An Interesting Home Repair Project

I don't normally think home repair is very interesting. Here's a case where it was.
We have an addition to our house that is about twelve years old. For the past few years, we've noticed that one corner seemed to be settling a bit too much. In the past year, a crack appeared in the brick on the lower level below the deck. The first picture below was taken after the crack had been partially repaired. Originally, it was about as wide as your pinkie finger.


We called a foundation repair company and they recommended installing three support "piers", two near the crack and one around the corner. A pier is essentially a lip that fits under the edge of the foundation supported by a steel pole that goes all the way down to bedrock. The next picture shows the three "lips" to be used on our piers.

The next picture illustrates the basic pier installation. One edge of the the lip is now under the foundation and the support pole is in place.

Here you see two of the piers ready for installation. The rig above each pier is a pneumatic device that will keep driving sections of support pole down until it hits bedrock. The operator keeps adding two-foot sections of pole as it goes down. The pier support on the left went down 44 feet before it hit bedrock.

Here's another view of the driving position.

Once bedrock is reached, all three pneumatic devices operate together to actually lift the house up. The operators move slowly here to make sure stress is distributed as evenly as possible. We're lifting the foundation, the frame of the house and the brick veneer all at once. New cracks could develop if care is not taken.

The picture below shows a pier after everything has been completed. It will stay in the ground as a support for the house. Dirt is replaced in the hole, hiding the pier and the surface is restored to its original condition. The white lines are just sunlight shining through the deck.

Here's the crack after the lifting process was complete. A little colored caulk was used later to touch it up for cosmetic purposes and to keep water out.

Next week, we'll cover how to hold your house together with caulk!