Day 14: Spreading gravel and laying out the first course of block

We started spreading the pile of gravel today. There is no maneuvering room for heavy equipment inside the walls, and a gravel pump does not exist, so we moved it by hand. We first placed some gravel around the pipes close to ground level. Then we loaded the wheelbarrow and moved little piles around the subgrade. It was harder work than moving APEX block the day before. My appetite has increased.

We also started laying out the 1st course of APEX block. This was fun and challenging. It is rewarding to see the blocks fit well over the rebar and have dimensions match what is on the plans. The corners present little puzzles. My walls are not an exact number of blocks long, so the last block must be trimmed to fit. Horizontal L shaped corner rebar must be placed. We will probably try several different methods before we come up with a solution that works best.

Here is a pic of the site from the East.

Green comment for today:
Consider manual labor now and then. It does take more time, but it has some advantages:

• It’s quiet, so you can and hear the tunes playing on the solar powered radio. If you are working with someone else, you can have a conversation.
• It saves fuel.
• It’s great exercise... if you don’t throw out your back.

Thanks for reading. Post a comment if you like.

Day 13: APEX blocks arrive, and more Plumbing

Correction from the plumber:

The reason the ABS pipe is wrapped in foam when in concrete is to allow expansion and contraction of the pipes so they don't wear and fracture over the years. Thanks Coady!

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The APEX wall building blocks arrived today. The road I live on is not wide enough at my driveway to provide access for the large delivery truck. For this reason, the material was moved off the delivery truck to a smaller flatbed for shuttling about 1.5 miles to the job site. A forklift removed pallets from the delivery truck – see pic below.

The pallets were transferred to a flatbed truck. The pallets arrive shrink wrapped, but they were a bit top heavy. The shrink wrapping was cut and the top 2 or 3 rows were restacked by hand. The following pic shows unloading from the flatbed at the jobsite.

The forklift broke down at one point, and 5 full pallets were moved by hand. Each pallet contains 24 blocks, so a total of 576 blocks were moved today. Each block weighs 52 pounds, so almost 15 tons were moved. It was a day of hard work, and everyone was ready for a beer when we were through. Here is a pic of about half the material that was moved by hand.

These will turn into walls over the next several weeks. Here is a pic of 2 blocks shown in position over the rebar.

While the crew was shuttling blocks, Coady and Adam finished up most of the preliminary plumbing. The kitchen and shower drains and vents were completed. Here is a pic showing all of the plumbing so far.

The pipes that come into contact with concrete get wrapped in a white foam material. The foam acts as a cushion providing a bit of protection during an earthquake. There is a pair of French drains installed below the slab. This is an unusual location for a French drain. They are usually installed outside the walls to drain water away from the foundation. These French drains will remove any Radon gas, which is heavier than air, from below the slab. We live in an area where Radon gas may be present at levels high enough to create a health concern.

Green comment for today:
Consider building with a recycled wall material. The APEX blocks contain 85% by volume recycled Expanded Polystyrene foam (EPS). On the one hand, I don’t like perpetuating the use of polystyrene. But on the other hand, the recycled foam blocks have some advantages:

• Recycling the foam keeps it out of landfills. Let’s face it, the use of polystyrene is not stopping today. That material needs to go somewhere.
• Petroleum is an incredible material with many uses. EPS provides an insulation R-value of 4 per inch which is comparable to other available materials.
• The block makes a great Insulated Concrete Form (ICF) resistant to rot, fire and termites.

I leave you with a pic of Justin and his cute puppy Stella – the construction mascot. She’ll grow to nearly full size during this project.

Thanks for reading. Your comments are welcome.

Day 12: Plumbing started

Coady Barnum and Adam White showed up to begin plumbing. They made measurements and planned the positions of drains and vents. The finish floor is a concrete slab, so it is very important to get all of these positions correct. There is no opportunity to make changes after the slab is poured. Coady used a laser level to establish the finish floor position. This allowed the drain for the most important seat in the house (the toilet) to be positioned – see the pic below. The big open tube pointing up is the toilet drain. The smaller tube heading off to the left is the vent, which will eventually go all the way up through the roof.

In the next picture you can see the utility room sink, washing machine and floor drains.

Besides this plumbing work, Granite Rock delivered 2 truckloads of drainage rock that will eventually be spread out evenly on the subgrade.


Green comment for today:
Building a home with one bathroom minimizes plumbing materials and complexity. This works for us because there are only two living in the home.

Thanks for reading. I appreciate your comments.

