Foundation ?s

Not something that I am going to try to fix myself but my question is when symptoms start to appear when do you make the call. My house is about 12 years old and I have started to notice some fairly minor things that are making me think about that call. The symptons are minor wall cracks (paint will fill), one short one on ceiling seam, some grout separation on kitchen tile minor mortar separation. Most things I feel pretty comfortable with but with a foundation I feel like my 80 year old dad taking his car to the Mercury dealer. I suppose there are honest ones out there but I just feel once you have them come out they got you. Do wait for a little more obvious things to show up or do you trust someone to give and honest opinion.

GL Hunt was the one I went with. Honest people to work with and no pressure. They said the main place to look for damage that is structural is your door jams. Where your trim is miter cut for the corner on the top of each door jam. If the miter cut on the trim is seperating, you have problems. Other issues are mostly minor concerns.

Another area is the same spot on your garage. They said these two places are the first signs of serious problems. We have a kitchen that has a bay window type eating area that is out away from the main house. We first started noticing the ceiling sheetrock cracking. After he showed up and did the level test, he showed us all the other signs.

They are out of Ft. Worth.

put some pics of it up stump, it could be just the drought and ground movement, not good but not much you can do about it in these conditions.

Good point. Have you tried soaker house around your house?

test your plumbing.

Just because you have cracks does not mean you have foundation problems. Expansion and contraction of the wood can cause a lot of cracks. Best way to look for foundation issues is on the walls above the windows and door jambs. If the cracks run at approximately 45° angles probably foundation, if the cracks are perpendicular to the floor/ceiling then probably expansion. If you live in a brick home look for exterior cracks in the brick and wide cracks in the mortar. If you have brick or mortar cracks you can monitor them for a while (month or so) by measuring their width. If the cracks continue to open then you may have a foundation issue. By the way, it will cost you a little money but I highly recommend a structural engineer evaluate your home and not a foundation contractor. Engineers make no money on foundation repair only on their reports. If you wish to have the names of a couple of engineers PM me and I will be happy to provide.

What is soaker house?

Best deal I would suggest is have your water and sewer tested for leaks.

After that check for drainage problems.

Then I would call a Engineer out to evalute your house.

Many of the Foundation companies out there are crooks.

Stay away from Olshan, All Pro, and especially First Choice, and for darn sure stay away from the fly by night companies

I would recommend Perma Pier they are probably the best and most honest and best priced.

I have worked with or for many of the foundation companies in North Texas doing test on plumbing systems and making repairs over the past 10 years.

Strated running it in June this year. I have a tree that grew on a volunteer basis in my front flower bed. It is a neat Juniper type tree. I was hoping maybe it would stay small. It did not and is coming out this weekend. I hate it because the birds love it.

Nor sure that wall cracks would show up well on a picture. They are about 1-2mm. On that might have I have already fixed. Everyone has pretty much confirmed what I htough about foundation companies. I am going to monitor the the mortar separation and see if any of the wall cracks that I have fixed reappear. Last summer when I first noticed some mortar separation it closed back up once it started to rain in the fall.

get down on eye ball level and look down the motar line on your bricks. Or run a string level along the motar line.

So what I am looking for is a mortar line that is off level?

how do you get down to eye level?

Ummmm... DUH!! Through the Soaker House.

Yes, if it looks off level, run a string level on it and measure the deviation. What I meant by eye level was that on some houses you have to get sometimes low to the ground to see the mortar line across an entire wall.

Perma-Pier

and there's your sign, that is ground movement, if the cracks did not expand during the drought then you should be fine on the foundation. expansive clay is predominant in this part of the country and will make a house shift and move yearly. there is not much you can do about it except the soaker hose. one of the problems with the way slabs are done around this part of the world is they are usually not monolithic and have sand placed inside the stem walls for fill. rock (3/4"-1 1/2") is a much much better backfill but is almost never used.

as far as the mortar joint method, that will work good if the brick was laid level. there will be deviation in the mortar lines no matter how good the mason. better way is to find 4 or 5 spots in the area you think is moving and mark the concrete about 6" above dirtline. measure up to a brick course (15th course as an example) and write the measurement down for each spot. remeasure every 2 weeks for 3 months or so and see if they match within 1/8", if so then your good, if not then up to a 1/4" movement is acceptable. more than 1/4" and its time to find an engineer.

Hey StumpJumper, I'm in Rockwall at least 3 days a week, If you want me to swing by, let me know. I inspect about 600 houses a year.