Backfilling the frost footings

With the front wall surface bonded, core filled and insulated we were ready to backfill.

Here you get a good view of the two layers of 2" extruded foam that was used to insulate the front wall. You also can see the sill plate anchors sticking out of the blocks. The anchors are tied to rebar that go all the way down into the footing.

We wanted to backfill the inside and the outside of the foundation equally to avoid excess pressure on the wall. You can see here the taller rebar that will continue to the top of the 8' walls. I wanted to protect the foam from sun and damage, so I attempted to stick ice and water shield to it. The theroy was good but it ended up being a waste of money and time (boondogle).

Here you can see the 8" blocks stacked on top of the 12" blocks. This creates a 4" ledge the concrete slab will rest on.

I had some problem with the outer layer of foam wanting to get pulled down with the weight of the dirt.

We did not fill the inside to final grade because this dirt was mostly clay. Once the clay is packed it is very hard and the floor will need to be leveled for the slab. So later we will haul in some sand to finishg filling the inside to 2" below the ledge that you see. It is filled 2" low to allow for a layer of 2" high density (250) foam insulation.

I did not take any pictures of me stacking the back wall. As you can see here I had to leave the side walls unstacked to allow room for vern to backfill.

About to fill in the pumping pits.

Gradeing the South. If you look between the two layers of foam you can see some blue foam glue that I used to hold the sheets of foam together. This glue did not hold at all, allowing the sheets to sag when we back filled.

First shot at S.B.C. (Surface bonding cement)

Once we had dry stacked all the 12" blocks that made up the front frost footings I needed to surface bond them together. The surface bonding process is not a new technique and studies have shown that it is stronger than a mortared wall. I was mostly attracted to the fact that I did not need to be a brick layer to dry stack cement blocks, and with the use of SBC I could make a wall that was stronger than mortar with no prior experience.

The process is started by mixing a product called surface bonding cement and water. I used Quickbond (a Quickcrete product) and it worked well. Be sure you do not get it on your hands. I got big time chemical burns from it in a real short time. After mixing the batch to my desired consistency I would fill a pail and trawl the SBC to the wall. It was fast and was not to difficult. Since the coating is only about an 1/8 - 1/4" thick you need to presoak the wall, and also keep the SBC wet down for as long as practical to let it dry slower. The SBC needs to be applied to both sides of the wall to be effective. I should also mention that it is water proof once it is set.

This is how you get running water with no electricity to the build site.

The SBC is applied to full thickness in one coat.

Hear you can see that I presoaked the wall ahead of applying the SBC.

See how the SBC is drying. I tryed to keep it damp for 4 hours or so after application.

Pouring Footings

 
The night that we finished setting up the forms we decided to start mixing cement. Mainly to get the process down for the big day to come. With the help of A.J., Trace and the boys we got a good start and figured out what we were doing for the next day.



   

  340 bags x 60lb. each = a butt load of weight 



With Levi and Cody running the mixer and me shuttling cement it was going really well.

The first dump of the day.

My good friend A.J. moving cement.

The first load of cement

Getting the leveling process figured out.

 

This old piece of steel roofing made a great chute.



The end of the first night of pouring (we only had about an hour).



  The next morning we started early to try and get it all poured in one day. We were doing really well until we heard this loud "Bang" and the mixer went quiet. I went to the mixer and tried to start it and it pulled over way to easily. I knew we had lost the mixer. It turns out that we snapped the connecting rod. So Trace and I quickly tried to locate a large mixer that could be rented. We were lucky enough to find one in Mora (8 miles away). All said and done we were back in business but had lost about 2 hours of time. Now it was going to be close for time. The forecast was calling for a few days of rain and I needed the footings done. We had a long way to go and not really enough time to get there.



The Frost footing.



Filling the step footing.



The progress as of noon the next day. Note the new mixer. The old mixer decided to snap a connecting rod about half way through the pour.

 

I think I found the problem.

 This is the last picture I got of the pour before it got dark.

  Well it was after dark when we finished the pour so I didn't get any finished pictures. I was 3 bags short of finishing and it was to late to go to any store and get more (I tried). I would have had 3 bags extra but during one of the mixes the mixer dump arm released and dumped 6 bags onto the ground. Such is life. We put plastic over the fresh cement in the dark as it started to rain. That was really close.