Foundations - Slab vs. Pier and Beam - Which is better?
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- Опубліковано 29 лип 2019
- We’re taking a look at the differences between concrete slabs, and pier and beam foundations for a new build. If you’re looking for good foundation advice, watch this for pros and cons for both systems!
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I built my own house in deep east Texas. I went pier and beam foundation. A few simple hand tools, a laser level and a 12” auger attachment on my tractor. 10 hours and 16 piers later I was done. I’ve gotten all kinds of flack about how I would have settling issues later and how I would have to have someone come out and re-level the house...my solution to that was anchoring jack bolts in my piers. So later on if I were to encounter any leveling issues, I could simply get underneath and use an 1 1/4” wrench, tighten or loosen the Jack nut to correct the problem and I’m done. Cajuneering at its best.
Damn man. Smart. Thanks
You mean you could literally use a 1 and1/4" wrench on a jack bolt and raise or lower you floor? How much distance are we talking up or down? 1/4" 1/2" 1"?
@@privateuploads-geo2625 good question I'm an 18 yr old tryna articulate myself more so plzz @eric hemard how much distance are we talking?
how much distance are we talking?
Thanks, gonna take that Cajuneering tip to heart.
This is a good book. Does provide a step by step introduction to how to build things ua-cam.com/users/postUgkxhgbP-6hUnXu_QRaoHgLztgsI0YF3HqR0 , also does offer some steps. Includes pictures to give you ideas for layouts and such. If you are looking for a guide, this is not exactly what you want. But if you are trying to familiarize yourself with the way that pole barn building and other out buildings, are made, then this will work just as you need it to. A few things in this book are a barn (of course), detached garage, storage building, and coops.
Had a pier on beam foundation for 13 years and slab foundation before for 10 years. Post on beam allowed easy access for underfloor plumbing and utilities. In addition, living in Houston, which can experience heavy rains that overwhelm the street drainage systems, having a first floor that is above grade keeps your sanity if there is any type of short term flooding. I also noticed, even with lots of trees, never had insect issues with the home elevated off the ground.
My house has a pier and beam foundation with a 6" slab as flooring. The piers stand 24" above the floor for ample room. It's a conditioned crawl space that's a pure joy to work in. I use a car creeper to move around on the smooth floor. Makes for a good storage area as well.
Amazing idea. What did it cost to do it this way? If you don't mind my asking.
I want to do this.
I've worked on a house with a pier and perimeter beam with a "sidewalk" slab underneath. For moving under the crawlspace we had an undercar cart. It was awesome to work under that house, just zooming around on a cart. It even had a couple lights :D
I use a similar idea to store my extension ladder in there. I use a $10 plant dolly. When I put the end of the ladder through the small door and into the crawl space, I rest the end on the dolly. Then I just push the ladder in, holding up the other end until it passes through the door as well. It works wonderfully. I just wish I had help setting up the ladder against my home! That problem seems to have no solution except hired workers.
Thinking of doing that with a house on 8' piers. It becomes my screened in porch with a pool table and i don't get taxed for finished space.Not as nice as a basement, but a lot cheaper.
As an engineer with over 30 years experience my $ 0.02:
Hire someone who can evaluate your soils, provide bearing capacity and determine if they are expansive in nature and to what severity.
If your soils are not expansive a slab on grade in frost free areas will work fine. Buried basement if you are in a frost zone. Insulation below the slab can be used but not typically used in the US. If the soils are highly expansive use piles and beams along with collapsible voids (hire an engineer). Expansive soils will give you a lifetime of issues regardless of how careful you are.
Piles are designed to actually increase soil loading in expansive soils to reduce expansion.
Rebar generally requires recommended slab thickness of 8"+. Poly fiber reinforcement is a reasonable substitute with thinner slabs. Post tensioning is great with concrete but generally expensive and requires specialized contractors. Wire mesh generally gets trampled to below the slab during concrete placement and provides little strength when not in correct position.
All Concrete will crack! Get it to crack were you prefer if possible and live with it.
Most problems can be mitigated early on by having professional engineers investigate and make recommendations. Early mistakes and money saving measures generally prove to be a lifetime of problems that don't go away.
I am in north Texas, almost to Oklahoma. Too bad Matt doesn't do houses up here. I do have a question for Matt, and you Tim... what are your thoughts on ICF homes. I am seriously considering this, but I want to make sure that it does not have all these cracking issues with the concrete you both discuss. Any thoughts on how to do that? Do I have to make the concrete extra thick, or what?
Now that I think about it, I guess I can do the ICF home, while still using the Pier and Beam method... I'd just probably want the conditioned crawl space like Matt had in this video. I guess you make that accessible from the interior of the home somehow though? I didn't see the entry point on the video, and it looked like the concrete perimeter was poured higher than the floor, so I can only speculate that the entrance to the crawl space is from within the house. Probably helps to keep the critters out too. I hope the bugs as well, because Texas is notorious for things like the dangerous brown recluse spiders. They'd love the crawl space.
Oh yeah, expansive clays.....they definitely put the heave in "heave ho". Early days of my life I lifted pier and beam homes, on bowdark piers. The wood was typically okay, the the footer was trashed. One house we lifted had settled on the high side of drain path over 20". The fireplace did not move, and you could see the original tar line around the brick of chimney where roof originally was.
Still a fan of P & B, though. Having access is so so nice.
@@totschoolmoms9977 Control joints. Lots .
Thank you so much
"thanks for letting me come back to the office, here"
I didn't have a choice, Matt.
9ravity, sure we did. We could have gone "click" [next video]. I'm glad I stayed. Good info lies within the start-and-end of any of Matt's videos.
😂😂😂
Lol
Lol Yeah, I don't remember being asked. But...you're welcome?
