracks. And this is [00:11:00] a big deal, and this can be really scary, and there's a lot of...

[00:11:03] Eric Goranson: Good foundation companies out there, and there's a lot of not so good ones out there that love to use fear that your house is going to fall down and that kind of stuff. And you're really going to see a lot of it this time of year with things moving around, you know, many homes as it gets colder outside, start to creak and make noise, humidity changes, those kind of things.

[00:11:21] Eric Goranson: And a lot of that can be, you know, depending on the soil that your house is built on many cases, you know, a house is built on clay soil. And if you're in a location where seasonably, you have wet and dry seasons, what can happen is, is that clay ends up like your kitchen sponge. And so what happens is, is when that gets smaller, you know, and that gets dried up, it shrinks.

[00:11:45] Eric Goranson: And so your house, Slightly settles and then when it gets wet, it expands, which means your house moves a little bit. And so many times that's where you'll see, like, cracks around, uh, in a crawl space, uh, [00:12:00] foundation cracks around vent holes and things like that. That's where that really goes. And so these are things you really got to be careful with.

[00:12:06] Eric Goranson: These are things that I really want you to make sure that you've got that, you know, understood and then you can figure out if, if keeping that soil wet for instance, all year round means your house moves a little bit less. Thanks. And you're just watering around there. So those are some of the hidden things that can happen just with a crawl space, for instance, with cracks, but with cracks, there's two different kinds of cracks that I want you to pay attention to when it's talking to load bearing foundation walls.

[00:12:33] Eric Goranson: So it's something that's holding up your house. What I want you to look for is the difference between a vertical crack and a horizontal crack. That vertical crack is. Many times caused by settling, you know, concrete always is going to crack. So that's already has a tendency to do that after it's poured.

[00:12:52] Eric Goranson: So with more and more things moving around, it's, it's pretty common. And so that kind of crack is one [00:13:00] thing. Now, when you have a horizontal crack and a bow, that is when. Structurally, things are going sideways that you should pay attention to. Now, this is something that I don't want to use fear in this because so many people out there that are foundation contractors will prey upon these situations.

[00:13:22] Eric Goranson: And so Um, that little bit of percentage that use that to, to close the dealer or something that I'm always concerned about. But if you've got a horizontal crack going, you know, like left to right across your foundation, the first thing I want you to do is I really want you to call a structural engineer before you've called that foundation contractor in to take a look at it.

[00:13:45] Eric Goranson: It might not be that big a deal. It could be where they had a joint. When they were pouring, they got a little dry and it was just a weak spot in the foundation. It could be a big tree outside pushing. It could be a driveway with it was added and it's [00:14:00] pushing in or I've even seen people have water barrels and water storage from their gutters outside that broke the foundation on the side.

[00:14:09] Eric Goranson: So I've seen multiple things that can cause damage like this. But most importantly, I want to get that structural engineer and so they can be the ones that that figure out the solution. Once they figure out the solution, then you can go out and get bids for that. So a lot of people come in and say, Hey, we're gonna we're gonna jack your house up.

[00:14:32] Eric Goranson: And, you know, you don't have to do that. There are so many better ways to doing this and really for foundation issues anymore. In most cases, you don't want to have to jack the house up because you want to be able to live in it. And most people aren't gonna let you jack them up. And live in the house, and now you're having to move out.

[00:14:47] Eric Goranson: There's a lot of things with that. And so really, there's no reason for that now. I have actually done a couple of different things. One, I've used carbon fiber going across that where they put carbon fiber straps. That are bonded to [00:15:00] the foundation and that is stronger than the concrete itself. So that's a really strong way to do it too.

[00:15:05] Eric Goranson: I've done a structural steel walls on the inside to keep that from moving anymore. And then, uh, doing it that way. Uh, in extreme cases, I've poured new interior foundation walls on the inside of it. So I double up the thickness and put a new foundation wall on the inside to help bolster it, bolster that up and give it, um, some additional strength.

[00:15:29] Eric Goranson: And, uh, I've done interior foundation walls on bad foundations. Where we didn't want to jack the house up. So all we do is we come in and pour a new foundation wall on the inside of the old one and leave the old one there. So basically you've doubled up that foundation wall. Then you can put in all the latest to the rebar.

