To Frame or Not To Frame: That is the Question

Week 6: Another rainy start to the week and a severe thunderstorm that had up to 80mph winds. A couple of tornadoes had touched down, and we had an extremely hard rain but no damage to the structure. Lost power at the rental house and most of La Grange lost power. More downed branches and trees out our way than at the house. I'm sure if we still had the two large maple trees in front that one would have fallen. We are happy that our architects have a sound structure with our walls being framed with 2x6 inch boards rather than 2x4's. As Mike stated to me, this will be the most well constructed house on the block. Mike has been scheduling around all the adverse weather and finally Joe, head of the framing crew, and his crew started this past week. They have framed the new addition's floor and all the external walls. They also put up the main laminated beam that will be the main structural support for the second floor in the new addition. The concrete company has broken out the slab and dug down to get the ceiling height clearance we so desire. As we expected, the slab was poured right over dirt and a portion was clay that had compressed so the house was sinking at one end. They have put installed the interior drain tile and puts crushed gravel down. The next portion of work for them is to put down visqueen (plastic wrap), mesh, and 2" rigid foam boards and then pour the new slab. Before they can do that though, we will have to have the plumber come out and get all the pipes set that will be going to the guest bathroom and to the sewer before they can pour the concrete over it. It has been a fun week to start seeing what the inside of the new addition will be like. We like the views we will have from the windows. Hopefully if the weather cooperates this week and it looks good from Tuesday on that they can make great progress. This week we are finalizing the windows and doors. Once that is done, then we can move on to the next decisions. I know we are going to have a tough time doing the light fixtures due to our budget. We can always change them out down the road.

Here is the slab. The first bit of good news is that there was a seam in between the foundation and the floor so they could just jackhammer it out rather than have to saw cut it. Came out easily.






Here is the black dirt that was under the slab. No crushed gravel for drainage.







there is a "Bobcat" in our house.








Here is a relative size view of Anne in the excavated house. Glorious head clearance. In the old house, she could touch the ceilings. We still hope to have at least 8 foot clearance in the old house.





Here is the start of the floor. We are using structured I-beams. Very strong structurally. Here they are securing the beams to teh structural steel beam. It has tongue and groove plywood nailed down to give additional strength.






Here is the crushed gravel to help with drainage.







This is a shot of the interior drain tile that is hooked up to the external system that eventually will connect to the sump pump in the basement. If you enlarge the picture, you will see the red line around the perimeter that will be the bottom of the floor once the mesh, visqueen, foam board and concrete are completed.




Here is the first wall that contains the dinning room window facing East.








Here is the South side that has more dinning room windows and the kitchen windows near the back.







Here is the interior view of the kitchen windows.







Interior shot of the dinning room windows on the left and kitchen windows on the right.







Here is a shot of where the mudroom will be off of the kitchen.








Here is the opening for the back door in the mudroom which will also have a fixed clear panel that will let it light. On the left is the opening for the sliding door to the future deck. It will have two fixed glass panels and either one or two sliding doors. Price will determine how many sliding doors.




Here is the laminated structural beam that will be holding up the second floor of the new addition. There will be two steel piers that will be located near the middle to solidify the structure.

Repetitive Theme

Can you guess how this week started out? Of course, severe thunderstorms on Monday. Another near 2 inches fell again so naturally the framing did not start. Here it is on Tuesday and lo and behold, the framing starts under the threat of more severe thunderstorms. All was well until around 8:40 and then a band of fast moving thunderstorms packing up to 80mph wind gusts came through with heavy rain. Heard the sirens and huddled with the family in the basement bathroom and the power went out. Came out to many branches down around the neighborhood. Luckily the couple of large branches missed the van by inches. Lights came back on around 45 minutes later. It was a very hot and humid day, the highest humidity of the year, but now with the storm, it is a relatively cool 67 degrees. Tomorrow calls for more possible severe thunderstorms. Will it ever end?

More Rain: Really!

Week 5: Well another week gone. Over a month already and we think we have seen everything. This week was supposed to be the starting of the framing work on the new addition, but mother nature had other ideas. We had another 2+ inches of rain and the threat of rain the entire week. Although it did not rain all week, it was looking like it would. We did not get to start the framing, but the first batch of lumber was delivered and if all holds up, they will start framing on Monday. This week we saw the installation of the new steel beams in the new addition and the replacement beam in the old house and Nicor came to hook up the new gas meter. The beam was a process which I discussed in a previous blog. They still have to finalize the beams by encasing the steel piers in concrete and tightening all the bolts. This week we hope to see the framing started, the water and sewer hookups and maybe the start of the slab demolition. The gas meter hookup was sort of a joke n that the crew came out early Monday and I get a call that they need access, so I had to go over to let them in after I got Kathleen off to horse camp. I went to work and 3 hours later, I stop by and they have dug a hole in the neighbor's yard. They then proceed to tell me that they did not have the correct size pipe and that they need another crew to bore the hole for the cable underneath the road. So two days later the boring crew comes and drills the hole and puts the pipe through. Then have to wait another day or so for another crew to come and hookup the pipe to the new meter. Then after they are done, the crew lounges around until 3:00, which is probably quitting time. Unbelievable. Anne and I spent part of Saturday looking at tile at a local tile company. As you know there are a multitude of tile and different options. We think we have come to agreements on everything except the guest bathroom, which we just did not have time to go over. Anne commented that all the different options she likes made her want to build multiple houses. I am fine with just the one.

