Bentonite and floating walls/floors/foundations

[Vision67]

Originally Posted by Noahma

if the foundation is designed right, you should not have the problems listed above. Some of the houses built in the 60's did suffer from problems due to the availability of foundation types at the time. Foundation systems have come a LONG way from then, and can be built in expansive soil areas. There are areas in which the soils engineers will tell you to NOT build in that area due to the extreme nature of the expansion.

A very good portion of Colorado is over expansive clay's. And designs have been done to compensate for it.

The problem is that no builder will absolutely guarantee that whatever they have done to mitigate expansive soil problems will work. You are left taking the risk.

Don't do that. Build on sand.

[Noahma]

Originally Posted by Vision67

The problem is that no builder will absolutely guarantee that whatever they have done to mitigate expansive soil problems will work. You are left taking the risk.

Don't do that. Build on sand.

if they follow the structural engineers calculations, and follow the soils engineers recomendations, there is no reason to feel that it is not a safe house. Most of colorado, especialy the denver and northern burbs are on moderate expansive soils.

[Vision67]

Originally Posted by Noahma

if they follow the structural engineers calculations, and follow the soils engineers recomendations, there is no reason to feel that it is not a safe house. Most of colorado, especialy the denver and northern burbs are on moderate expansive soils.

Nobody is saying that the house is not safe. So you will guarantee that the flat work will not heave, the walls will not develop cracks, the doors will not be hard to close, and the garage floor will not shift?

Oh, I didn't think so.

So we can agree to disagree.

[Noahma]

Originally Posted by Vision67

Nobody is saying that the house is not safe. So you will guarantee that the flat work will not heave, the walls will not develop cracks, the doors will not be hard to close, and the garage floor will not shift?

Oh, I didn't think so.

So we can agree to disagree.

if properly designed, I can tell you that the walls will not develop cracks that would hinder the structure unsafe, I can guarantee that the flat work will not fully heave, there may be movement though, which is allowed for in the design work. I can guarantee that doors will not be hard to close (which is due to improper load calculations on the pipe columns causing the house to sag in the middle. Garage floors should not heave, though you might get some shifting of the slab due to soils settling. I can tell you that the same slabs will move even if the soil is in perfect conditions as well.


I have been designing houses long enough in Colorado to know that I would stand 100% behind my designs if the builder and the engineers design their end correctly, and build it to plan.