Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Floor Poured

Been a while since an update, have made some decent progress. 

Prior to pouring the floor, 6 mil plastic is laid and taped to create a vapor barrier below the slab.  This goes down directly on the 6" of gravel that was placed.  Any moisture that comes up through the gravel is stopped by the plastic.



 Here is the plastic doing its job.  The sun was out and moisture was coming up through the rock.  You can see all of the moisture that would normally be in the slab from the ground.

 
The plastic is lapped up the wall and taped to the ICF foam.  2" of XPS foam (25psi) is installed over the foam, and taped as well. 
 
 
Even though we are not installing infloor radiant heat, I am still putting down 2" (r10) of foam.  This creates a thermal break between the ground and the slab.  The foam touches the ICF walls, making the basement like a foam cup.  It added roughly $1500 to the project, but it makes the floor more comfortable.  Since there are bedrooms and a large family room down there (as well as a music/aux room) it was worth it. 




All penetrations are taped as well. 

 The slab as been poured.  It only took a couple hours.  I had the pumper come back to do the basement.  There was not very good access to the basement for a truck, so the $400 for the pump made it easy for all of us. 

 
Power troweling the slab. 

 
Here is the finished slab later that afternoon.  The north section was getting a lot of sun and was drying much faster than the south part.  The south part was still dark gray almost a week later. 
You can see the LVL ledgers and the anchor bolts cast into the wall.  These hold the hangers we will put up for the floor structure.   
 

Sunday, November 4, 2012

ICF forms are poured

Saturday....
Pump showed up at 8:30.  Concrete showed up at 9.  We had a good size crew there comprised of newbs, experienced ICFers, and the man himself, Andrew Hobbs.
However we were still scrambling to finish up last minute things.  The concrete had to sit there for about 20 minutes before we could start to pump it.
The specs called for a 3000lb, 3/8" ship mix at a 4 slump, then we would adjust it on site.  We started with the garage forms, and it went pretty well.  Moved over to the basement walls, and it was getting hung up on the rebar and forms inside.  We adjusted it to about a 5 slump and everything flowed great.  It took a little bit of practice on the pumper to control it well (ok, took about the entire basement pour to finally get the hang of it) but everything turned out well.  A little more sloppy and messy than I would have liked, but it all still works. 
All in all, the stressful day went on without any issue, no blow outs, no problems really of any kind.  However I am not sure if I am looking forward to it on the next level in a few weeks...

I am admiring our work from the mountain tops

 
Pumper truck getting started

 
Pouring the garage forms

 
first round around the basement forms.  We went around this 3 times with lifts of roughly 3-4' each.


Me and my younger brother moving the vibrator.  That large hole is for the HRV fresh air intake and exhaust.  All of the holes for the hvac and plumbing items are stubbed through the wall with pvc so we do not have to drill later.  Besides, not sure if they make a drill bit that big anyway....

 
Forms completed.  One level down, lots of work to go.
This week we will get the plastic and that pretty pink foam down down on the rock floor.  Hopefully pour the basement slab this Saturday weather permitting.

 
Rebar is continuous from the bottom of the form to out the top roughly 6".  I will install a horizontal #5 around the top at about 3" up for the main level forms.


Garage forms all finished