@@leejohnson7293 I said he could! lol
Great video. As soon as you said pier and beam is more maintenance friendly, I was sold. I maintain church buildings and am a big fan of easy repairs and maintenance! Thanks Matt!
i hear ya!
Ive worked concrete forming for 3 years now and i learn more from these videos than i do from my Journeyman.
In DFW many do "Slab on Grass" construction. Scratch the earth, pour concrete, and blame the soil. If you can fix it later, you could've done it right the first time.
New concern with poured slab homes is that they flood easily. Pier and beam can give some flood protection, depending on flood elevation.
Can pier and beam be done in northern states?
@@nofurtherwest3474 Probably. Your local building department can confirm either way. But the details of insulating the floor/bottom of the house becomes more important since it’s potentially more exposed to ambient temperatures.
@@edbouhl3100 Yeah I was wondering how the water pipes stay above freezing temp if it's running bare through a pier and beam crawl space. I guess it would be somewhat "conditioned"? It would have cement block walls around it and maybe a vent from the furnace?
Mr. Risinger, it’s been so good seeing the beginning of your videoing and the development to today’s technology. As a former Fedex driver I smiled real big the days I saw your 18 wheeler trailers at the truck stop in MontEagle,TN! He’s still at it, reminding me to look you up on a day of rest or on snack break. I may not be remodeling or in the industry but have enjoyed watching these videos...& hearing ”Oooon the build show” slogan. Much Kudos Brother.
Love pier and beam or any raised foundation - easy on the body & upgrades later on / repairs as you stated. Slab really requires proper installation of pipes, insulation protective foam around pipes and prayer that everything was done right. Gr8 vid.
Over the past 30 years, I've easily done plumbing changes and repairs from my unfinished basement. The last thing I want in any future house is to have it all buried under a slab.
Good point. I’m not a plumber but we need to consider plumbing and drainage
Exactly. The slabs are 6-8 inches. High tension rebars in between. Plumbing sewer is below slab. How to fix sewer issues ? That will happen with these flushable wipes eventually
@@maheshrajannan3416 Worrying about clogging a line with wipes is no reason to avoid a slab. You can clear the plug. It is the leaking sewer line under the slab that would mean disaster.
Plus slabs are radioactive.
Great video Matt. I'm from the UK and here we use concrete 'block and beam' a lot for the ground floor, with the beams resting on the load bearing walls, the foundation being a 600m wide trench. As it is a suspended floor you can run services underneath. Very popular here now. We also have another type of foundation, the raft foundation. This is a suspended concrete floor strengthened by rebar and supported by the trench foundation. This is for dodgy ground basically and used a lot in mining areas. We have a lot of 19th century mines in the UK which aren't mapped so they don't like to take chances in those areas!
Danny Murphy
Interesting. I appreciate hearing about different building challenges and how it’s dealt with. Thanks.
The conditioned pier and beam with a concrete “sidewalk” base is very interesting because it removes the humidity and critter infestation problems of a traditional crawl space. Similarly, couldn’t you pour a slab on grade foundation and then frame a raised floor above the slab? The plumbing would go between the slab and raised floor, not buried under the slab.
"Proudly Built by Risinger Homes", nice detail.
Excellent education in 19 minutes. I would like you to have commented in more detail about the concrete troughs (need for, dimensions, depth, substructural, etc). Great video. I continue to watch and learn from you, Matt.
I'm relatively new to construction. Been following you for a while now. Your videos are now becoming my education. I really appreciate the depth of your info and variety of info.
this video is jam packed with knowledge that anyone involved in building a house, from the designer to the builder to the customer, needs to know. i've watched this video 2 or 3 times and i've gleaned new nuggets of information every time. well done !
I've owned homes with slab, crawl space, and basements, and it's hard to beat a full-height basement. You get extra square footage for storage or living (if finished) and all the mechanicals are easily accessed and placed (e.g. no water heaters taking space in a closet, devices are easy to reach for service, etc). It's worth the extra expense imho if you need to hammer/blast for one.
I agree but go to texas and very few builders know what there doing with a basement build and the engineers who are local are clueless you almost have to go up north and find an engineer who knows how to build a house with a basement
@@sqike001ton A full basement is very expensive. The deep excavation, the thick solid reinforced concrete walls and the insulation/water protection. Most people don't want livable square footage underground with no windows.
I agree with you, but what Gleason said is somewhat true as well, more expensive, not usually VERY expensive, though. If they just had one more foot in the crawlspace I think it would do so much better...
@@JamesG1126 A full basement is less expensive than adding another story in areas that have frost depth. And, yes, the basement will have windows. A full basement (or split foyer style so the windows are 100% above-grade) is the way to go if your soil type allows. Potential water problems are the only real drawback in my opinion.
@@knurlgnar24 No Dude. Are concrete walls cheaper than wood? Absolutely not.
In other parts of Texas than central Texas, the clay goes deeper, and expands and contracts as the weather changes. Add in the odds that there is some backfill under the slab, and it gets even more unstable. Every house on my side of my street has had foundation repairs, including mine. The front half of the houses sank, suggesting that a trench of some sort was backfilled.
Some builders are doing slabs on top of piers. The piers go down to stable "rock. That is like doing the repair before the slab fails. An "ounce of prevention"instead of a "pound of cure."
Deep pile foundations are best suited in expansive soil, especially when the house is Stilt type like as Matt shows with Pier and Beam in technical terms, allows the soil to expand as it does and protect the house from such demises as those of you so experience with repairs.
I am not in the construction industry nor am I a carpenter, I wanted a good guide to help with small projects such as small sheds and some remodeling around the house. So there’s a magic which is Shed Plan [ visit here *WoodBlueprints. Com* ]. This Shed Plan covers all my instructions from top to bottom in a step by step manner.