Day 11: Pouring footings

The footing trenches passed inspection by Santa Cruz County in the morning. Concrete for pouring the footings was requested immediately after passing inspection. A concrete pump is used to distribute concrete into the trenches more easily than moving the concrete truck around. Here is a pic of the Pacific Coast Concrete Pumping set up.

The Las Animas concrete truck showed up soon after the concrete pump. The truck parked so that it could pour concrete directly into the inlet of the concrete pump – see pic below.

The pump was turned on and a person on the end of the hose directed the concrete into the trench – see vid below.

Approximately 25% of the Portland cement in the concrete mix is replaced with fly ash, a by product of coal combustion. The use of fly ash has several benefits:

• it replaces Portland cement - a material with high embodied energy - with a material that was once considered a pollutant and waste product
• it makes the concrete stronger
• it makes the concrete easier to pump
  

The crew followed behind the hose. People poked shovels into the concrete to help it settle. Several people hand troweled a smooth top surface while one person checked with the laser to make sure we had a level footing – see pic below.

After 2 empty concrete trucks and a couple hours, the work was finished – see pic below.

Thanks for reading. Feel free to post a comment.

Day 10: Rebar

Raul, Victor and Fernando from Monterey Bay Rebar showed up Friday morning. They brought a trailer full of rebar in a variety of diameters and configurations needed to meet my structural drawing requirements.

The first two rules of mechanical engineering are:

1. don't push on a rope
2. don't pull on a brick

Rebar is cast into concrete to comply with that 2nd rule. Concrete does not resist tension forces very well. That's why you typically see things hanging from strong wires or cables. Rebar has ridges to help grip and transfer tension forces from the concrete.

My foundation needs three horizontal rebars running the entire length of the footings. Every 16” on center, a 48” long vertical bar penetrates the top surface of the footing. All of the horizontal rebars must be spaced a minimum of 3” from the footing trench soil. The trick to rebar placement is twofold.

• rebar must be held in the trench before concrete is poured
• rebar must stay in place during the concrete pour until the concrete sets

Victor and Fernando made the job look easy. They used steel wire to tie the vertical bars to the horizontal bars in such a way to make a self-supporting assembly. Then they supported the tied rebar assembly off the footing trench floor with small precast concrete blocks called dobies. Here is a pic of Raul, Victor and Fernando followed by a picture of a dobie in place.


A horizontal rebar is tied along the top of the vertical bars to keep them spaced properly during the pour. This piece will be removed after the concrete has set. Steel wire loops connect the top of the corner vertical rebars to the batter board spikes. These loops are twisted up which turns them into turnbuckles keeping the entire structure stiff enough to stay standing during the concrete footing pour. Here is a pic of a turnbuckle followed by some pics of the completed work.



Thanks for reading. Feel free to post a comment if you like.

Day 9: Almost a day off

There was not much action on site today. We met with a rebar contractor to talk about the foundation. I pulled some scotch broom which is kind of a meditative process. I thought about how invasive homebuilding really is. It may be called green building, but ripping out tree roots and running over all the vegetation is nothing but green. I have to stay focused on the end result - a permaculture design that uses the energy on site more effectively than before I arrived. That's all for now. Thanks for reading.

Day 8: Initial grading completed

All the preliminary grading steps were completed today. Water supply and electrical conduits were placed, and the trench was backfilled. A large section of the site was leveled for storage of building materials. All the last little piles of soil were smoothed out.

The geotechnical engineer made another site visit and approved the footing trenches for concrete pour.

All the other pics from today are pretty boring and technical, so I am closing with a pic of a snake we found hiding in a tarp last week. I think it is a scarlet kingsnake.

Thanks again for reading. I appreciate your comments.

Day 7: More trenching

The footing trench for the West wall was completed today. The main sewer line was run from the existing septic tank pipe and capped next to the home for future connection to the drains. Utility room footing trenches were completed. The water supply trench was completed. As the initial grading portion of the project is coming to a close, Steve is smoothing out and redistributing the assortment of dirt piles. The site is really taking shape. It is further along than I expected at this stage of the project. Following is a pic looking West down on the home site from the hill to the East.

Thanks for reading. Post a comment if you like.

Day 6: Cutting trenches

Strings were set up at the 4 foundation corners to create a line for the backhoe to follow when cutting footing trenches. The backhoe cut 2 foot wide footing trenches for the North, East and South walls. The laser level was used periodically to check that the trench depth was accurate to within a few inches. Two people with shovels kept the trenches clean of small debris as the backhoe progressed. This work went quickly after all the good preparation done in previous days. Batter boards were set up at the 4 corners to get ready for positioning the walls on the footings. The diagonal measurements to the outside of the footings were accurate to within an inch. That is great for the footings. Here is pic of the trenches as we finished Saturday.


