Pouring it on...

After getting the basement floor ready for concrete, it was time to dig and level the trenches for the garage footings. Susan's sister, Suzanne and her son, Brian and his wife, Katie came up from Boise to give us a hand. With their help, we got it done in one day. It sure is nice to get a little help once in a while.


Betty and her crew have begun the concrete work for the garage. Here the footings have been poured and they are pictured smoothing the surface where the stem walls will be poured.



This morning Betty and the crew installed the rebar and forms for the garage stem walls. A short while later, a concrete truck arrived to fill the forms. While it was here, Betty also poured the footings for the columns that will support the deck that will span the back of the house, and for the columns that will support the roof over the entryway.

This means that I will spend the next several days at my least favorite task - backfilling and compacting the areas around the garage and columns. Sometimes I wonder if I will ever be done with that evil compactor!

Getting in on the ground floor...

Today marks a major step forward in our homebuilding project. Our day began at 5:30am as the concrete pump truck arrived to pour the basement floor. As the sky lightened, the concrete trucks arrived, delivering 32 cu.yd. of concrete for Betty Baker's crew to expertly apply to the floor area. The six man crew completed the pour in just over 1 1/2 hours.


Betty Baker directs the concrete onto the basement floor, while the other five workers spread and level the mix.


Susan oversees the work from the north wall. The smile says it all.




As the morning sun peeks over the hill, the crew completes the pour. It will now be power troweled and finally smoothed by hand. It will set up for a couple of hours, after which 1" saw cuts will be cut into the concrete at various intervals using a diamond saw blade. This will prevent random cracking of the slab caused by settling and expansion and contraction. After the slab has hardened, the lid for the vault room will be poured, using 6" of reinforced concrete over 1 1/2" steel panels.
Once this is finished, we will be able to begin framing the interior walls and floor.

Prepping for the floor pour...

We have finally reached the point where the basement floor can be poured. The preparation included getting all the drain pipes positioned, running the electrical and water lines into the house, connecting the septic system, and stubbing in the ground loop lines for the geothermal ground source heat pump. All these steps required fees, permits, inspections and approvals by the various bureaucrats who are here to help us.
Once all that work was done, Susan and I completed the leveling and compacting of the dirt inside the walls. The picture above shows Betty Baker of Baker Concrete and her crew shooting elevations for the pour.

We were fortunate to find used 4'x8'x 1 1/2" sheets of foam board for use as insulation under the slab. These panels have aluminum facing on both sides, and usually sell for $12-$15 apiece. We picked them up for less that $3 per panel. The reflective aluminum will have no effect beneath the floor, but I am also planning to use them between the studs in the basement walls. They will be covered with visqueen (heavy black plastic sheeting used as a vapor barrier). Then four inches of concrete will be poured directly over the insulation and visqueen.


This is what the floor looked like Friday afternoon. Naturally, a windstorm, complete with thunder and lightning came through Friday night and blew the visqueen and panels all over the hillside. I spent this morning gathering everything up and putting it back in the basement. Tomorrow Susan and I well refit and reinstall everything in preparation for an early Monday morning pour. Keep your fingers crossed that there won't be any wind!