Concrete boats

Originally Posted By: rray
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Here’s a foundation that I saw today. For the life of me I can’t figure out where all the soil went; the foundation perimeter wall was undermined also.


![](upload://kU4Qf8Ee5DyWUvVrfCoorLrmXBo.jpeg)


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Home inspections. . . .
One home at a time.

Originally Posted By: jmyers
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Russel,


Any chance it sunk?

Joe Myers


Originally Posted By: lwedige
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If this house is setting on concrete piers, the loose spoils from the pier holes may have settled or been removed after the pour but before the house was built.


Larry


Originally Posted By: Nick Gromicko
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I think the carpenters came along and ran the joists and decked it before the concrete guys could pour the floor of the crawl space over the post footers. On a crawl space so small, it would be too hard to pour and finish now.


Nick


Originally Posted By: Daniel Massuto
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Ok here is my take on this. what does everyone think?


The footing looks new in comparison to the wood structure so my guess is that it was poured long after the original construction. Maybe the wood columns originally went below the soil, not a good situation to start with and deteriorated. Then it was dug out and a new footing was poured. Why it was poured on what looks to be an old footing is beyond me.


Dan


Originally Posted By: rray
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Here’s what the engineers said.


Apparently, the cause of these concrete boats was flooding in the neighborhood. About twenty years ago there was a canyon at the right of the property. The canyon was filled in and a large apartment complex was built on the landfill. Prior to the landfill and construction, water used to drain heavily in the area, causing major flooding along many of the streets. Because the canyon no longer exists and storm drains and drainage pipes had been installed in the neighborhood back then (alleys and streets), engineers said that although a proper foundation should be constructed ($8,000), the stability of the soil in that area did not present any specific problems for the size and age of the house at this point.

I went back out to look at the apartment complex. After digging through the bushes, brush, and other interesting stuff (this is not the most desirable neighborhood; I went in daylight), I did find the storm drain/street drain concrete pipe exit under the alley that now exists at the rear of the subject property, although the exit was several blocks away.

If I were 10 again, I would have explored that wonderful "tunnel." Instead I went to On The Border and had a margarita.


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Home inspections. . . .
One home at a time.

Originally Posted By: jmyers
This post was automatically imported from our archived forum.



Russel,


That is pretty cool. Since I don't drink I would head to "south of the border". ![icon_lol.gif](upload://zEgbBCXRskkCTwEux7Bi20ZySza.gif)

Joe Myers