November 2016 – Bakwas Enterprises

Framing, Part I

The first step in framing is to draw chalk lines on the slab to mark all the plate locations for the walls. This was expertly accomplished by Hugo and his framing crew. These guys are top notch and come in force with as many as 12 guys working simultaneously.

This was a surprisingly elaborate job executed with extreme diligence according to the plans. It took an entire day just to run the chalk lines. It started with running various reference lines using string lines for all the major axis to ensure every other line was marked exactly parallel and perpendicular to the reference lines. Then, chalk lines were snapped to represent the position of each plate as well as the various number of the plates required to make up the required of wall thicknesses. These were all 2″x6″ plates for the exterior walls with additional 2″x6″ or 2″x4″ plates for the wall thicknesses.

The plans called for a first course of pressure treated wall plates with a sill gasket to maximize protection against water penetration.

A second plate of untreated SYP was placed on top of the treated plate to accommodate the subfloor and finished flooring. Holes were drilled in exact locations for each of the penetrating lag bolts embedded within the foundation slab for all exterior walls. For interior walls, impact nails were driven into the concrete via explosive charges.

Cutouts were made in all the plates to accommodate plumbing runs.

And finally, entire wall sections were constructed on the slab for flatness and squaring, plated with SYP, framed 16″ on-center with DFir studs, and capped with Glulam headers and/or SYP where necessary before being raised into place and secured to the sole plate.

Various 2″x4″s were used as squaring and bracing as wall sections were assembled.

The whole process is fascinating to watch as each team on the crew expertly analyzes the plans, calls for cuts on the cutting station, and assembles the resulting lumber into the wall sections. There are no lulls in the work outside of lunch as the compressor continuously charges its tanks for the pneumatic nailers to finish the job.

Lumber

The foundation pour marked a milestone in the building process. A point at which the project moves from planning, preparation, and destruction to creation.

The next step is framing the house and this is a very exciting phase as the house finally gets it’s “bones”. Framing starts with the delivery of a massive amount of lumber of all shapes and kinds. There are several key materials dictated by the plans and specifications:

Stacks and stacks of 2″x6″ and 2″x4″dimensional lumber for the framing of the exterior and interior walls which includes
- Southern Yellow Pine (SYP) which is used for it’s strength and density
- Douglas Fir which is used for its dimensional stability, superior strength to weight ratio, and nail holding power
- Pressure Treated SYP for plates for wall framing
Glulam beams which is used for a pound-for-pound strength that is greater than steel for headers and long dimensional runs
Pressure treated CDX plywood for the first course of sheathing
Sill seal gasket for the plates to provided water and vapor barriers for the walls

Temporary Electric

Update: This process has turned out to be a real pain. The problem lies in the lack of communication and handoff between the electric retail provider and CenterPoint Energy. When the retail provider passes on the start service order to CenterPoint, they effectively are done with the process and are waiting for CenterPoint to let them know the temporary meter information to start the billing. However, CenterPoint came out and had issues connecting to the temporary pole (T-pole) because it required them connecting the pole to an existing pole on someone else’s property. Apparently, this is trespassing although I’m not sure why as there is a utility easement on the backside of the property and where our T-pole is so where the trespass.

Consequently, CenterPoint passes back a construction required status back to the retail provider which canceled the service order. Back to square one.

When trying to find out exactly what CenterPoint means by construction required, it took several calls to the local CenterPoint supervisor, Justin Green, to understand exactly what the issue was. The CenterPoint support team didn’t have the details and the customer is NOT allowed to speak to the CenterPoint installation teams. The supervisor is the go-between and the bottleneck.

Once we understood the trespass issue, we moved the T-pole to another corner of the lot where we have a permanent pole on our property. I called the retail provider and re-requested the start service. They in turn called CenterPoint and we are now in a 7-10 business day holding pattern for CenterPoint to reattempt the temporary meter installation.

CenterPoint was supposed to attempt another install this past Friday. It was not done. I hope they were not able to make it out because if there was another issue, I’m sure the retail provider had to cancel the start service order and we’re back to square one again. I’ll be calling to find out the status first thing tomorrow. Ugh.

All of this has taken weeks. If we would be able to directly interact with the install team, we would have knocked all this out on the first visit.

Meanwhile, the framers are crying foul at putting time on their generators…

At some point, such as the beginning of the framing stage, it becomes impractical to have generators to power air compressors and other tools. There are too many crews at too many locations around the house to cover with a collection of generators buzzing away. I also suspect the workers and the neighbors tire quickly of the noise.