Nicor truck early Monday morning for the new meter install.








Here is the pipe in my neighbor's yard.









Here is the new meter hooked up to the new addition. It looks high up, but when the walls are in and the grade is filled in, it will be only a few feet off the ground.





Here is a shot of the crawlspace under the new mudroom that is filled with crushed gravel over the new drain tile.








Here is the crane that lifted the steel beams.







Here is a shot of the new steel beam in the new addition. It also shows the step down underpinning that solidifies the new structure to the old.






Here is the new beam with the two new piers that are connected to a concrete footing pad.







Here is a shot of the new steel beam for the old portion of the house to replace the cut up main structural beam. They ended up cutting it in two pieces to give more support over the long span.






Here is where the chimney was that they prepared for the new steel pier to support the new steel beam.








Here was the rest of the chimney.








Here is a close up of the beam in the concrete "pockets". Ther was a discrepancy on the plans where it showed the beam pockets and then on another part, it shows the beam "in construction" which means it is hidden within the floor. This is for the head clearance coming sown the stairs. So, the guys had to remove the beam and fill in the pockets with concrete.


Here is the beam being re-installed outside of the pockets and laying on top of the foundation walls. This is the day that it rained hard on and off all day. I took this shot just before it started pouring rain again. It did not seem to bother the crew. They were already soaked.




Here is the new structural beam inside the old house where it was cut in two.







Her is one of the new piers in the house. They will be encased in new concrete.







Here is a shot of the new steel beam installed. The old beam is still to the right of it, but will be removed once the piers have been encased in cement. The slab will be demolished next with the old structural beam and piers.






Here is the end of the beam that is sitting where the fireplace once was.






One of this weeks gotcha was the foundation is cinder blocks. So the foundation is hollow in the middle. This is not uncommon when they did it this way. We will put something over it to create a better structure.





This is gotcha number two. The supports over the doors and windows on the first floor are not made of cinder blocks. It looks like a poured concrete. Whatever they used, the ends on most all are cracked and on the long one over the windows in the old family room, it is cracked in two places near the middle. It looks as if it is bowing in the middle. It probably was just a matter of time before it all caved in. We have decided we will cut out a huge portion of the front wall and frame it in with wood to shore up the structure. We will have to do this around all the places where they used this header. Both the architect and our GC feel this is the best solution.


Here is the first delivery of lumber...Yeah. No rain please.

Race Against Time

Week 4: What a week. As my other posts stated, it was a week of progress and radical changes in the weather. We start out the week with high 90's and humid, then we basically dropped 40 degrees in one day and had a massive rain storm all day. We went over to the house today and I took a shot of the new addition and the level of all the rain. It seems every week we get more rain and it fills up even more. Well this week, we saw the race against time to get the step footing underpinning completed and get the foundation waterproofed and insulated. The underpinning is a series of steps at a 45 degree angle with rebar that is structurally attached to the old house. This makes for a solid structure. I felt bad for the concrete guys, setting up the forms and getting everything ready in the heat we had. All their hard work paid off in getting the forms poured and removed before the rain started. The foundation was waterproofed and the rigid insulation boards were installed. Then they back filled the dirt up against the foundation. Makes the area look quite different. They also cut a square and poured a footing for one of the new steel beam piers. When they dug out the hole, we see that the slab foundation looks to be built right on top of the dirt rather than having any crushed gravel for drainage. That was the major work from this week. Next week includes the starting of framing of the new addition and the installation of the steel beams. I elaborated on the installation steps for the beams last week so it will take awhile to complete all the steps. Once we can get the framing up, we will not have to worry about the rain filling up the basement anymore and can concentrate on the interior work. We spent today looking at gas fireplaces and found a great shop where the owner gave us plenty of information so we can make a sound decision. We need to let Mike know so he can relay it to the framers when they are creating the wall for the fireplace.


Here is the foundation with the green waterproofing membrane and the rigid foamboard. There is crushed gravel that is covering the exterior drain tile around the perimeter of the new addition.





Here is another shot of the insulation.









Here are the new window wells in the basement they are very long, but are needed as an egress from the basement.






Here is a shot of what the drain tile with the overlaying sock looks like.







This is the excavation for one of the new steel piers for the new steel beam. See the black dirt underneath the concrete.







Here is the step underpinning forms being prepared.









Here they are after the concrete was poured. Because of the way we needed to connect will mean we have a little less basement to work with but it will be structurally sound. Almost looks like we are putting in stadium seating.