[00:15:46] Eric Goranson: You can use, uh, some of the new waterproof cements that they have additives out there that make cement, uh, much more waterproof. So there's a lot of cool things you can do with that. Now you will lose a foot or so of square footage on the inside, depending [00:16:00] on how thick it is. But I tell you what, it's a great option.

[00:16:02] Eric Goranson: Especially when lifting the house is not a good idea. So that's one right there to really pay attention to. Cause again, these are things that are cost effective. You want to make sure you have an engineer in that. Now I've even done in these situations where I've actually gone in there and we have actually gone in there and done a new foundation wall, but we made it taller.

[00:16:24] Eric Goranson: And so we actually came in and lowered the floor at the same time. And so how we did that, so we didn't structurally hurt the walls. We actually went in and dug down and did footings. Beneath the soil, and we cut out a and B sections, so we only would remove 50 percent of the concrete in the 1 wall and then dig down and skip every other section.

[00:16:46] Eric Goranson: So we break them off into, like, 3 foot by 3 foot areas. And then we would go through there and after we did that, it was really cool. So we dig down, put a footing into it and then once those are locked in, we would dig out the other pieces and then do that. Once you get [00:17:00] those footings in there like that, and you've got that poured, then we do the interior foundation wall, and then we dig out the stuff in there, all the, take out the concrete, and, and, you know, a foot or two of soil, and now you've got a much higher ceiling height.

[00:17:14] Eric Goranson: And so, you know, things we had to do when we did that, we had to remove the HVAC equipment if there was. Way to take the water heater out. We had to pay attention to where drains were and things like that. Um, that changed everything. So you really had to make sure that you knew where the sewer was coming in.

[00:17:29] Eric Goranson: If it came through through the floor, is it now coming through the wall? So these are all things we had to really take into account. But they're all manageable. You know, we had to add on to stairs. So we took the stairs out and reframe those. So these are all things that, uh, that could be done. We put Egress windows in at the time.

[00:17:46] Eric Goranson: So there's a lot of times that you can go through and fix a lot of problems and get yourself some good square footage in there as well. And, uh, these are also times that you can fix any, uh, structural things with the ceiling above and deal with beams and posts and footings [00:18:00] and put in a stronger system than what was there before.

[00:18:03] Eric Goranson: So really don't be scared of those kinds of things. But again, if you've got issues. With cracks in the foundation and those kind of things get the structural engineer in there first. I've dealt with tons of, uh, you know, vertical cracks and I had those, uh, shoot. I have them on my house here where I went through.

[00:18:21] Eric Goranson: I had one crack that was vertical and I went through and I went at the deck out. I went through on that side of that corner there and I repaired that. That way I used carbon fiber so it wouldn't move. And it was a really good, strong repair. So carbon fiber is a great way to do it. You want to do it as a DIY project and you know what you're doing.

[00:18:40] Eric Goranson: Check out Rhino carbon fiber. That's where I get my materials for and you can get it online around the house. Be right back. Don't go anywhere

[00:18:55] Eric Goranson: Hey, this is Ron keel the metal cowboy from keel the Ron keel [00:19:00] band and Steeler We are rocking around the house with Eric G

[00:19:09] Eric Goranson: Welcome back to the round the house show This is where we help you get the most out of your home through information and education. Thanks for joining me today Hey, if you want to find out more about our show right here, head over to around the house online. com. You can find out more over there as well as contact me and as well as take a look at our over 200 videos that we have up on YouTube with all home improvement stuff, everything about your house, including some great made in America stuff that we have taken a look at.

[00:19:35] Eric Goranson: And really just watched people make some amazing and create some amazing things. And so we highlight those over there as well. We typically do about one a week of those. So take a look at our 200 plus videos over there. It's a lot of fun. So, uh, take a look at those might be able to help you on your next project.

[00:19:51] Eric Goranson: We've been talking today, everything about basements and crawl spaces and how to fix them, right? And so we've been talking about going through. And dealing with [00:20:00] cracks and stuff in the foundation. And we were talking about as we go to break, you know, carbon fiber is a great way to do it. But there's one thing you can do, especially with horizontal and even vertical cracks in your foundation.