Thanks for the video. Most concrete contractors are booked out two years in my area and I had no idea what was meant by 8” perimeter beams. The pictures definitely help show what I need to do when framing the slab for the shed.
I grew up in Georgia in a house that was built in the 1880s, the house was held up by river Rocks and the big beams had bark on them.
Sounds like a real old school engineer. That's amazing.
My parent's house in New England had a full basement, about 15" of which stuck up from the ground, as did all the houses on our street, but a few year after they finished our street, another developer leveled the area down the hill and put in a whole subdivision of "California ranch" style houses on slabs which were only a few inches above ground level. They had copper-tube radiant heating, which must have seemed like the height of modernity in the late 1950s, though almost all of them leaked and have since been converted to baseboard radiators. They also has a penchant for wet floors, so owners tended to spoil the modern roof lines with add-on gutters that always ended up at a funny angle. Still, they seemed OK until one of the drainage creeks that served both neighborhoods silted up; our house had a lakeside view over the flooded park for a week or two, but all the slab-ranch streets were cluttered with ruined furniture and other waterlogged stuff. I hate to think of the mess these owners had do face, with all their living space flooded. Even if our houses were lower, we'd likely have just lost the stuff in the basement. Each has its pros and cons, but if there is much chance of flooding, I'd stick with something at least a foot off the ground.
Please do a collaborative video with Essential Craftsman during his Spec House build.
That's be a cool vid
Ryan Moeller Now that would be interesting! The Essential Craftsman mentioned Risinger and his expertise in his last video.
Two of the best minds on UA-cam
Risinger would have to go back to Oregon though
I second that request... or maybe 12th!
I really and truly enjoy your videos. I always walk away having learned so much more! We use a lot of slab building in Africa. Most places have no issues with frost/snow; and we, for the most part don't need to build with earthquakes in mind, so our processes are simple and easy. Thanks for a wonderful channel!
I'm studying the IRC (International Residential Code) and it's very helpful to see in the field pics of various construction methods. Keep up the great work!
Another benefit to post and pier is that in Hawaii having air flow under the house cuts down on mold in the house.
This, I was about to mention this myself. I'm in the "Deep South" and it's not quite as hot as Hawaii, but the humidity and heat together will kill a house and make YOU feel pretty awful too. Having that airflow is sooooo much better. In places where there's a freeze line, basements are great. Around here, unless you're willing to spend a LOT of money not just in construction but in continuing maintenance, a basement is just asking for a flooded space under your living area. :(
Sonja Johnson a lot of new homes are built with sealed crawl spaces as if you live somewhere humid all ventilation is doing is letting the humidity in under the home.
Hellwithpots but wouldn’t you have swearing or condensation, like you would in an attic as well? In TN a vented basement is standard, with our humidity being 80% commonly.
@@morehp1 I disagree, under the house is shaded, and the air has a cooler temperature no matter the humidity. It's like sitting under a tree when it's hot out. That cooler temperature actually radiates up, and pushes against the heat. Much like it does in the winter when the heat is on but from the knees down it's cold.
Here it doesn't get that cold, but in the summer time that airflow keeps the mold down, and helps keep the house cooler.
@@StacyForest738 no the crawl space is completely sealed off with heavy poly done right will have a cap of concrete poured over the poly on ground and the crawl space walls are insulated and heavy poly over them. Small dehumidifier is installed to keep humidity at desired level. Witch hardly run as there very little way for humanity to make it in. If you ever been under one it’s a Beautiful thing and smells fresh under there. Been under a bunch of homes doing different work. Dirt crawl spaces always have the old stall dirt smell, bugs and spiders everywhere, seen mold under many homes. Yes many states still have code on vented crawl spaces old habits die hard. Many builders do things because that’s what they were taught. Doesn’t mean there’s not a better way.
Very interesting and informative episode! The conditioned pier and beam sounds ideal.
What an excellent quality service you provide, Sir. Kudos!
Thanks Matt! I appreciate your efforts in education to the masses!
Here, in the northeast, a deep foundation is required. My preferred solution is to set the first floor elevation at about 24 inches above the high point. Excavate to an elevation that sets the bottom of foundation at frost depth, normally 48 inches then grade up to an elevation that leaves 12 inches of exposed concrete. The material from excavation is used to accomplish the regrading. Basements are the least expensive space to construct and are so useful. The downside of this approach is water intrusion, but this can be controlled with perimeter drain, water sealing and adequate site drainage. I enjoy your videos and have followed many of the solutions that you support. Thanks.
A deep foundation is not required, you can do a shallow frost protected foundation (SFPF). Ideally it would built on a thick layer of insulation and wrapped up the slab edge. Welcome to the future.
"Basements are the least expensive space to construct and are so useful." So true, unless you go fancy and make it a complete finished living area. It only cost me an additional $4,700 (in 2011) to get a full basement instead of a dinky one just big enough for the furnace, water heater and a tiny bit of storage. Tremendous value for 700 sq ft of usable space. And yes, the builder did a full perimeter drain, water sealing and there is proper site drainage.
From living my childhood to young adult age in a house with just a partial size basement as the rest of it was just additions to the original, my dad had to dig out a few crawl spaces to gain access to the additions which were not well done.Along with working for my step dad as well for several years in my young adult life (15 to 22 y.o.) where we mainly worked on basement waterproofing work doing primarily retrofit and such and a few new ones at times when we were requested to per our reputation for doing such top notch work, in those days has set me to prefer a place with a basement. Even my sister bought her first home with a full basement, though half of it is only finished, the rest is unfinished but still comfier than an unconditioned or uninsulated one. I plan on hoping to live in a house with a ICF basement foundation and mostly finished in, even on a sloped property like her but with access to park a car inside of perhaps so as not to have a view blocking above grade garage space.
