Footers

We have the basement dug and the soil in big piles. In this entry we will put in the forms for the footers, pour the concrete, remove the forms, install the drains, and put in the stone.

The footers are 8” x 16” with two 5/8” re-bar. The projection allows a small room under the back entrance where the door to the garage and the door out to the patio goes. There will be a long closet along the back wall. We will see all of that when I frame it. The patio will be built up on the soil to the right of the picture. Where the ladder is the garage footers are yet to be dug. That will be done after removing the piles of earth and laying up the block basement walls. The block layer has a few open days and wanted to get the basement walls up before I arrive. That way I can start the framing on the main part of the addition while they do the garage. 

Now you can see where the deck for the patio goes. It will be under the main house roof. The next blog entry or the one after will show how these two walls are tied together. I saw all of this in my mind a year ago before I put it on paper. Now we are seeing it come to life in the real world.

The concrete was delivered and the footers were poured. Notice the vertical re-bar used to tie the walls to the footers. I will be glad when the basement walls are finished and the old house is sitting on something solid and not dangling out in space. I can see there is going to be a lot of hard physical work to construct a doorway into the old basement just to the right of the pier.

Another view of where the patio will go.

The drain tile is added to drain ground water into the crock in the corner where a sump pump will pump it out.

A ready-mix truck with an elevator attachment on the back delivers the stone for the drainage. That elevator sure saves much work. The operator has a remote control in his hand that controls where he wants the elevator to deliver the stone.

The entire area between the footers will be covered with about 4” of stone to provide nice drainage for the concrete basement floor. As soon as the walls are built they will pour the basement floor. That is not normally done at this time, but I have requested it because I will be building some support frame walls when I arrive. If you stay tuned this summer you can learn much about constructing an addition. I think we will have fun together. I will do the work and you will watch. How did I end up on the work end?