Adding support to floor

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scrotlife

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Im in the process of purchasing my first home. Had the inspector in to look at things and he pointed out a few things I could do. He recommended adding more support to the basement and insulating. Im thinking I'll add the support before insulating. The support looked a bit shifty in places (wooden supports rested directly on the rock under the house, and some supports the just didnt look to be doing anything) The inspector told me that the floor is fine, just requires a bit more support.

What is involved in this job? Can I just crawl in and add support posts (I was planning on resting them on concrete blocks, not just directly on the ground as some of the existing ones are). Can I just get up under and wedge in pieces of 4x4? Attached are a couple pictures from the inspector.

Thanks

foundation.png

foundation1.png
 
Got a huge mess under there.
No way are 4 X 4's expectable.
No way is wood laying in direct contact with the ground expectable.
No vapor barrier over the dirt floor.
Should have been piers dug a doubled up beam and concrete blocks used for piers.
Unless your buying this house for the cost of the land I'd pass.
 
Yea I realize it's a bit of a mess... The house is 65 years old. I know that posts resting on the ground isnt acceptable, that's why I want to fix it.
So wooden posts are out of the question? What is acceptable? Jack posts? Vapor barrier on the ground will be the last step. Insulation and more posts first...
 
You can use posts but I would go with at least 6x6pt. The real issue is what's what is on the top of the post and under it. I don't know where you are, nor do I know your soil conditions, but those are considerations.
Generally you would want the supports on a concrete footing. Depth is a local code issue. You could also use concrete block as you mentioned but you'll end up having to shim between the block and the girder. With wood you can cut them to the exact length. You want to use galvanized stand-offs for the bottoms and straps for attaching the tops to the girders.
Your home inspector should be able to tell you how many supports you need for the span of the girders.
 
Cool, Thanks.

The soil conditions are basically bedrock. The house is kinda built on the side of a hill that looks to have all the soil grubbed off down to the rock below. The back of the house only has a few feet clearance of crawlspace, whilst the front half or so of the house has a nicer poured floor and is developed into a furnace room with a little workshop space.

I was going to use wooden posts on top of the concrete blocks (floor joist - wooden post - concrete block - ground/rock) so I could cut them to fit.

There's a small sag in the kitchen which I guess i'll have to jack up before doing the other securing (i'd like to put tile in the kitchen, want to have everythign nice and level prior... also if I jacked it up after adding support the added supports might lose their function)
 
Kinda looks like they under built both the beem and the joists. Posting under the beam in the center will be like cutting the span in half which should be fine but you should dig down to frost level or to solid rock and install a concrete footing, 16` sq and 8 inches deep and then post from there and the best for the joist would be 2 footing and make a beem out of 2 2x10s and post to that.
 
Thanks.

When I posted "floor joist - wooden post - concrete block - ground/rock", I think I meant "floor joist - beam - wooden post - concrete block - ground/rock" (I should spread the weight out across several joists by putting a beam across them?)

I dont think Im going to be able to dig much. There's only whatever dirt that was left on the rock from when the area was cleaned for building. Might be able to scrape off an inch in some places, other places it's bare rock.

The house is only 850 sq/ft, so it's not a large footprint. And only about half of that is low crawlspace area.

I think I may wait until summer to put plastic on the floor. I want to see what the water situation in there is come spring melt. The place looked dry and doesnt look like it ever had water entering, but for my own peace of mind I'd like to know that before covering the ground.
 
If you have solid rock, you can just drill a hole in it for post saddle and use a treated post.
 
^^

Im in Canada, Newfoundland. I'll get that info a post it when I get a chance (out of town currently and dont actually take possession of the house for another week and a half). Will post it for advice once I get in there and can measure.
 
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