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Build a House (av)(aw)

With the foundation wall up it is time for the start of what it will be supporting.

This is a wood frame platform style construction so in order to begin they need to attach it to the foundation wall.

This is accomplished by bolting the bottom of the frame, to the cemented in place anchor bolts.

This is called the sill plate.

Notice how the wood of the sill plate is not allowed to make direct contact with the cement.This is done by placing a foam sill gasket in between.The foam comes in rolls that remind you of a big roll of tape.100 feet each in this case.

When looking at the picture you will see extra space,as the brick veener will sit here.More on brick veener later.

sill plate

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Posted by Bob Elliott (Chicago Property Inspection) on 05/24/2007 11:13 PM

Comments (28)

condo inspector, home inspection chicago, condo inspection, home inspector chicago

This post has been included in Illinois Information Cook County, IL Information

28 Comments on Build a House (av)(aw)

MAY

2007

Wow! Build a house and you can have 900 posts. Great photos. Around here the sill plate needs to be pressure treated.

MAY

2007

Hi Wayne..Thank you for the comment although somewhere between 50-100 posts should take us through the entire process.

Not bad concidering all that can be learned.

Perhaps you could go further and explain how they pressure treat the wood.

MAY

2007

Hey Bob, this is a great series you are producing. I think it is very informative.

The sill plate in this picture is treated wood. Treated wood is the same as any other piece of wood and in todays construction materials, it is most likely #2 yellow pine. They treat the wood during the drying process and is put into a large high pressure kiln and chemicals are introduced into the kiln under negative pressure forcing the chemicals into the cells of the wood. The makeup of the chemical is mostly arsenic, which is a natural deterrent of termites. Caution: Always wash your hands after handling treated wood and never ever burn the wood in a fireplace.....it can be very dangerous.

The floor joist or floor trusses rest on the sill plate next and are attached to the sill, via toe-nailing. Once the floor framing is in place the sub-flooring goes on, thus shoring up the foundation walls with lateral support. At this point the walls can be built.

Hi Robert..Good comments however I am pretty sure the cut out the arsenic around seven years ago.

Every time I see the word ARSENIC the old Cary Grant movie Arsenic and Old Lace comes to mind.

FYI, Guys. They no longer use Arsenic in the process. I believe that a nickel salt and maybe aluminium salt are now used. But I do know that Arsenic is no longer used.

I knew I had read that many times,but the date they stopped is probably around seven years ago.

I guess they were mainly worried about pets and young children licking the stuff on decks.

MAY

2007

Well, I guess that gives away my age......lol Good to know. Now that you mention it, I did start noticing that the look of the treated lumber has changed over the years.

One other thing I did notice that varies from the way building practices are in my area. When a home is to have a brick veneer faced exterior. The top of the foundation wall is required to have a brick ledge, instead of setting the brick at sill level. The front of the foundation wall has a 4" x 4" notch at the top exterior around the entire perimeter of the home or where ever the brick rest. This allows the moisture to exit the weep holes at the bottom masonary level, insted of at the sill level.

What type of floor system are they using?

Remember the hardware is more vulnerable to the ACQ and needs to be stainless or well dipped galvanized (some say 2 to 3 dips), or specially coated fasteners, with decks no aluminum flashing...

Steve

It is going to be brick veneer.and the comments are appreciated as I personally have never tried this before and often dumbfounded on what would make good captioning.

More than likely I will go back once in a while and put them all together in PDF from the beginning to create a smooth flowing storyline based on these comments.

Should I stick to photos or would their be some kind of way to give you guys credit for comments with a link to your sites as that would be the Active Rain way of doing things.

By the way the brick is sitting in the front yard for the last couple of weeks due to a carpenter problem.

These guys were fast as lightning,but there were issues with some of the workmanship,

As for myself,I have been busy trying to think up ways of increasing business now that I am trying to make this a full time gig.

So far I have never stepped foot in a Real Estate office and have been relying on internet leads which is just keeping my head above water.

The cool thing is my job tomorrow the guy said he read a good review on my service at Goggle.

Where did he see this as I was not aware people were rating me.?