@@dustinehrlich5706
in the case of piers and slab you mentioned (11 minutes into your presentation), if they were not able to reach the rock and had to do reinforced concrete footing for each pier, would they have been able to do a reinforced concrete slab still (I know he said the slab was not reinforced)?
if so, can the piers be taller than 2 feet; say 6 feet tall? Can it be done (I know it would be very heavy)?
University of Risinger. I like these deep dive videos a lot.
Clear and concise. I learn quickly when Matt explains.
I learned quite-a-bit from this teaching on floor foundations. In the near future I'm going to build a home. Thank you so much!
In Central, North, and West Texas; where the water table is generally very deep, structures can be built with in-ground basements like that. These also happen to be the areas with those solid "bedrock" conditions and, such difficult excavation creates obvious budgetary constraints that restrict the inclusion of basements for mid-level value construction projects (and/or track developments). However, there are other restrictions to basements in Texas. Along the coastal area of Texas, for at least 60-80 miles inland by the crow, and in the river basins which encompass much of the East of Texas, the water table is (generally) only a few feet below natural grade (it's 26" where I'm at in Hitchcock, TX); which limits inclusion of basements for nearly all construction projects because of the constant intrusion of large amounts of groundwater; the area is also prone to frequent floods and storms, and therefore have significant flood elevation requirements.
Considering the fact that; with the exception of the Hill-Country region of Texas...which has limestone bedrock, and/or boulders, with minimal soil coverage of any kind...the lower Coastal region (SW) and West Texas having primarily sandy soils, and the upper Coastal region (SE) having a loamy soil of a Sand and Clay soil stratification, and nearly all areas of North, Central, and East Texas have entirely, or some depth, of expansive "Beaumont" clay soils....one would think that pier-and-beam would still be the norm across most of the state. (BTW, the type of perimeter wall used in the video P&B example, I've always heard that referred to as a "chain-wall" or "knee-wall")
Pier-and-Beam used to be the construction norm for most of Texas; at least until the mid-20th century, when the availability of lumber from big trees of the "old-growth" forests in the mid-western US dropped off. The price of lumber skyrocketed, making large timbers with full-rip faces and wide, wood-plank cladding construction too expensive for most people. Then, newly enacted forestry restrictions in the early '60s; and the shift to "new-growth" pine lumber of the Northwestern US, made housing design "shift" to use smaller, lighter, lumber that was efficient, and more affordable. Drive through any "heritage" neighborhoods in Texas and you will likely recognize the progression from 19th-century Georgian and Federalist, Victorian and Queen Anne - with locally-milled, true sized lumber, wide cuts of wood plank siding outside, and all-wood lathed interiors; to timber-framed Tudor and Praire Cottages - entirely sided and roofed with shake shingles; to Arts-and-Crafts styles - with prominently displayed exposed beams and a greater use of stone, and Craftsman-style bungalows - utilizing ever-shrinking cuts of affordable lumber, and increasing ply-wood paneling, trying to hold onto that 'look' through a couple more decades; into the variety of mid-century moderns and Traditional American Ranch - with their efficient framing, cladding, and limited use of decorative woodwork... By the time the influx of soldiers returning from Vietnam, financed through Federal VA loans, spurred huge tracts of suburban residential developments in the late '60s and early '70s...each was filled with single-story, two-story, and split-level "ranch-style", homes - using a more economical, and faster to build, Slab-on-Grade foundation to accommodate the demand (and budget) of these new home buyers.
Today, Pier-and-Beam construction, IS regaining popularity...primarily due to flood elevation requirements going up across the state and the returning style of residential homes that 'give-a-nod to bygone eras favor the foundation method. And the P&B's towering cousin, the elevated foundation, with their structures a full 'floor level' [7-10+ ft] above grade, and oftentimes just called a "Pile" or "Column" foundation. The finished structure is fully supported by a grid of either:
1. Round, or square, timber piles...that are machine-driven into the ground 8+ feet; or
2. Engineered, square, concrete piles pre-stressed during manufacture in order to provide very high strength and, generally, are used when elevations or severe conditions would be a problem for other types of columns... that are machine-driven into the ground 8+ feet, in the same manner as timber piles; or
2. Poured concrete columns that are integrated with concrete footings and/or grade-beams, or with subterranean "bell" footings, and a non-structural, slab-on-grade, concrete or fibercrete, "basement" floor underneath the majority of structures; or
3. Stacked CMU-blocks, back-filled with concrete or sand...either in a single, vertical, course, or a double, interlocked, pattern.
(Your video mentioned steel sub-piles under a slab...I suppose in drier, not saltwater areas those could be quite efficient; but along the coast, they'd provide very little friction resistance for loading and would be gone in 10 years due to corrosion.)
I guess I'm a tad partial to an Elevated foundation construction...I should, I've been designing them for nearly 20 years with coastal hazard mitigation in mind! I did the structural on this one [www.cnn.com/2008/US/09/18/ike.last.house.standing/] while Lead designer at a local engineering firm about 13 years ago. The plan was a typical P&B from a .com shop and had to be adapted for the EF design required by the site. The majority of my work has been coastal, but I see applications for EF's in larger cities where, due to urbanization, flooding is an issue and existing lot sizes are already small from previously being laid out for little track bungalows and what-not. I, personally, think EF's offer the most economical method of reaching (or exceeding) elevation requirements that would exceed those of a standard P&B Pier. They can give a structure "freeboard" that, with only 2 ft above BFE, will cut flood insurance costs as much as 50%.
Elevated foundations require minimal, if any, fill and help with net-0 runoff requirements required by many municipalities because "basement" floor materials can be pervious, or omitted completely, or in part. EF's have the added capability to provide larger living spaces in a smaller site footprint because they're able to take vertical advantage of the site...often being 2, 3, or 3.5 stories above ground level...automatically provide garage and storage space below the occupiable floors. Often, elevated foundations provide a land developer with higher profit potential, through the additional homesites created as a result of smaller lot sizes necessary to accommodate this style of construction...each to be sold at the typical price range...while creating minimal infrastructure cost increases for the development as a whole.
