Slow Progress, Cold Weather

So now that I have that first course down, I don't really need to worry about rain too much. It doesn't matter if water gets into the excavated trench, caves parts of it in, and turns it all into a layer of mud. So I figured my progress would speed up. Nope. It seems that ever since we broke ground, I can't catch a break when it comes to the weather. Now it's the temperature. 

In order to mix concrete and have it set up well, I'd really like it to be 50 degrees during the day and above-freezing through the night. But other than that first day I started, we haven't hit that mark on the weekend, not even close. Sure there were a few days during the week, but...my real job gets in the way. So everything has been quiet for the last couple of weeks.

Today the weather was marginal, with a high of 48. I was tired of just staring at the place so went for it. I used hot water from the house to add to my concrete mix. I concentrated on adding another course of block in the corners, as that's the next "hard part" of the job. Once all six courses of all corners are set and at the right level, all I'll have to do is fill in between and then the job will begin to move along. I promise. 

After three courses, all of my corners are not right on with where they need to be...24" from the top. There are still a couple of high spots within the span, but those should wash out as I progress higher. 

I've been using my story pole and the string lines to set the block to this point. I think for the 4th, 5th and 6th courses I'll get out the laser level I use it to verify that everything is coming up where they should. It only takes a minute to setup and is good insurance against potential sagging string lines that could cause the foundation to be just a bit off. And we don't want that!

Ok, so today I set 26 blocks, 80 total, 217 to go...

First Course Complete!

Wow, it's amazing what can get done when everything aligns. I was off for the day. I had nothing else on my schedule. And the weather...the weather cooperated! We had a high of 58 degrees and not a cloud in the sky. It made for an enjoyable day outside. And as you'll see in my photos, I had good company (and yes, I had to change out our well pressure tank last weekend). My plan today was to get the entire first course of blocks finished. I really don't want to worry about drying the footing and scrapping away mud and dirt again. If I can get the first course complete, then I won't have to worry about it. Any water that gets under the tarp won't bother me much after that point, except for wet shoes. 

Since all the corner blocks were in place and set up nicely from the day before,  I used some mason line and pair of mason line blocks to stretch a line from corner to corner. The line was set at the top corner block of each end. This gave me a guide to set the remainder of the blocks. I could lay a block and tap it into position so it was just off the line, and then set the height so that the top of the block was level with the line. I still used a level to make sure the block was level in its width, but otherwise I moved pretty quickly. Quick being relative as I've only been doing this for a few hours now. 

The one frustrating thing, and I'm sure all masons have to deal with it, is the uneven footing. I just didn't think with that fancy laser level it would be quite the issue. As I go along the line I'll have to pile up a good bit of mortar, or really thin it out when the footing gets high. But I've now taken care of all the low spots. My first course blocks are either spot on where they need to be, or they are still high by about 1/2"-5/8" or so. As I mentioned in the previous post, there's only so much ground you can recover from being high. So while my wall won't be perfectly level as of yet (a fact that really bothers me), it will be soon.

I got the entire first course completed. Before daylight ran out, I was able to set a block in all four corners for the second course. Once these setup, I'll be able to use my mason line blocks and string to stretch between them to fill in. It's supposed to start raining tonight and then turn cold, so it looks like they'll have a week (at least) to setup before I can get back to it. And now I can concentrate on building up the corners to the full 6 course height, like a pyramid. 

So, that's 39 blocks today, 54 total, 243 to go! Being an engineer, I think I'll need to put these in a table and work up some graphs for a future post...

First Blocks are Set

I had a four day weekend coming up. What better time to get started on laying the concrete block foundation? If only the weather would hold up I could get quite a bit done. And of course, it did not. That's what I get for trying to build in February. But better now than in July. 

After checking out the upcoming weather forecast, it looked like there were going to be two straight days, Thursday and Friday that were good for mixing up some concrete and laying block. The rest of my long weekend Saturday, Sunday and Monday, not so good. So I took a day off of work to get a jump start. 