My next step is going to be a dip into Guerrilla marketing.

I will let you guys know what works and what does not.

MAY

2007

Hey Bob,

I use a lot of the Guerrilla marketing ideas. I also market to realtors, but having a great web presense is key also. I wish you the best of luck in you marketing efforts. Should you have any questions about anything please feel free to call me or send me a note, I would be happy to help.

Lately I have been marketing to mortage company's and banks doing draw inspections. I also target new constructin phase inspections relying less and less on realtor referrals. I have also been doing a lot of marketing to new construction warranty inspections. Hope this helps a little.

I think what you are doing with the series is great, keep up the good work.

Back to treated wood: Don't forget that the foundation bolts need to be either stainless or the HDG type, or they will corrode over time. I would say that 80% of the new homes I'm inspecting they have neither and most are already rusting.

Scott since the bolts are embedded what would be the fix ?

That's the beautiful part of being a home inspector, we don't have to design the corrections or repairs!

I would suppose that the only way to properly take care of improper foundation bolts would be to replace them. Logic tells me that one would do it the same way one would add foundation bolts. A hole is drilled through the sill plate and into the concrete slab or wall. Then the proper threaded bolt would be set in the hole with and epoxy designed for concrete and metal bonding. But none of this should be done without it first being designed or approved by an engineer or the architect who is over the project.

Sounds like an awfully expensive fix for them to be doing it wrong 80% of the time.

The cost of the repair and the fact that it is seldom done has little to do with the builder correcting it. All I can do as an inspector is to report the problem. The only time an inspector will see this is if the drywall is not up or the walls are open, unless it is a crawl space.

I see most of them while I'm doing draw inspections for banks, and the banks are only looking (and paying) for percent complete not quality.

MAY

2007

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1/2 x 8 x 2 x 4	●	●
1/2 x 10 x 2 x 4	●	●
1/2 x 12 x 2 x 4	●	●
1/2 x 18 x 4 x 4	●

5/8 x 8 x 2 x 4	●	●
5/8 x 10 x 2 x 4	●	●
5/8 x 12 x 3 x 4	●	●
5/8 x 18 x 3 x 4	●	●

3/4 x 6 x 3 x 4	●	●
3/4 x 8 x 3 x 4	●	●
3/4 x 10 x 3 x 4	●	●
3/4 x 12 x 3 x 4	●	●
3/4 x 14 x 4 x 6	●	●
3/4 x 15 x 4 x 6	●	●
3/4 x 16 x 4 x 6	●	●
3/4 x 18 x 4 x 6	●	●
3/4 x 20 x 4 x 6	●
3/4 x 22 x 4 x 6	●
3/4 x 24 x 4 x 6	●	●
3/4 x 30 x 4 x 6	●
3/4 x 30 x 4 x 7	●

7/8 x 10 x 3 x 4	●
7/8 x 12 x 3 x 4	●
7/8 x 18 x 4 x 6	●	●

1 x 12 x 4 x 4	●	●
1 x 16 x 4 x 6	●
1 x 18 x 4 x 6	●	●
1 x 24 x 4 x 6	●	●
1 x 36 x 4 x 6	●	●
1 x 36 x 4 x 7	●

1-1/4 x 32 x 6 x 7	●
1-1/4 x 36 x 5 x 6	●
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MAY

2007

Thanks Robert ...I may need the help soon as I have no experiance with marketing

The internet is bringing some business but not enough to stay afloat and I will never be reduced to being a putz begging at a Real Estate office.Here have another donut,while I use psycology to convince you I will pass all your homes with a gold star ,give you payoffs and kiss your butt you wonderfull good looking intelligent master of all salespeople.Yech!

The other avenues you mentioned may be more palatable.

While I do market to realtors, I do not beg. I also make it clear that my report is in the best interest of the client and will never be a fluff report. Believe it or not some realtors respect this and some do not. I am only looking for the honest reputable realtors that want a great inspector. You can market to realtors and still hold your head up high, just find the ones who respect what you do and want whats in the best interest of the client.

As far as the rest of the marketing, Have you tried banks and title company's?