Trenches for the water supply and phone line were also cut today. We made good progress and ended early. It was quite hot and everyone was ready to start the weekend after a hard week.

Thanks for reading. Feel free to post a comment if you like.

Day 5: Laying out foundation stakes

The remainder of the concrete slab subgrade was completed today. It was compacted one last time. The geotech engineer performed a final moisture-density test which we passed.

We positioned the foundation perimeter location on the subgrade and pounded stakes at the 4 corners indicating the outside edge of the footings. Here is a pic showing the SW and SE corner stakes. The NE corner stake is partially hidden by a little pile of dirt in the back corner. The NW corner stake is too far left to be in the pic.

The cut for the utility room was nearly completed, and the cut for the south patio was started. The whole site is starting to look like what I have imagined for a long time.

Thanks for reading. Post a comment if you like.

Day 4: Pounding sand...again

A short post today - more of the same as yesterday. The 3 foot deep hole was filled with about 1 foot of soil at a time. Each of these fills is called a lift. The foot of soil was compacted a few inches, then another lift was applied and compacted. The geotech engineer showed up for another moisture-density test after approximately 2 feet of lifts.

We passed the test and started filling up the remainder of the hole and leveling out the entire subgrade. Here is a vid of me driving the compactor (maximum speed, 50 feet per minute :-)

At the end of the day, the full subgrade for the concrete slab is really beginning to take shape. Here's a pic from where the West entry will be.

Thanks for reading. Feel free to post a comment.

Day 3: Pounding sand...in a good way

If pictures tell a thousand words each, then videos should be even more.

The day began with cleaning out the Western 3 foot deep section of subgrade. Here is a vid of a tree root being removed.

After flattening the 3' deep section, a sheepsfoot compactor is used to, duh, compact the soil. It has a vibrating sand filled steel drum for a front tire. It is driven back and forth over the soil many times like in the following vid.

The goal is to get the soil to 90% of its maximum possible density and as close to optimum moisture content as possible. The geotechnical engineer took a soil sample yesterday to determine the density versus moisture curve for my site soil. Look here for an example curve. We called in the the geotechnical engineer again today to see if the soil was dense enough. He used a machine called a Nuclear Surface Moisture-Density Gauge. First he pounds a pin into the soil at least 6". He then inserts the probe of the gauge into the hole and pushes a button. The results are compared to the lab sample curve in seconds. We passed! The soil is nearly the density of concrete. Here's a vid of those last few steps. Sorry it's 90 degrees off. My old camera doesn't adjust when I rotate it, so you'll have to turn your head.

Finally, I leave you with a picture of Gabby (Steve's dog), the grading mascot.

A good day today. Thanks for reading. Don't be shy, leave a comment.

Day 2: Setbacks (not those lines on the site plan your building must stay clear of)

Unfortunately, we discovered today that the water supply line for my neighbor's home was run underneath my foundation location. In the picture below, the trench on the left contained my neighbor's water line. The trench on the right is where the water line had to be rerouted to avoid my foundation. The majority of the day was spent solving this problem. Another couple hours were lost while a leaking backhoe hose was replaced.

The geotechnical engineer made a site visit to check out soil quality in the foundation cut. He ordered that the top 3 feet of soil on the West half of the subgrade be removed and replaced with soil more suitable for compaction. The sandy "topsoil" I mentioned yesterday will be adequate to mix with the removed soil. At least the on-site material is acceptable, just in the wrong place ;-)

On the upside, the level spreader trench was dug and the crew's porta potty was delivered. I hope tomorrow moves a little bit more in the positive direction. Until then, thanks for reading, and feel free to leave a comment.

Day 1: Groundbreaking

After many months of home design and permit application, groundbreaking day began!

At 10:00 am, Steve began digging out the roots of the oak tree. There was a large amount of nice looking "topsoil" down around the roots. This soil was piled up separate from the more sandy soil located on top. During final landscaping, the topsoil will be spread out for the garden.

After a day of digging and moving soil around the site, the initial cut for the home is nearly complete. Here Georg, the GC from Integral Construction, and Steve are seen checking flatness of the slab subgrade with a LASER level.


I feel good now that things are started. Today was a pretty dramatic change for the site. Until the next post, thanks for reading.