It had rained the day before, so after getting the kids to school I pumped off the water on the tarp. I was frustrated to see water had gotten beneath the tarp and coated half my footing trench with mud. I was thinking I might as well go to back to work, but fortunately the other half of the trench was clean.   I have a nice blower fan unit that I grabbed from the barn and put in the trench to try to dry the water, while I spread it around with a broom to thin it out. 

As the blower was doing it's thing, I decided to get started on the other side. By now it was already nearly 2 o'clock. Better late than never. I had quite a bit of a nervous adrenaline rush getting ready to break open the first 80 lb. bag of concrete. No turning back now. It had been 14 years since I last laid block on my previous house garage and I had just that nervous anticipation of the unknown. 

Six quarts of water was perfect for the mix (as the instructions called for) and I thought I had it just right. Using a concrete pan and a ordinary garden hoe (the same from '99!), it wasn't even as hard to mix as I thought. My nerves quickly subsided as everything clicked and I felt like I had just done all this yesterday. I started in the corner where the footing was the lowest point of the whole perimeter. A good 1" low or so. I built a thick and full bed of mortar to lay the first block. And down it went. I used a story pole I had made to check my height against the string line above and carefully tapped it down into position. At the right height, level in both the length and width directions. No don't bump it! 

I set four more blocks around the first corner block and then moved to the next corner. Although I had a chalk line snapped to guide me along, it's not the easiest to stay perfectly straight. So I wanted to set another corner block so that I could then use a string line pulled taut from corner to corner

to more easily guide the way, and set the height. 

I set the first block of this corner (not really a corner, but an end) to be exactly 10 blocks away from where I started. This was because I didn't want to start right at the end against the existing house foundation, otherwise I'd have a small cut block in the middle somewhere. This way, I keep the cut block against the house, and underground.

By now I had the other side of the footing pretty dry. In between laying the previous block I had moved the fan around, spread the water around and swept the dried mud away with a stiff straw broom. The corner nearest the house is actually a high point of about 3/4" high. The opposite corner is about the desired height. 

With the contractor using that rotating laser level to set the pins for the footing depth, I have no idea how this footing was so un-level. From 3/4" high to 1" low. The low points aren't so bad, they can be built up quickly. But there is only so much space to made up when you are high. Normal mortar joints should be 3/8" thick. And obviously you have to have some mortar between each layer to hold everything together. I have 6 courses to work with, and I think it will take most of them to remove these high points. I'd rather get it taken care of below grade where it won't be seen, but I don't think I'm going to have that option here. 

Anyway, the remainder of the blocks went smoothly, although my back started to feel the effects of carrying 80 lb. bags of concrete, mixing them, and then working in the bottom of a hole all day. Hopefully I'll get conditioned to this. I have a long way to go...

If you want to keep track, that's 15 blocks today, 282 to go!

Level (With a Laser) and Square

Today we braved the cold and set out to set up our batter boards and lay out our string lines for the foundation. I had already cut the stakes and boards and gathered all the other equipment we'd need including string, water level, screws, etc. 

Water level? I had used one of those in the past to layout a garage foundation years ago, and while they work great they sure are a hassle to use. You always have to be mindful of where the ends of the water hose are before uncapping them or else you'll surely get wet, and then have to refill the hose. So...in you recall in a previous post I told you to to remember the excavators use of a self-leveling rotating laser level? Well, that thing was pretty slick. So after much deliberation, I splurged and bought a Johnson Level & Tool Co. Model 40-6515 laser level kit. Complete package including the level, detector, grade stick, tripod and a nice case to contain everything. 

And what do I have to say after using it so set the batter boards? Money well spent! It was a piece of cake and made quick work of setting all the boards perfectly level with one another and at the exact height to match the existing foundation. I'll be using the laser level again when we start work on the porch foundation, and I'll always have other uses around the house for it. It's one of those things you wonder how you ever did without it. Now if only I had it last year when I made that retaining wall all around the barn...

To backtrack a bit, we started by pounding in the posts where we needed them. They were located out away from the footing so they wouldn't get in our way later. I pounded them in using one of those steel fence post drivers. Worked great. Then I set the laser level up on the tripod and clamped the detector to the grade stick. That's all there is to it. Turn it on and it self levels and begins spinning around. You can't see the laser in the daylight, but the detector can and will let you know with with a series of beeps and LED's when you get close and then hit the mark.