I cant believe this knowledge is readily available on youtube thank you for sharing your experince :D
@@furrycircuitry2378 You're welcome; 25yrs experience in Texas (and the Gulf Coast as a whole) designing the infrastructure for developments and structural for the buildings on them has given me a pretty good overview.
How cool is this! What awesome information.
in the case of piers and slab you mentioned (11 minutes into your presentation), if they were not able to reach the rock and had to do reinforced concrete footing for each pier, would they have been able to do a reinforced concrete slab still (I know he said the slab was not reinforced)?
if so, can the piers be taller than 2 feet; say 6 feet tall? Can it be done (I know it would be very heavy)?
0:45 We''ll see you next time ON...the grilled show!
Another high quality and easy to follow video. Uncomparable. I hope one day you'll do a step-by-step series of building a house from scratch from subsurface investigation / boring samples to framing to rough-in electrical and finish work.
Great video. I've been using a similar slab/raft foundation with a 100mm layer of EPS300 insulation directly below the structural beams of the raft. 300mm of EPS100 below the floor sections. Quick and simple.
My home in the south of England has been sitting on the same spot of a clay subsoil for about 300 years. Very interesting listening to you talk about the subject of foundations but personally I'd like to be up on stilts or columns because we live in a wet, moist and damp environment compared with your mostly very dry part of the world Matt.
when i built our shed i used a plan from *WoodBlueprints. Com* and it had all the blueprints, supplies, materials, and list well laid out for me.
@@isaacbuenrrostro4839, I perfectly understand however anybody does their shed Isaac especially if you have enough money to do it. My shed will eventually be like my house with wooden lath, straw-bale and a haired mortar and plaster over the lot plus a simple mono roof and solar panels.
I lost pretty well all the inside house space to my lady and our 2 girls so at least I've got the garage AND the man-cave and that's why we've stayed together for 30 years and survived covid.
Stay safe, live long a and prosper.
Slab on grade foundations are quite common on the part of the Maine coast where I live. Most of the newer homes built that way start with a smoothed and leveled surface, then around 4" of closed cell foam then the rebar slab. There is usually foam around the perimter of the slab too, particularly if the slab will have radiant heat. Fully half the houses on my road, including mine, are slab on grade and all have radiant in-floor heat.
Are there any issues with those slab radiant heat lines freezing in Maine?
@@michelebarber534 only if the heat is turned off for the winter and the system isn't winterized. As I understand it, people that shut their heat off for the winter often fill the heating system with antifreeze rather than water to prevent freezing.
Good point at 16:50 about the relative softness of pier and beam... We moved the our parents (RIP) back into my grandma's 1947 pier and beam a fewbyears back:Prior the move my dad had broken his hip at my sister's place which was on a slab...after the move both my dad and my mom took several spills on the pier and beam oak floor but no one ever had any more than some soreness afterwards.
That little bit and of bouncy forgiveness makes all the difference for old folks.
Another benefit of a slab foundation that we did to my dad's garage in Illinois. Use below grade insulation under the slab and put a tubing grid in the concrete for convection heating and cooling by circulating RV antifreeze through the tubing. We used an electric hot water heater as a storage tank for solar hot water, and had the water heater set up as a backup heat source running off of a battery bank and solar panels... Can't stand to turn the thermostat over 55° because you'll start to sweat in the dead of an Illinois winter.
@@LincolnLog we started off with just wanting to use the convection heating. I wanted to test the idea of running a series of copper pipes painted black in a black box with a plexiglass lid as a means of endless hot water when the sun was up. The idea worked, so we decided to plumb that solar water heater into the system. The way things are set up, the electric heater rarely needs the grid to run (my dad is an Advanced Electronics Tech, so he built a controller that uses solar hot water first, electric hot water from batteries second, and grid power third). It started as an experiment and just stayed connected because it works well.
Pier and beam is great.
As a plumber that’s what I looked for when I bought my home. I have a 3ft to 6ft crawl space which has allowed me to easily run new wires, ducting, plumbing and a big thing, STORAGE.
A lot of my customers have multiple sheds or garages filled with junk. I have around a 1000 sqft of space for storage thanks to that.
Basement/cellar is far more spacious than a crawlspace as it adds living space! Lived in two home with basements, also lived in a few slab foundation homes, I rather a basement for the more spacious extra space compared to a crawlspace with its limited height.
Is that pipe for a toilet, toilets don’t carry ground traps.
@@Blox_fruit_master1shower I think it was. The trap for the toilet is the toilet
My house is a beam on pier on wheels... an RV!
Mine too! Parked about 10ft off the intercoastal of SE Texas...saltwater just steps away!
I’m in a pier and beam home in Houston. Having access to the plumbing is a big plus. Also less worry about flooding.
Thank you for this clear and informative video. Lots of great information which was presented very well. The pictures were gigantically helpful. Thank you so very much.
Interesting and informative video.
Couple things came to mind. The conditioned crawl space looks like a great source of earth temperature moderated air. Warmer in winter, cooler in summer. Like what is used in a passive house.
A video borescope might be a useful tool in diagnosing plumbing and electrical problems buried in concrete. You could run an illuminated camera into those small spaces and have a look see.
@Steve Slade
Awesome suggestion.
Greatly enjoyed the longer format video with a detailed subject. Not that I don't enjoy all your vids. 'Til next time.
Matt, I've watched any number of your videos, but this is the one that made me hit the subscribe button--not something I do often. Even if I don't always agree with you on everything, I always learn a great deal about aspects and tradeoffs I hadn't considered.
