Foundation mend Specialists Help Homeowners Avoid farranging and costly Repairs

Paul Brown is known among his friends as a very positive, upbeat kind of guy. But the news he received about his house last week had him truly shaken. "There were just two small cracks in the basement floor when we moved into the house two years ago," he explained to a neighbor. "But when I went down to the basement last week, I saw that both cracks had widened, and that one section of the concrete slab had unquestionably sunk down about 2 inches below another."

"I heard that a family at the other end of the development had a similar problem," Paul's neighbor responded. "They had a real mess on their hands. They paid a contractor to jackhammer most of the basement floor; then a big concrete truck came in to pour a new floor."

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Paul looked worried. "That's what I'm afraid of," he continued. "It's not just the cost of replacing the foundation that bothers me. I hate the idea of that heavy tool destroying all the nice planting and landscaping work we've done around that section of the house."

Why A Foundation Settles

Fortunately, this story and others like it can have a happy ending. Foundation settlement problems are prevalent in many parts of the country. Sometimes this happens because the soil below a basement or crawl space foundation has poor load-bearing qualities and ends up compressing or sinking over time. Other times, drainage problems unquestionably cause soil to be washed away, creating voids below sections of concrete slabs or footings.

Alternative to Excavation-Piering

Regardless of the cause of foundation settlement problems, the cure doesn't need to involve excavation, rubble discharge and new construction. The alternative to this uncut and costly heal strategy is to use piering techniques that join together settled slabs, walls and footings to solid bedrock and/or loadbearing soil. Once piers have been driven down to stable soil at greater depth, strong steel brackets attached to the piers can be used to stabilize settled foundation sections and even raise them back to their traditional positions.

Which Contractors Use Piers

General home heal contractors don't have way to foundation piers and the tool required to setup them. Nor do they have the training and engineering sustain to originate and certify this type of permanent repair. That's why some unfortunate homeowners end up paying for excavation and rubble discharge work that isn't necessary. The right contractor to call in is a foundation heal specialist. These building professionals are trained to gawk and analyze foundation problems, originate permanent repairs and perfect the work using extremely engineered tool and materials. In most cases, excavation work can be minimized along with the need to demolish existing masonry and haul it to the landfill.

Expert Engineers

A foundation heal scholar can call on the services of soil engineers to analyze soil characteristics at a site where foundation problems have occurred. By establishing the depth and location of dissimilar soil types, engineers can settle what types of foundation piers are most suitable, how many will be required, and where private piers should be located. Heavy tool isn't ordinarily required to originate openings where piers will be driven. Driving, bracket attachment and jacking operations are also performed with contract hydraulic equipment. Once the holes at pier locations are patched, the heal is invisible.

Foundation mend Specialists Help Homeowners Avoid farranging and costly Repairs

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