The solution is to drop a temporary electric pole on the lot. Most builders include providing the pole and handling the electric as part of their construction costs. I asked for it to be outside the bid to manage the costs directly. For Corbel’s part, they dropped a temporary 10′ pole on the edge of the lot and provided a temporary circuit breaker box and electrical outlets as part of the pole. On my end, I had to call CenterPoint Energy and follow the instructions here. In short, you have to call CenterPoint to get an ESI ID number. The 22-digit ESI ID number serves to identify the service location for a specific address. It also identifies the meter where electric usage will be tracked. Once you have the ESI ID, you contact your electrical retail provider after 48 hours (presumably for systems to update) or find one on Power to Choose to start your service. They in turn, contact CenterPoint to start the service. This includes CenterPoint wiring the temporary pole to the electrical service pole for the property and installing an electric meter. Then you are free to silence the generators.

Pouring the Foundation

Wow. I thought the orchestration of the pier pouring was impressive but I had no idea of the manpower and coordination involved in the pouring of a foundation. Larry Langan and his crew at Foundation Builders were in full force on pour day. We were lucky to have great Saturday weather with clear skies and cool breezes for the pour and they knocked everything out over a single hectic day.

Multiple crews were responsible for simultaneous activities during the pour process. Concrete by its very nature is very unforgiving and time sensitive material. From the moment it’s mixed in the truck its already started to cure and therefore, it needs placement and finishing as soon as possible. In total it took some 30 mixing trucks, each with 10 cubic yards of 3000 PSI concrete, arriving on-site at a rate of 1 every 6 minutes to complete the pour. Two mixing trucks would pull up to the pumper truck side-by-side. One mixing truck would pour concrete into the hopper of the pumper truck while the other mixing truck’s mixture would be prepped. Occasionally, slump would be removed for immediate slump testing and long-term strength testing. Outside the site, Larry would be examining each mixing trucks contents for consistency and adjusting moisture accordingly. Inside, the pour supervisor, Andy, would be prepping each truck and ensuring a constant flow of concrete into the hopper of the pumper truck. From there, the concrete would make its way through the elaborate booms of the pumper truck and into the foundation form. The entire management of the boom and flow of concrete was controlled remotely at the outlet nozzle by a supervisor from Allied Concrete Pumping with guidance from the Foundation Builders crew controlling the nozzle. A primary team, led by Al of Foundation Builders, would ensure that the target portion of the foundation forms was prepped to receive concrete. This included straightening the displaced rebar, poly vapor barrier, and clearing and dirt movements. The nozzle crew would then call for concrete in the working area of the pour and fill in accordingly. Another crew using hand rakes would evenly distribute the mixture while a team member would use a mechanical vibrator in the beams to ensure that there were no air pockets in the pour. This was followed up by a crew using a long aluminum level to flatten out the surface of the pour shortly followed by a team member using a bull trowel to smooth the surface. A finishing team would then use hand trowels to smooth the fine lines and place the J-bolts and various anchors at the perimeter of the slab for anchoring the framing plates.

All the while, various people would be following up this work by removing some of the inner support forms and hand troweling and finishing various portions of the slab as the nozzle work crew moved onward to complete another section. All in all, about 20 people were on the slab simultaneously and it was a sight to behold as they worked diligently and quickly to make sure everything flowed smoothly and consistently throughout the slab pour. The entire pour took about 4 hours to complete and then the finishing work began.

The finishing work consisted of the removal of all interior form supports as the concrete set up. This was followed by more hand troweling and smoothing. Eventually, this was followed up by using a spinning machine trowel and finally, the entire slab was coated with a concrete sealer.

The finishing work itself took 5 hours to complete and no detail was overlooked.

Measurements were verified, slopes and grades were verified, and various portions troweled and re-trowelled to make sure the final product was smooth, consistent, strong, and exactly according to plans and specifications. One of the last, but very critical operations in the finishing process, included the entire family pressing our hand prints into the slab and writing our names above them. Apparently this is not an unusual request and the very busy team at Foundation Builders were extremely accommodating as they guided us through the process (much to the delight of our kids).

The next work day, the crew came back and removed the final form boards leaving a perfect foundation in place for the framing contractor.

Great work guys! Very impressed.

Drainage Again, Really?

Ok, City of Bunker Hill, you really need to revisit your drainage codes. I’m told that the City counsel actually passed a code amendment that requires that the drainage plan be in effect BEFORE the foundation is poured. On the one hand, I can see the logic as the foundation pour does create a very large impermeable surface on the lot. With the added impermeable surface, there would be more runoff of water into the drainage system. However, have this as a blanket rule is unnecessarily taxing for the home owner/builder. In our case, the lot did not have any surface drains before construction and the run-off was acceptable to the City. Now the we will add our foundation surface, that adds to the impermeable BUT in our case that impermeable surface is actual the SAME as the impermeable surface before the old home was demolished. So, there will be NO additional runoff once our foundation is poured.