Thanks. That’s a high compliment
Growing up in Texas we always had a slab foundation. The only place we lived that had a basement in Texas was base housing on Lackland AFB. Every time it flooded we had an indoor swimming pool. That housing has since been torn down but I sure did like having that extra space.
I'm looking at doing a conditioned pier and beam foundation for my house. That way I have easier access to the utilities under it for maintenance and repairs. I would love more info.
I have the same issue in my guest bathroom with no p-trap for the shower, although the house was built in the late 50’s. I lucked out by finding a plastic insert for the drain pipe. It lets the water through but keeps the gases out. It was like $5 or so on amazon. $5 fix or spend $1000.
Good for you bud!
If your house is like mine, there is an open void around the shower/bath drain. So you got real lucky by being able to just swap it out. The contactor he was pointing out didn't install the p trap and poured concrete over it. The homeowner was stuck spending that $1000 to get to the problem area. It doesn't matter that there is a five dollar fix, when you still have to spend money to get at the problem area.
$1000? For a modern tiled shower I expect it is more like $10000+ to fix properly, with new waterproofing, tiles etc. Anyway an insert sounds more similar to the gullies we use in Europe, it is in my opinion a lot better to have an insert water trap that can be pulled up for cleaning, than letting everything clog a p-trap or the pipes further on under the slab. Possibly Matt used a gully, just calling it a p-trap.
www.purusgroup.com/products/gullies/
@@nordlands8798 I just went and looked at the website you sent and those gullies look to be a very cool product. I've never heard of them before or seen them used in my 26 years of construction and quite frankly look to be just as good as p-trap if not better because of the easy access to clean them out. Thanks for sharing the information, good to learn something new today.
@@derekolander7933 Before UA-cam, I had never heard about p-trap!
We bought a 1940 Cottage on a Pier and Beam Foundation, Upgrading the Plumbing was a one day job, and yes love the flex in the floor
Now I understand more about my pier and beam home. I appreciate it for what it is helping me do.
I really liked that Matt didn't try to sell me anything this episode :)
Hahaha
You weren’t sold on the Stego vapor barriers?
I'd bet the majority of contractors appreciate when he sells a product because we often have never heard of it.... now they can often be 3x the price of our traditional materials and homeowners often don't appreciate that but you gotta sell them on the value!
He already sold you his knowledge. You bought it by watching, and paid it with your time.
Gustav Larsson
I really appreciate the variety of products he talks about. As homes become more air tight we need information about advancements in these products and learn from builders. I wish more builders did this like Matt.
Could not agree more I'm just east of Austin and peer and beam on this sandy soil is way more reliable and easier to install or repair if ever needed. I've seen so many cracked foundations and homes costing alot to re-level, with peer and beam but a jack on it slide in some cribbing and done.
Great video. I have a pier and beam home. My satellite dish was starting to be blocked by some trees (12 years after the home was built) and needed to move the dish or cut down the trees ( that wasn't going to happen). Only took 30 minutes to run new cable under the house from the other side of the home where there wasn't any trees. Pier and beam is definitely the way to go if you have that option. Especially since I have no attic space (cathedral ceilings). I also will probably be doing a bathroom remodel and the re-plumb will be easy.
Honest and needed review of each, thanks
Matt that was an excellent discussion. While I am not a professional builder I do have a deep interest in construction. I really enjoy leaning the cutting edge developments in the construction industry that you showcase on your channel. Huge fan of your work! We hope to be building a new home on Mountain View Ranch in the near future. I have an ongoing list of “Risinger Build Concepts (RBCs)” that I want incorporated in our build. Thanks for all you do on UA-cam!
USNERDOC
Same here. I’m not a builder but I like to maintain and upgrade my home. His discussions and demonstrations are so helpful. I wish more builders would do this
Craig Wheeless - Agree 100%! This is an area where Matt has carved out a unique niche. I think there are a lot of guys like you and I that are not professional but have a strong interest and do some of our own work that follow this channel for that very reason. Plus it is hard not to get swept away with Matt’s passion and enthusiasm!
Matt, a few corrections:
You didn't say why Slab on Grade isn't found in the northern climates. The reason you don't see Slab on Grade in colder climates is because the footings don't go below the frostline. To keep a foundation "rock solid" and not moving, you have to build the foundation below the frostline. Otherwise, water will get under the foundation, and the freeze/thaw cycle will move the foundation vertically. Basement foundations do this and create usable space.
Post Tension: The cables aren't compressed in a post tension foundation. After the foundation is poured and cured, the cables are pulled taut (stretched out) against the concrete. The cables then try to contract, and this contraction pushes against the concrete, compressing it. The reason has to do with the materials involved (steel and concrete) and the three stresses (compression, tention, and shear). Concrete does really well when compressed. That's why it makes a good foundation, because it likes holding a lot of weight. Sadly, it stinks against forces that would stretch (tention) it or make it shift sideways (shear). Steel, on the other hand, loves to be stretched. So, adding it to the foundation as rebar allows it to take those other stresses for concrete. We can go one step further by using the tensile strength of steel to compress concrete in the sideways directions, further enhancing the foundation's resistance to tension and shear. And you can use rebar with Post Tension. (The UA-cam channel Practical Engineering discussing all of this with lots of experiments he does to show the effects: ua-cam.com/video/cZINeaDjisY/v-deo.html)
Also, you mentioned in the pier and beam foundation someone removing the air from the pour. You want to do this with ALL FOUNDATION TYPES, not just pier and beam. Air pockets will create a weak point where the concrete will fail. So, if your contractors aren't doing this with every foundation, you don't want to use them.
Only the second person in the comments to fully understand the definitions, Matt has no idea 👍
You do a great job and educating I truly enjoy watching your videos!!
Thank you so much for Sharing two of the most valuable assets you have knowledge and time!!