[00:20:14] Eric Goranson: And I'll tell you how I've repaired these in the past. And this was a engineered solution that we did at the time. So always consult your engineer to make sure that that solution is right for you. But here's how we did it. So we would go through and take the crack and clean it out, get all the loose stuff out of.

[00:20:31] Eric Goranson: And sometimes that crack gets to be really big, especially with deteriorated foundations. And so what we do is we go through and do that. We'd actually wet the wet the foundation wall down with a sponge and get it. So it's soak the water in because anything we put on it. Okay. It will soak the water back out of it.

[00:20:49] Eric Goranson: So if I use any kind of a patching compound on that, so, um, what we would do is get the cement all, uh, repair patch [00:21:00] material in the bags and we'd mix it up. And it's a ultra high strength concrete. And so what we would do is mix it up. And so it's the consistency that you could make a softball out of it.

[00:21:10] Eric Goranson: Right? So that would be about as thick as we would get it. And then we fill in and trowel smooth that entire area. So we get that thing all patched in and we kind of skim coat that whole area right there where the crack is not the entire wall, just around that and get it smoothed out almost like you're doing drywall, but no tape, just gonna.

[00:21:31] Eric Goranson: Smooth that out. Once that dries, we would then drill through that repair and then put an injection port in and we would inject in a urethane sealer. Now, this urethane sealer is kind of the consistency of warm honey. And what's cool about this is when you pump that into the void space behind the foundation wall where water was coming through, if there's moisture there, it [00:22:00] creates a foam, kind of like how your urethane glues foam up.

[00:22:04] Eric Goranson: If you've ever used those, those gorilla glues and that kind of stuff, when that hits moisture, it foams up a little bit, and that's what helps that glue work. Well, as soon as it hits that moisture, it foams up. And creates a spray foam type barrier on the backside. That's waterproof. So it's perfect for that.

[00:22:22] Eric Goranson: Once it hits that boom, and then since you've created that dam, it doesn't have a place to go up again. So just seals that up. It's a really good solution. For fixing cracks that are leaking in the foundation. So it's a great thing to do. If there's pipes that come through, you can do that where you drill through carefully and then use the urethane.

[00:22:41] Eric Goranson: There's a lot of places that you can use it to seal up any of those foundation leaks. And, uh, the only time that it doesn't really work well is if you have a concrete block wall. Now here's the problem. A lot of older concrete, you know, CMU block walls, they love to [00:23:00] leak. And the problem is, is that a lot of the times when they built these, they didn't fill them up with concrete.

[00:23:05] Eric Goranson: And so they're almost like a honeycomb in that they've got all these open cells. And so you could have water leaking on one side and that water is going through and filling up and, and leaking someplace else. So it's really hard to track down concrete block walls that are leaking because that water is moving around everywhere.

[00:23:24] Eric Goranson: And you really just can't fill those things up. And so, I have had to go around with a very small drill bit and try to see where the water is leaking from. And I've gone through and, and let loose 50 gallons of water, I think, coming out of the wall because they were all filled up with those little holes in the concrete blocks.

[00:23:47] Eric Goranson: So they had seeped between blocks. That can be a huge problem. So, things to consider. Um, you don't know where the water is coming in and so we have tried multiple different ways to get it [00:24:00] figured out. But really, the only way that we could really waterproof those walls effectively was to dig down on the outside of the house.

[00:24:08] Eric Goranson: And do a waterproof coating on the outside because those concrete blocks, you just really couldn't get in there. We had thought about drilling in and pumping in a mortar mix into there to help fill them or something like that. But we just couldn't really get a good way to do it once they've been installed.

[00:24:24] Eric Goranson: So something to think about that concrete block foundation wall is the worst to try to do. So the only way I would do it would be to go ahead and do that on the outside. Now, here's the thing, guys. Thanks. Any of these coatings that you put on the inside, they don't really work well. You can go in and put all the waterproof coatings on the inside.