I had marked on the existing foundation the spot that I wanted the new foundation to come up to. This will be 3/4" below the current foundation as we are using 9-1/2" I-joists (existing house has 9" lumber) and 3/4" subfloor (existing house uses 1/2" plywood) which accounts for the difference. So I set the bottom of the grade stick on the mark and adjusted the detector to signal it had detected the laser. 

After that it was simply a matter of walking around to each stake in the ground, moving the stick until the detector beeped and marking the bottom of the stick with a pencil. 1x6 boards were screwed across the stakes at the level line all around the perimeter. That's it. 

The hard part was running the string lines. I couldn't think of a new way to make this easier. So out came the tape measures. I also printed out a foundation layout plan from my Sketchup plan that contained all of the diagonal measurements for the addition. Our oldest daughter came out of the nice warm house to help us. One person to hold one end of the tape measure, one to read the measurement, and one to move the line. So with three people working the lines, it wasn't too terribly bad. It was straightforward, but took a lot of walking around back and forth to get everything spot-on. 

And spot-on we did. When all was complete, my diagonal measurements were right on the mark from corner to corner, a nearly 40' distance. And I'm talking on-the-mark! Did you expect anything less? (Hint, my wife would tell you No). 

Next up is actually putting down some cement and laying some block. If only the weather would warm up...

First Delivery

Today we received our very first construction related delivery: Three pallets worth of concrete masonry units (CMU's), otherwise referred to as concrete blocks. 297 of them to be exact. That's how many my 3D SketchUp plans told me I'd need so that's how many we ordered. Don't think I'll screw one up? We'll see. But actually I'd rather be a little too short and have to throw a few in the back of the truck, then have too many lying around. Something about having to load up and return heavy blocks doesn't sound very appealing. And what else would I use them for? They're not really known for their curb appeal or artistic landscape features.

So those, and another pallet containing 23 bags of 80lb. Quikrete Type S Mortar, a pair of lintel blocks for the crawl space opening and a bunch of 10" anchor bolts to secure the subfloor and we're in business. Now all I need is for this rainy and cold weather to break and I can start the laying some block. Did I mention we just received our first snowfall of the year a few days ago? Four inches of the fluffy (and wet) stuff. Nice.

Dig a Hole in the Ground and Rain will Come

Ever since the electrician left his beautiful work behind, we've been trying to get the footings dug for the new additions on the house. And of course, as soon as you start seriously discussing plans to dig great big holes in the ground, Mother Nature hears you and turns what has been a very dry season into an instant monsoon. I've had a weather station at my house for over a year now that records weather data to the PC, and it has already told me that January 2013 is a record month since it has been in operation. Awesome. And don't anyone tell me we "need the rain" in January. For what!? Everything's dormant. There. Oh and here comes the arctic cold. Ok, ok, back to the house.


After reading that, you'd think that nothing's happened. Well, the footings are complete! Fooled you. But the weather is no lie. After the 5+ inches of rain the week before, we had a couple of days of sun and warmer weather to dry things out. Our excavator found a window to fit us in and delivered all of the equipment a couple of days in advance: A very large excavator, a smaller excavator and a Bobcat. The plan was for him to arrive Monday, Martin Luther King Day and do all of the excavating and stump removal. On Tuesday the building inspector would arrive and check off the permit followed by the concrete truck a few hours later.

Well it turns out that extreme cold temperatures for this area were inbound on Monday night into Tuesday. Our excavator talked to the building inspector and got an advance "OK" to go ahead and pour the concrete in the footings in the same day due to the weather that night. They both thought it too risky to pour on Tuesday in below-freezing temperatures when on Monday it was 45F.

It all happened very quickly. They crew showed up at 7:30am and got to work tearing out the old porch foundation using the smaller excavator. It took quite a bit of pounding, scrapping and prying to begin to break it apart. Eventually it came out and was loaded into a dump truck and hauled away.