Thx JC™
So, I saw this happen ONCE. A guy, about a quarter mile from where I live, loved his house and move a half mile up the road. It was a slab foundation, they rigged it, and cut the framing off the slab and mover it to it's new location. He really liked that house, I thought he was crazy.
It would be good to build a slab first then build a pier and beam house on top of that so when crawling underneath, you don't have the dirt to deal with. Pier and beam cost less material I believe because there is no concrete and steel rebar use. One thing I like to point out is there is no need to build the water supply pipes underneath the slab foundation, some of my condo properties they used CPVC pipes installed inside the ceiling areas. It would be good to insulate the CPVC waterline supply though.
Last year I did plumbing work at my house and ran Sharkbite pex in the attic from the supply waterlines at the water heater to a new bathroom location and were insulated with foam tube insulation. The freeze we just had in Texas in the 2nd week to the third week of February 2021, the pex pipes has no issue. I kept the house at 66 degree heat and here is the key "I flushed the toilet every hour or less for 4-5 nights without sleep (this help water gush through the water supply pipes to keep water from freezing) & also let the faucets dripped pretty good". Water is much cheaper than fixing burst pipes under the slab foundation.
The new bathroom project I did I also had to dig down 3 or more feet to make new drain pipe connection, the house was about 45 years old built in 1977 yet the drain pipe section that was cut out has very little wear. We do not need to install water supply pipes under the slab foundation, only drain pipes are needed. The plumbing problem in this video is the exception not the norm.
I hope what I shared someone will benefit from my information particularly flushing the toilets regularly in freezing weather and run pex water supply lines in the attic and insulate it when building a new house, thx.
I live in a trailer in North Dakota and don't even need to do all that 🤣
All your videos are great, but this one is especially interesting.
This was an excellent video Matt. As a construction professional I enjoyed the information and fotos. Excellent. Cheers
Matt an excellent presentation; well explained and support photos.
Cheers from Oz.
Pulpo
I wanna see you do a video where you show something on This Old House that you disagree with and would do different/better!
talk to Matt from demolition ranch, I think you guys would make an amazing video together since he's working on his new mansion
Wow! I wish that you built homes in Georgia! Thank you!
Thanks for this informative comparison!
Pier and beam all day. Ease of repair, can be insulated , and flex and the crawl space can be used for storage. All good things if you can get to solid earth. My previous house was P&B. Loved it. My current house is slab on grade and the only nice thing for me is how quiet things are. No cavity under the house to amplify sounds. Cool in the summer but cool in the winter unless you have a sunroom to warm the slab, of which the house I'm currently in does not have.
The more common old term for the technical term of pier and beam is "stilt" house, as it can be for any height above the terrain, and as the following links goes to show it can be done using ICF which does two or more steps into one.
logixicf.com/blog/news/building-hurricane-resistant-homes-a-tale-of-the-survivor-house-in-mexico-beach-florida/
www.insuldeck.com
Matt slab houses are easy to insulate. In Europe we put before the slab hard styrofoam. Sometimes constructors put weak concrete to grade a ground.
Americans are decades behind
@@snorko2 Not really, its easy to insulate a slab using ICF floor forms which also can be used for a roof pitched or flat. By which I mean the form for both floor and deck can be laid atop a vapor barrier to protect from water ingress and then along the edge use a block form to tie into the decking and provide additional insulation up to where the house framing starts and closing any gaps to prevent thermal bridging..
www.insuldeck.com/residential/
Thanks for the info. I live in the rockies, so most of our houses have crawlspaces.
Getting ready to close on my first home and it has a pier and beam foundation. This video makes me feel a lot better!
For some reason, I’m scared of pier and beam foundation.... I’m buying a home in north TX and it has pier and beam... do you really think it’s okay? I’m worried about the future.
In the DFW area it’s very difficult to find an experienced pier & beam contractor since majority of the area is so flat. They can do slab on grade a lot quicker so if you have a slope they want to lean towards retaining walls and compacted fill to level out the site.
Not only is the DFW area flat, I believe it has a really shallow frost line (like a few inches). You probably can get away with a backhoe digging a one foot deep footing. (Always check your local codes, kids.) I bet the backhoe is way cheaper than digging out the footings for a post and beam foundation.
Hi, do you have a good pier and beam contractor you can recommend in the DFW area?
This is very interesting. My wife and I are looking at a home in frisco and it is on a slope. Who do you typically reach out to for the retaining wall?
A number of houses in the New England, built as low income housing, were built in 60's, 70's, & 80's. Biggest problem with the early built ones, was they put copper pipes in the slab for heat. Copper and concrete don't mix. Pretty much all of them ended up leaking. Also, the floor near the edges got cold in the Winter. Grew up in one and owned one.
Thickness of copper matters. M is paper thin and is legal above ground. L is what I used everywhere, when I re-piped my house, in the dirt and above ground, with no contact with concrete except as the new pipes emerged as hose bibs, though stucco walls. So some day soon I'll break that stucco and look for corrosive influence on my precious copper pipes. By the way, as detailed at This Old House, an old hot water tank whose sacrificial anode has disappeared (thanks to acidic water) will eat copper pipes, from the inside out.
P.S. My Dad use K copper, which is thicker yet and unheard of by most people. His concrete on slab structure, built and plumbed in 1964 in SoCal where the water isn't acidic, has not suffered a failure of copper piping even though said copper is beneath slab and comes through slab.
According to This Old House, water is acidic in New England. This is a big deal.
The house I grew up in had to have the floor jack hammered by a later owner to replace the heating system. As has been said, concrete will eat copper pipe sooner or later. The slab ranch, that purchased later on, had forced hot air heating, so no such issues.
Thanks for sharing. Very informative and useful information. Cheers !