[00:24:46] Eric Goranson: And if you have moisture pushing through, it tries to push that off the wall and that can be a really big problem. So I get it. If you're trying to stop some moisture. That's one thing, but really [00:25:00] you're not going to paint on a coating on a foundation wall and stop a moisture issue in the basement by just painting it.

[00:25:07] Eric Goranson: It's just really not going to work that well. And so one of the things that I want you to keep in mind down there is airflow is your friend if you have a basement. So one, I would make sure always be testing for radon every few years, make sure you're good, but really with a basement, I want to make sure that that air is getting taken around the house because many times that basement Dark, it's musty, it's smelly, and that is from high humidity and low airflow.

[00:25:35] Eric Goranson: So one, I want to make sure that all corners of that basement and go around to test it is below 60 percent relative humidity. So make sure you got that dialed in. If you're down there, 40, 50%, that's fine. If you're getting up into the mid fifties, you should be paying attention because you probably need your own dehumidifier down there.

[00:25:54] Eric Goranson: So there's kind of two schools of thought. If you have dry air upstairs, if you're moving that air around, you could balance it [00:26:00] out. But really, if you've got high humidity down there, I would put in a, don't get one of the portable ones. They just don't work well, but mount in a regular dehumidifier, you know, mounted up correctly, hardwired in there.

[00:26:14] Eric Goranson: With a drain and let it just run and then make sure to change filters in cleaning as necessary, but really a dehumidifier in that space is big and that's where it's going to save you a ton of money and keeping mold and dust mites and all those things that come. With, um, the health issues of having a mold in a crawlspace or basement is big.

[00:26:36] Eric Goranson: Now, the other thing I want to talk about is crawlspace encapsulation. And you've probably seen the commercials where you see the, the picture of the white plastic crawlspace that's hermetically sealed up. And there's two things that need to happen with this. One, if you're going to do that, okay, you're going to seal up all your vents, you're going to condition that crawlspace.

[00:26:56] Eric Goranson: You need to mount in a dehumidifier in there. [00:27:00] And that way that's running and keeping that So it's a dry space. You don't need condensation happening down there. And that's where the issues come about. So if somebody went down there and encapsulated your crawl space and there's not a dehumidifier or you're not heating and cooling that space like the rest of the house.

[00:27:18] Eric Goranson: Then, uh, I would have a professional go down and take a look at it. Uh, that should be a conditioned space. If you're in an area where green grass can grow outside, uh, then if you're in that kind of a place, then guess what? That could be a mold issue down there. So you want to make sure that you've got that even in desert areas, when you encapsulate a crawl space, you can have humidity issues that create mold.

[00:27:40] Eric Goranson: So if someone is doing a crawl space encapsulation, there better be a dehumidifier in that budget, or they're moving the HVAC system around to make sure and heat and cool that space. So it's just considered the regular part of your house. But, uh, to me, my favorite is just putting in and [00:28:00] keeping that sealed up and putting in a dehumidifier.

[00:28:02] Eric Goranson: That way you're good as gold. And, uh, you won't have to worry about that. And it's only going to run when the humidity jumps up. So it doesn't have to sit there and run the entire time. So only when it gets there and make sure you stay on top of the maintenance, have somebody come down there once a year, inspect it, clean it, change filters, do whatever they need to do for your unit around the house.

[00:28:20] Eric Goranson: We'll be right back after these important messages. We're going to talk. About some other places you should be watching for just as soon as we return.

[00:28:57] Eric Goranson: It's the end of the show, now drinkin down people, [00:29:00] it's time to go. It's that time again. Welcome back to the One and Only Around the House show where we help you get the most out of your home through information and education. We've been talking about basements and crawl spaces today and how to fix them right.

[00:29:13] Eric Goranson: And so these are a lot of the little things and tips and tricks that I have learned to make sure that you get things dialed in. Now. One of the big important ones is if you've got a foundation that's moving around, there are these things called helical piers that they can come in and help support the foundation.

[00:29:31] Eric Goranson: So it's not moving around a lot. So let's say you've got a, an old chimney that's starting to pull away from the house. Cause maybe it's settling weird or something's going on. You could actually go in with these things and think about as large screws are like eight inches across. Right. And so they bring in a Bobcat and they, they go in by pressure.