Here is what it looks like with the dirt back filled against the foundation.







More back fill.








Here is the footing that was poured for the new steel pier.








This is the interior drain tile that is in the crawlspace.









This is the after the rain picture. Mind you, this was several days after the main rain, so there is quite a lot of water to be pumped out. We might as well just make it an indoor pool.





I was inside and took some more shots of the main structural beam from the bottom looking up to show you just how much they cut out of the beams to run a pipe. So basically they compromised the entire structure of the house with these cutouts. Luckily the floor did not cave in.




Here is the same beam, just a little ways down from the major cutout. This was for the HVAC ducts. They basically did it to keep the ceiling height what it was. Not very bright to allow this to happen. anyway, we will take care of this with the removal and installation of the steel beams.

Why Me

I met with Mike and Bruce, who is the plumber who will be hooking up our new water service and sewer service to the house, the other day. Mike was hopeful that we would not have to dredge up the street and tap into the water line. He was looking at boring underneath. Well, it looks like we will have to cut up the street and access the water line on the opposite side of the road. Of course, it is in our neighbor Sal's yard. Sal is a semi retired painter that now works for the School District at the High School as part of the grounds crew. Sal loves his yard. He is the one neighbor on the block that has that impeccable yard. The one that makes the block envious. Anyway, it is the one yard that I wish we did not have to cut into. I nervously had a conversation with him the other day and he could not have be more accommodating. He basically said to ask them to minimize the damage and we will have to replace the damaged lawn. He told me to do whatever is necessary. What a relief. At least we have the sewer on our side of the road, so that will not be an issue.

For Better or Worse

Wow. So much rain. We had almost 3" in the past 24 hours and more is on the way today. Our GC, Mike, had stated they were fighting against time before the rain came to pour the step down underpinning and get the foundation waterproofed and back filled. He was able to get that all done before the deluge started. It came down fast and hard. We even had water coming into the rental house basement through cracks in the floor and walls. Not too much though, just had to move the carpet a bit. I am more worried since there is more rain to come and the ground is already saturated. The weekend calls for great weather so hopefully all will dry out. Not much else going on at the house until next week. We are looking at having the steel beams installed and the framing of the new addition started. I have had great conversations with Mike. He will probably get tired of all the questions we pose during this project. We have been discussing different aspects of this project for probably 8 months before we even got started. With Anne doing a lot of research over the years and my curiosity and interestsin the building process, we come up with quite a few items of discussion for him. Mike is great and patient to explain everything we have asked and has raised topics of discussion on what is needed versus what was specified. Will post pics this weekend.

As Hard as Concrete

Week 3: This was a week of progress. The foundation walls for the new addition were poured and they look great. The external weeping tile was also installed. The next steps are to Waterproof the foundation with a product called Rub-R-Wall and then place insulating Foamboard around it. It is a 2" rigid foam board that will help keep the basement insulated. We are hopeful that the waterproofing will keep any seepage out. Any that does get through should go to the new Sump Pump. We had Ferd, our Architect, come out and redesign the plans for the addition of a new steel structural beam, because the previous owners decided to compromise the structure of the house to add duct pipes. We submitted the change to the Village and now await their approval before installing. The installation will involve jacking up the structure to remove the beam, then jackhammering out the current concrete piers and braces. Then the 3 new concrete pads will be poured and the new steel piers will be installed along with the steel beam. Once this is done, then we can start the removal of the concrete slab. Here are some shots of the "pool" we had from the severe rains I talked about last week and then the new walls.

The new pool due to the severe rain. They had to pump out the water again to be able to continue.







Here is the rebar that is connected to the current house and will tie into the new foundation. This will help to support the old house as well.






Here is more rebar that is on the bottom of the foundation walls. There will also be some on the top to help support the concrete.







This is the formboards and the crushed gravel they used on what will be the floor of the new basement. It took a crew of three about three days to setup the formboards. It takes patience and a lot of measuring to get the walls the correct height and widths.





Here is another shot of the formboards before the concrete pour. It looked like a maze.







Here is a wall that has been poured. There are heavy duty screws and bolts that are put into the concrete and they will connect to the bottom plates of the walls to hold them upright.






This is a shot of the external weeping tile. It is a perforated black corrugated pipe with a sock membrane around it to keep out silt and dirt. This should contain any water and move it to the sump pump to be discharged. There will be more crushed gravel above it and then covered with back fill dirt.




Here is the concrete without the formboards that were removed on Friday, only 24 hours after the pour. The concrete will dry in a day, but to fully cure, it takes about 28 days. This shot shows what will be the stoop for the new front door. It will be filled with crushed gravel, a lot of crushed gravel.





Here is a shot of the inside walls showing the two window well openings.






Here is another shot of the walls with the bolts. This will be the new mudroom.







Here is a shot of the side of the house with the new foundation.








The Foamboards were delivered awaiting installation next week.