Unfortunately, the City still requires the drainage plan to be put in place. This is troublesome because the run of the drainage lines crisscrosses the property and is very susceptible to damage from ongoing construction including uprooting all the temporary spaces required for contractor parking and materials storage. Not to mention that final grade has not been established yet and therefore the surface locations of the catch basins may be off if we stick exactly to plan. I’m talking drains that are higher than the surrounding earth. What’s the point?

We brought that argument to Steve Smith, the City Building Supervisor, and once again, he came up with an acceptable solution. He is having us do half of the drainage plan with a temporary outlet to the swale now and the rest later. The part we are doing will provide drainage for the eastern part of the lot which should not be adversely affected by ongoing construction. Once the “big equipment” phase is over, we can do the western part of the property and tie everything together.

Thanks again Steve. Common sense win the day…

Steel and Cardboard

In order to reinforce the concrete beams and tie the piers together, “cages” made of steel reinforcement bars (rebar) of various diameters are wired together to the protruding rebar of the piers. The cages are comprised of various pre-bent rebar rectangles with long runs of rebar joining them together. All of this is wired together to create a rectangular column of steel reinforcement that connects each of the piers together. The concrete, when poured, will bind all the piers and the rebar runs together to create the superstructure underneath the slab. All of these structures are specified in copious detail by the structural engineers include diameters of steel rebar, connection points, bindings, etc. Every part of the slab is dictated in the plans by a diagram showing all the details. One of the dozens of diagrams is shown below.

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Each rebar cage must be custom built to ensure that it encapsulates all the required details as well as accommodates all the plumbing rough-in pipe runs. Many of the cages were built around these runs as the pipes move between each of the various dirt squares and through the beam trenches. Each of the Schedule 40 PVC pipes is enclosed in a sleeve of Schedule 35 PVC pipe to ensure its not damaged by the rebar or the concrete pour.

Since we are building a structural foundation, the actual slab will bind the top of the beams together. The underside of each of the dirt squares will have a cardboard carton placed on it along with a fiberboard cover. Then the entire square is covered with a vapor barrier plastic. This creates a void underneath the slab to protect it from expansive soil movements and in essence elevates the slab above any earth movement impact. The cardboard cartons sit directly on top of the dirt and are designed to degrade over time to simply leave empty space between the dirt and the slab. This is why they are also called void boxes. The fiberboard sheet placed on top ensures that the entire surface area of the square is covered so the void is uniform on top of each dirt square. The vapor barrier is a 6 mil thick plastic sheet that ensure that no moisture comes in contact with the underside of the slab once the void boxes have deteriorated. This keeps any wicking of water out of the slab itself and prevents mold and mildew on the underside of the floor coverings on top of the slab.

The entire process is fascinating to behold as the amount of steel rebar used is massive and the effort required to meet the structural engineers specifications at each beam is very detail oriented. I spend many an evening reviewing each of the connections on every intersection of each rebar joint. This took hours as the foundation crew worked very quickly. But my children playing “maze runner” hopping between each dirt mound allowed me some alone time while I scrutinized each connection.

Once the rebar is in place for the beams and the void structures in place on the dirt squares in between each beam, a grid of rebar is placed on top of the entire surface. This constitutes the enforcement structure for the entire slab and is the visible portion of the foundation. Grease is placed around each pipe protrusion to ensure free movement once concrete is poured. The grid is elevated so that it is in the middle of the 5 ½” thick slab through the use of concrete pavers. This ended “maze runner” and while my kids were sad that they couldn’t play anymore, we were ecstatic as the foundation pour was just a few short days away.

Now, the entire structure is ready for inspection before the pour. The City of Bunker Hill gets a review. Foundation Builders get a review. Corbel Custom Homes gets a review. Strutton Plumbing gets a review. And, DTS Engineering get a review. Any variances according to plan constitutes a punch list to be resolved before the concrete pour. The plumbers also get the review the pipes and the runs to ensure no damage has occurred during foundation building and reverify/finalize the pipe locations.

Beams

After the plumbing inspection, it’s time to dig out the trenches for the beams. The beams are concrete beams 12-18 inches wide and anywhere from 2-4 feet deep in various places. They make up the superstructure of the slab by joining all the piers into a lattice of steel reinforced concrete upon which the actual slab will sit. Width and depth are determined by the structural engineers according to load and water permeation. For example, the “future pool” in the back required 4 foot beam depths to keep out any intruding water. String lines are set upon the forms and in-line with the piers to dig the trenches. The heavy digging is done with a small excavator but a surprising amount must be done by hand in order to avoid damaging the plumbing rough in.

The end result looks something like the top of a waffle maker with square mounds of dirt surrounded by the beam trenches. It made for good fun for the kids as they played “maze runner” hopping around each of the dirt squares. However, the fun didn’t last long as the rebar reinforcement cages were quickly put in.