[00:29:51] Eric Goranson: So they will. Basically screw down with these until they get into bedrock or a very, very dense soil. And then they actually bolt these [00:30:00] to the foundation. So they will bolt it to the, to the side of the chimney, down low into the footing. They'll put it to your foundation of your crawl space or whatever.

[00:30:11] Eric Goranson: And these are pretty expensive. You know, they can be twelve, eighteen hundred, two thousand bucks a pile if you're not careful. So really understanding who's doing the work for you and then making sure that the engineer has drawn this up and told you where to put them. These can be places also that you jack from.

[00:30:32] Eric Goranson: So I've had it where we went in and wanted to level up a vintage, big concrete staircase. So we actually went in and bolted in and actually jacked from those places. And you can actually lift from those places too. So many times though, helical piers are not really put in for lifting, but they're put in for stabilization.

[00:30:51] Eric Goranson: So I would not recommend unless you've got an expert out there of like. Hooking into that chimney and then trying to jack and move. It's probably not going to move that well, [00:31:00] but you can keep it from going any farther. So, that's part of the thing to consider. Now, I wanted to get into something here that's, that's important when we're talking about leveling things and leveling a house or you've got a bow in your floor and you're going to replace the post in your basement because it's rotten.

[00:31:18] Eric Goranson: Whatever that is, right? Now, here's things that I want you to think about. And this is where remodeling can really get you in kind of a problem. If you went through and remodeled your, your house and got everything plum level as best you can, your kitchen cabinets are level, everything's doing good, but you want to get in there and level it because that part of the house is sunk and you're going to do that.

[00:31:44] Eric Goranson: You can cause a ton of issues from cracked tiles to broken glass to windows and doors not operating. So Really understanding how you're going to affect things, because if you have made things [00:32:00] stronger, you've made things level, as soon as you move that house, it's now not going to be level. So, if your house is settled, and you're hiring a company to come in and lift a little bit and get that back, that's great.

[00:32:13] Eric Goranson: But I'd be doing that before you do any remodels, not afterwards. Because there's just too much of a risk of things breaking. Now, if you're going to go in there, the first thing you're going to do and level it and then go through and do demo and that kind of stuff. Awesome. Maybe I'd recommend going in and doing all the demo and get all that stuff out of the way.

[00:32:29] Eric Goranson: So you're not fighting it. So if you're gutting that house to the studs, get it gutted to the studs. Then get in there and lift. And if once you get that lifted, listen to the house, your house is going to tell you what's going on. It's going to creak. It's going to moan. It's going to make noises, make sure that you've got that dialed in and make sure that you're just not doing it yourself, that you've got experts there to make sure that you're lifting and that you're not creating problems.

[00:32:58] Eric Goranson: You need to go [00:33:00] slow and you need to really spend some time working on that and making sure that you're not creating other problems. Move it a little bit. If you've got windows in the area, start moving those windows around. Do they work? Did you put new windows in and somebody shimmed them all up level and now you've got to go in and they're wrong because you leveled the house.

[00:33:20] Eric Goranson: So I just want to make sure that you're not trying to fix one problem and creating 32 other ones by all these different things. So be really careful with all of that. Okay, just take your time and make sure that you're gonna not create other issues. By lifting on that house. Now, I have successfully leveled off living room floors, kitchen floors with replacing a post and didn't cause any damage at all.

[00:33:45] Eric Goranson: But, uh, I've been in some homes, um, that were on hillsides and stuff that had severe structural issues. Like, floors were inches off. The house had been literally sliding down the hill that needed [00:34:00] hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars of stabilization. So, And lots of peers, because someone in the engineering department, when they built that house made tactical errors that were fatal to the construction of that house.

[00:34:16] Eric Goranson: So I have seen some where they were a hot mess and that house had moved down the hill. And so these are things to really pay attention to because some of these older houses that you see on hillsides and stuff, and especially here on the West coast, they didn't build them on concrete. Many times they were, they actually put them on these peers that are like, Well, they're like railroad ties or they're like telephone poles and these poles are pushed into the ground.

