support posts Archives - Charles Buell Consulting LLC

June 25, 2015 by Charles Buell

The Dirt Giveth and the Dirt Taketh Away.

Without dirt, the biggest trees in the world would not amount to much. Redwoods may not be the biggest trees in terms of volume but they are the tallest trees on earth—reaching as high as 378 feet–longer than a football field including the end zones. They grow in dirt and when they eventually die, as much as 2000 years later, they return a lot of dirt to the earth as well. Even the great redwoods succumb to wood decay/rot and wood destroying insects.

It is very common to see support posts in crawl spaces that are impacted by dirt.

Just like it took dirt to grow the trees that these support posts are cut from, so too will the dirt return them to the earth. This is all part of the natural cycle of life.

In our homes our goal is to sloooow this process down.

In crawl spaces where the support posts are vulnerable to damage from eroding soils, they must be adequately protected from the dirt. When dirt covers the wood, the wood becomes susceptible to moisture and wood destroying insects.

In this first picture one can see the stain on the side of the post where it used to be buried in dirt. Someone knew this was a problem and put a barrier of concrete blocks around it to protect it. Unfortunately the blocks, and the black plastic that covered them (before I moved it out of the way), only help in trapping moisture in the bottom of the post.

While the decay is slowed, it still will continue quicker than if proper clearances for air circulation had been created.

As we look down inside of the space next to one side of the post we can see that the dirt at the bottom is wet and the post is badly decayed. Even though much of this decay occurred before “repairs” were made, the repairs have been insufficient to stop the progress of the decay/rot. This whole post will need to be replaced with ground-contact pressure treated wood or other suitable means of support.

Remember.

The dirt giveth and the dirt taketh away.

Even if you are a mighty Redwood.

By Charles Buell, Real Estate Inspections in Seattle

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September 23, 2013 by Charles Buell

Forty days and forty nights

Well, it probably took 40 hours to fix the 40 posts, which was not too bad considering I only recommended that one be fixed—-which would have taken only about 40 minutes.

It is not uncommon to find support posts in crawl spaces compromised for one reason or another. Even in new construction this can be true because it would be pretty unusual for a jurisdictional inspector to go down into the space after the deck is installed. On an inspection a while back I found one such post that was not properly supported by the footing and not attached to the footing per current requirements. I called for repairs to be made to that support post and even included a picture in the report.

When I went back for the re-inspection I found that someone had done an incredible job of attaching metal brackets to all 40 of the support posts throughout the entire crawl space—–like the ones in the picture below.

As you can see there are two heavy metal brackets attached to each post. Each bracket required roto-hammering holes into the concrete to bolt the brackets to the footings and then the brackets were bolted to the posts. This is how it was done, in spite of the fact that there was already the required metal strap attaching the post and footing (as can be seen on the left side of the right post).

This next picture is what the post I called for repairs to looked like—-prior to repairs.

This next picture shows what the post looked like—-after repairs.

As you can see, except for the angle of the picture, the post remains the same, and most likely will continue to do so for another 40 days and 40 nights.

You can take a horse to water but you can’t make it take a bath—or read instructions.

By Charles Buell, Real Estate Inspections in Seattle

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April 25, 2012 by Charles Buell

Treading water and other versions of holding ones breath.

One of Bill Cosby’s most famous stand-up comedy acts was called “Noah.” I used to have it on a record (you remember—those things that go around and around). I am not going to recite the whole monologue here, and if you want to hear it you can find it here: Noah. It is a little long—but funny as all get out.

Noah is busily building the Ark and his neighbor comes over and wants the pile of wood out of his driveway so that he can go to work. Noah is being secretive and won’t tell him what he is building and the neighbor wants to know if Noah can at least give him a hint. Noah says, “You want a hint? I’ll give you a hint—-how long—can you tread water?”

This brings me today’s post about hydraulic jacks. While the connection between Noah and hydraulic jacks may be hard to imagine, I promise there is a connection—-of sorts. You see, hydraulic jacks work on the principle that when you pump them up, oil is pumped into a cylinder under the piston through a one way valve which causes the piston to move up and be “uplifting.” Now—as long as that one way valve does not leak, whatever you lifted will stay lifted. If the valve starts to leak—–things can tumble down or at least get all cattywampus.

A while back, in one of my many crawl space adventures, there were five of these jacks holding up the house so that a new foundation could be poured under one side of the home. It had been this way for several years—-symbolic of someone’s dream gone awry—or at least out of money. These five jacks have been “treading water” pretty well, for a long time—-how much longer is anyone’s guess.

All bets are off when all the beasts of the world—-two of a kind—-both male and female, start to party in the house.

***

Charles Buell, Real Estate Inspections in Seattle

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