I don't go into RE offices either. I think that is a waste of time. I do speak to people every day and always find ways of letting everyone know what I do. You never know when your services are needed or can be recommended.

Sometimes, I'll spend a couple of hours on a Saturday or Sunday stopping by some open houses. Not to beg or bribe. I just introduce myself, sometimes chat a bit. If they like me or my personality, perhaps they will recommend me. Perhaps another day I will meet them elsewhere. At some point, when they think of a Hone Inspector they may think of me.

Why didn't anybody mention the spacing of the foundation bolts? OK, who knows the answer?

And since your talking brick shelfs, then also mention that the ends of the beams should be fire cut. Meaning the top of the joist that is buried in the masonry has to be cut back, so in the event of a fire it allows the beams to drop out when they burn... so the building will "fall in" and not "fall out". There should also be ties at the ends of the beams into the masonry to keep the building from bulging out. I usually make my own by weld a "T" out of 1/2" square steel stock. I drill two holes on the straight end to attach to the beam and bury the "T" end into the bricks/blocks.

Since the treated lumber is no longer made with arsenic, can it be used for more than the first layer of lumber.

JUN

2007

Hi Steve..Just tried to send you a private message but it did not go through,so I will try agaim tomorow.

To answer your question about sill bolts ,anchor bolts,or as you called them foundation bolts,they should be spaced 6 feet apart and 12 inches from ends.

The rest I will let you educate as it is to late for me to research.

On anchor bolts:

Bob, you got part of it right.

The requirement for building/homes over two stories is every 4 feet. And all require them to be no less than 1 foot from the corners. So you start in the corner and space them out either 4' or 6'. This is from the IRC so it might be different in areas that do not use the IRC. I'm betting that the Florida Building Code is completely different. Maybe Mitchell can chime in.

Ok Smarty pants..He did not specify over 2 stories.

Florida's building code is different. I think the insurance companies had a lot to do with that. I think they got tired of their houses blowing away.

Bob, What do all the abbreviations (aw), (ag), etc. stand for?

What's for dinner tonight?

Or are you spending the evening out. You had better behave yourself!

Oh I guess I figured every one would catch on.

With so many photos that is my way of numbering them.aa ab ac ad

As a frusteraated artist I have to many and need to start storing them before this laptop runs out of memory.

I may go out for a little ,but here in the city we have alot of fairs going on this weekend.

I am not doing as much this summer as in years past.Getting old sucks.

Between reading the boards I am experimenting with a blog and a wiki as a means to start that special boiler plate thread we disscused.

Everything takes longer when you do not have the formal training.

Sometimes I feel it is an advantage to not know limitations however.

I have so many links I may publish them .

JUN

2007

I figger'd it was some type of "filing" system, but I didn't see a pattern and was a bit confused.

My weekend is non stop too. I have to work today, this was a surprise, but I have to install a piece of lami at UCP in Manhattan. I was hoping to work on my boat, maybe I'll still get in a couple of hours. Sunday my son starts football camp, his first time, and I volunteered to help, so now I am a "football dad".

Getting old is a bit frightening at times and it can be depressing at others, but it sure beats the alternative. As far as limitations go, I'll bet you're just complaining out loud. I don't think you are the type of guy has has any limitations.

As far as all those links are concerned, buy a bag of onions, a bushel of peppers and open a stand at one of those fairs that are going on. You'll probably meet some young chick there and you can show her your blog and wiki.

Several years aga I actually did a few art fairs and may do so again as it is in my blood to create.

I go to many fairs and festivals in my constant search for something new and different to inspire me.

Good luck with your boat,There is nothing like the smell of the fresh air,and feeling you get looking back at the shore.

In Chicago we often go out ,anchor,and swim off the boats.

Is this something you are able to do there,or is the water to cold?

The water is fine, although I don't like swimming in the harbor. We do have a few favorite spots. We also like to fish a bit and simply going for a ride is relaxing. Especially at night.

I also enjoy the boat without even leaving the dock. I shut the door, close the shades and turn on the air conditioning. The peace and solitude are like medicine to me. The only time I ever oversleep is when I stay on the boat. The gentle rocking is so relaxing.

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