[00:34:42] Eric Goranson: Well Just like anything would, no matter how much creosote you put on it, eventually, they're going to break down. And so when you have to go in there and replace those on a hillside, that can be a really big deal. And so, um, in that case, we've gone in and, uh, it poured in, you know, put in [00:35:00] helical piers, poured some concrete, put in metal, and really beefed things up so they could be held into place.

[00:35:07] Eric Goranson: But those are hot mess issues to have to take care of. And that's where that engineer gets involved in there. But, uh, helical piers are great. Um, making sure that, uh, if you're going down and putting in a new post in the basement and you're going to be doing any, anything upstairs, it's not a bad idea to go in.

[00:35:25] Eric Goranson: And if you're taking that post out to put a larger footing in down underneath there, if it's an unfinished basement, you're going to finish it, putting a little additional support. That is one thing that was not done on older houses. In many cases, the footings were much smaller than what we require now.

[00:35:42] Eric Goranson: So if you're going to be doing additions or things like that, we have run into that where we had to go down to the basement and, uh, because we were converting a loft space into a bathroom, for instance, we had to actually dig up their finished basement and put in a footing that was going to be where that old post was in the middle of the [00:36:00] basement.

[00:36:00] Eric Goranson: That needed to be a 30 inch by 30 inch by what 18 inch deep footing, I believe. And we had to do some serious work to tear that up and pull the carpet back and get that dialed in and get that fixed. So that was a big project. All in doing a bathroom remodel that caused that. So if you know, in the while you're at it, it's a good thing to start working on.

[00:36:23] Eric Goranson: If you're going to do that. Check and see what code is for that area would not be a bad idea to go ahead and do that while you're at it. If you're if you're in the belief of, hey, it lasted there 100 years as it was, and I'm going to put another 1 in awesome. But a little stronger and make sure that you're using all the metal brackets and stuff.

[00:36:40] Eric Goranson: And that leads me to my last thing. Earthquake retrofitting. When you get into homes that were built before 19, uh, mid 70s. In many areas, homes are not fastened to the foundations. It is the weight of the home holding it down. So really going around and making sure that you've [00:37:00] got everything bolted down is really a key.

[00:37:03] Eric Goranson: And, uh, Simpson strong tie and others. Make some great brackets for doing earthquake retrofits. So take a look and do that. Um, many of the older homes after the, you know, even in the 80s, sometimes I've seen them, but, uh, these brackets will attach the house to it so that if you have an earthquake. Or a wind event or tornado or that kind of thing.

[00:37:27] Eric Goranson: It really makes the house a lot stronger. We've all seen the picture, right? Of the house laying in the middle of the street. You know, Toto and all of that from, from, uh, from the Wizard of Oz of the house flying around. That house would have probably survived if it hadn't blown off the foundation. So tying that in and making sure that's bolted around.

[00:37:49] Eric Goranson: You know, I, I recommend going around and, and having an engineer drop something, but if you're going to do it yourself, if you generally go around and put those in about every four feet, that's probably going to be [00:38:00] plenty good enough to hold that down there. And, uh, that's really how you do it. So, all you do is, uh.

[00:38:05] Eric Goranson: You need to have dust control because anytime you're working on concrete, uh, that silica dust is cancer causing. So you need to make sure you're not getting that around. So make sure that you're using a wet saw that if you're chipping or grinding that you've got HEPA vacuum systems around there. You don't want that concrete dust going around.

[00:38:22] Eric Goranson: It's nasty. And so that is 1 of those things that is a big safety thing. But basically what you're going to be doing is drilling into the concrete. And putting in fasteners and drilling into the wood sill and fastening those two together so they're fastened and not going anywhere. So that way there's no lift.

[00:38:39] Eric Goranson: There's no slide and you're going to have a much stronger house and a good connection between that and the foundation. Well, that's it for foundation one on one this week from basements to crawl space and how to fix them, right? If you have any questions, hit me up over on, uh, around the house, online. com.

[00:38:55] Eric Goranson: You can send me a message there or on social media. Have a great rest of your [00:39:00] weekend everybody. Thanks for tuning to around the House