Gteat video, Im getting into home inspection and understanding foundation is vital. This video was helpful.
What are the cost comparisons between an equally sized conditioned pier and beam and a traditional slab foundation? thanks for the video.
Just an educated Mexican appreciating what you do for us! Lol thanks man!
Fascinating really enjoyed the vid! As a note, most likely on my next personal home build that farmhouse with the pier beam and conditioned crawl space sounds like the most functional and versatile way to go. Awesome, Be cool!!!
love the buried flex line!
Pier and beam has a lot of advantages that Matt mentioned. One he didn't mention is cost. A lot less concrete which we all know is crazy expensive these days.
Would have been great if you went over cost comparison
I started in the new home construction related business in the late sixties, by which time virtually every new home in my part of Texas was built on a slab. In the intervening 5 plus decades I've come to the conclusion there IS no comparison. Give me pier and beam EVERY time. Pre or post tensioning only delays slab cracking, it doesn't prevent it. But the single biggest advantage is being able to level a house when the earth eventually shifts. No pain, no strain. One guy can do it. And the advantage of being able to get to plumbing issues so easily can't be overstated. I'll admit there are issues that must be dealt with. But with careful planning, and KNOWING your area, those issues can be addressed and "fixed" upfront. Critters under the house. C'mon, it doesn't take a genius. Not even mentioned in this video is the HARM done by covering so much of the earth with impermeable concrete. In Houston for example flooding becomes a bigger issue every single year. With homes, driveways and sidewalks in addition to all the streets and freeways water has nowhere to go. At least one municipality within Houston has now nixed new homes on slabs. Too little too late, but they're at least trying. The older we get the more we find that in many cases "the old way" was vastly superior to the new.
@Steve Slade
With the rainfall rates at times in Houston it runs under the house, taking the path of least resistance. And simple migration plays a big part. That migration is taken away with the 12 or more inch perimeter beam on a slab. A fair amount of research has demonstrated that were there no slab homes in Houston and surrounding areas our flooding would be much less severe. A caveat. With so much clay, and with Houston's burgeoning population combined with flood control systems decades out of date and designed for a tiny part of our current population pier and beam would not be a panacea. But it would HELP. And again, that's only part of my reason for preferring pier and beam.
Thank you for this video. Very informative. We are in south central Alaska where our frost line is VERY deep. It does get cold here. We have a lot of ground that is permanently frozen, until it gets exposed, and then, here come fa frost heaves! Wow! Some civic minded folks decided to build a tennis court in a community park. Whoa! You should see that slab today! Sections are at 45º to other sections. And earthquakes!? Well, you get the picture. We build our home with the pier construction and thankfully on gravel. The house is twenty years old and never moved. Other peoole need to adjust their house seasonally to get their doors to close. Thanks for the great video. Oh, my son is a carpenter kn upstate NY. He recently started his own businesd. God bless! Love the videos.
"In the last 20 years or so"
Hell, that was the most common type of foundation in use in Austin in the 1970s when I was a kid
My personal preference is for pier and beam,, like my grandmother's house, built sometime in the fifties if I recall correctly
You can always do a wood floor on screeds if you don't want a hard surface to stand on if you have a slab. I do agree that a pier and beam foundation is a much better way to go.
Excellent overview for someone who does not know much about building. 🙌🏽
Thanks for the info Matt! 😃👍🏻👊🏻
Matt, I'm just down the road in Bryan, and loving your videos. As a homeowner, I'd love to see some videos about how to choose and interact with a contractor. I've seen a lot of shoddy work done by flippers or cheap crews; how do you tell the difference between a good contractor and a sub-par contractor BEFORE you start your project? Perhaps more importantly, when you realize in the middle of a job that your contractor is willing to cut corners that you're not comfortable with, how do you talk with them about it? I'd be really interested to see a series of videos on this subject.
I'm a former building contractor. The best way is word of mouth and touring active job sites. A builder can often invite you out to see what the current project looks like. A portfolio of satisfied customers will always be the most important characteristic.
Have a good set of plans and specs. Watch close and make sure they follow the specs. In addition look up the product supplier for their best practices for installation
Whiever charges the most maybe? Reviews?
Great info. As a tradesman I really appreciate all the great content you put out.
Would be better if he got it right, so many mistakes in this video
@@colstace2560 would you mind explaining, or share some sources so I can educate myself?
@@BPDRacing1 ignore the armchair so called pros and experts.
Love the information presented in the video.
Hey Matt, I just excavated for my house here in Alaska. But because of cost I will be putting in a permanent wood foundation. This is pressure treated for the footing and the basement walls. I dug down eight feet and this will give me space for all my utilities and storage
Here in the Netherlands there is no bedrock and not much sandy grounds. Just clay and peat. So every house is built on piles. Usually 60 to 100 feet deep. Beams are layed down on the piles to carry the ground floor. All made of concrete.
Here those are called deep foundations since they go so far down, we do the same in parts of the USA here, deeply driven piles to which a house is placed atop in "pier and beam" fashion. Also known simply as stilt homes.
See for images showing how they are connected:
pearsonpilings.com/pilings-solutions/home-foundations/
The most common for houses built in the SE there is a footer, pier and beam with dirt floor and the crawl space is never conditioned.
Hopefully the floor is insulated.
Mine was like that in NC. With the humidity here I had a huge dampness problem and bug and mouse problem. Cleaned, sealed and dehumidifier installed. Much improved energy efficiency , air quality and no pests or pesticides.
Great video Matt! I'm in Mississippi and our soil moves a lot! I'm currently dealing with a plumbing issue at one of my rental properties because the house has shifted and the drain line snapped. 😭 I'm thinking about doing a new build and I believe a conditioned pier and beam foundation would be best for our soil conditions. Thanks again for the great content!
Great information, thanks, Matt