Then attention turned to using the large excavator to dig out a large 38" diameter stump that just barely in the way of the new addition. This tulip poplar tree stood near the house and was struck by lightning back in 2009. In 2011 we had it cut down as a large piece of the canopy hanging over the house had died. Standing over 135ft. it was a beautiful tree. And now there is nothing but dirt where it used to be.

Back to the smaller excavator and the footings. He used an auto-leveling rotary laser level (remember this) to level out the area of the new addition crawl space. Then laid out the measurements I had given him for the addition dimensions. After checking for square, he dug them out. It looks like I'll need to lay 6 courses of block work to meet up with the existing foundation subfloor.

Before digging the footings for the porch addition out front, we had to find where the oil line passed through between the house and the buried oil tank. I had been in the crawl space a few weeks before and found and marked where the pair of oil lines dove into the dirt and heading outside the wall. One guy in the crew had the job of hand digging to find and trace this oil line. Whoever dug this trench 45+ years ago must have been drinking. Sure enough, while the path wandered back and forth toward the tank, it ended up crossing exactly in the path of one of the foundation holes for a porch post. Not a big deal, at least now he knew where it was and not to hit it. After laying out the dimensions for the porch, he dug four very square 2'x2' holes for the porch columns. I was impressed with how square a hole he dug with a bucket on an excavator.

There was now only about an hour before the concrete truck was to arrive. They set pins in the trench to the height of the footing, and laid two lines of rebar down in the trench the entire length, side by side. One guy took off to get some bales of straw and some plastic. The idea here was to cover up the concrete in the footings with plastic and then fill the trench with straw. This would help keep it insulated against the cold weather showing up that night.

The concrete truck arrived and put nice big ruts in the yard. Because the new (temporary) electric lines hung so low, the truck couldn't get close enough to the trench to use the chute directly. Here I was thinking he'd be cussing me out under his breath pushes wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow of heavy concrete mix back and forth. No big deal he said, and proceeded to use the bucket on the big excavator to fill and transport the concrete. Pretty slick. And that bucket can hold a lot of concrete. In no time the concrete truck had cleaned up and left.


And that was that. We now have a trench full of straw. The kids think the square porch foundation holes make excellent trap doors. Tomorrow they'll be back early to dig out three other stumps elsewhere on the property (all due to past hurricanes and tropical storms, Ernesto and Irene).

This brings an end to hired help. Now that this is done, we're on our own. Next job: Concrete block foundation. Time to take the "DIY" and kick it into high gear.

I Said it was Only Temporary, But...

Now that the porch was gone, the next thing in line was to get our existing overhead electric service moved out of the way. It comes to the house on the same side where the addition is going to go. There are three insulated individual solid copper lines coming from the nearest utility pole up to the peak of the house. 

A very old and rough looking service entrance cable then goes down the peak, disappears under the eave and runs to the front of the house, right next to the entrance on this side of the house. Not a very nice place to have a meter. 

So, we hired an electrician to temporarily move the service out of the way. He in turn coordinated with the local utility power company to do their part. Within a couple of hours, the service was moved. Not exactly how I pictured, but the job was done. I assumed they'd put up a utility pole right next to the front of the house and run the line to there and down. What the electrician ended up doing was place a couple of ordinary 12' 4x4's into the ground about two feet and stringing it up from there. Well, I guess it is just temporary...


The utility company ended up replacing the wiring coming from the transformer all the way to the house. This was old pure bare copper coming from the transformer to the next pole. 


From there it turned into the insulated wire I that goes to the house. All of this was changed to the modern and standard triplex wire, all wrapped into one insulated bundle. They left this cable extra-long so that it can be moved to it's final location once the new addition is complete. 

The plan is to eventually move the service to that same end of the house, the exterior wall of the addition. At that time the electric meter will also be moved to that side of the house, out of view. The service entrance cable will quickly disappear under the crawl space and run to to a brand new main panel to be installed in place of the old Wadsworth panel we have now. It's old and we're just about out of space in there now. 



It may not look pretty but we have power to the house. We just have to keep reminding ourselves that it's all just temporary. 










Now that everything is out of the way, ground breaking is next!