retaining walls done

The last (east) retaining wall in the basement is complete. No more hauling buckets of sand out of the basement to mix concrete and cement. No more hauling buckets of concrete and cement into the basement.

We'll haul the cement mixer into the basement for mixing concrete for the slab.

so close

The retaining walls in the basement are almost finished. We have spent the month of August (and it has been a beautiful month) in the basement working on the cement block walls.

 The west retaining wall is completed, insulated, and back filled with sand. Martin has also built a cement block post to support the center beam.

 The retaining wall on the north east side of the house is at its fullest height. Today, Martin finished insulating it.

 To be able to dig out the sand below the center support wall, Martin had to use a come-along to tie the foundation (rock below it also) to the center beam about so it is temporarily supporting itself.

 The southeast retaining wall is completed and insulated. The picture above only shows it half finished.

 Martin is hoping to frame in the footer and pour the foundation tomorrow for the center section of the east wall. The south section of the east retaining wall is the depth of a cement block further into the basement because of how the wall was built on the south side of the house to accommodate the bulkhead stairs. Martin will have to finagle the walls to make them meet and to provide support for the center beam wall.

half pint mason tender

Martin got a cement mixer. After spending some time refurbishing it so it works better.

Then I had the pleasure of being the one to use it.

A mason tender is supposed to do the prep work so the mason can just keep on working. Unfortunately, I am so small that I can't lift the 94 pound bag of Portland cement or the buckets of gravel and sand that need to go into the cement mixer. Martin had to prep the materials for me (half buckets and a way to measure the Portland cement) so that I could actually use the cement mixer.

Once the concrete was made, Martin dumped it into a tub, shoveled it into buckets, and hauled it into the basement to pour the footers.

 At some point, we (meaning Martin) will be hauling the cement mixer into the basement so we can use it to mix concrete for the slab. Lots to do before we get that far.

bucket by bucket

We started with no basement. One of our neighbors helped dig out most of the current basement with his back hoe. Unfortunately he couldn't get the whole basement dug, so we are left finishing it off bucket by bucket. It doesn't seem like we are making much progress at this point, but the basement work is just one small step forward at a time.

We start with a section of the basement that has too much sand still. I fill buckets and Martin hauls them up the basement stairs and empties them where we are raising the grade around the house. 

 Once we get enough sand removed to allow Martin to pour a footer, we need to build a temporary sandbag wall to hold back the sand that is still there.

 Then we (meaning Martin) dig out a trench and put in a form for the footer.

Then we mix up a bunch of concrete and fill the form.  Hauling the buckets of concrete down into the basement and bring sand back up to be mixed in the concrete.

Once the footer has set up, we lay 3 courses of block and put solid insulation in behind it.

Then the sandbags get rescued (to be used for the next section).  As we dig out the next section, we dump buckets of sand behind the new wall to back fill.

 Then the last 3 courses of block get laid and insulated with more sand to back fill behind the wall.

We are trying not to haul too much sand up and out of the basement. Not only is it a slow tedious and physically exhausting job, but we need to have enough sand to back fill behind all of the retaining walls. One of the benefits of having so much sand is that we can use it when we make concrete and mortar mix for laying block. The biggest disadvantage is that we frequently have cave-ins. Remember those golden childhood days on the beach making sand castles. Dry sand just doesn't work well for building.

basement retaining wall, west side

I spent a couple of days digging sand so Martin would have access to the correct floor level to be able to pour a footer for the retaining wall we need to put in.

Because the ground is sand, we couldn't jack up the house and dig the foundation to the full basement depth. We need to step back, build a retaining wall, and then pour a slab.

 After I dug down to the right depth and dug out the length of half of the retaining wall, Martin decided that he needed more room to work in the basement.  He spent a couple of days hauling sand out of the basement in buckets.

 He got the footer poured. Then I had the pleasure of being a mason tender again. Half of the west side retaining wall is in. 

 It looks like I'll be digging in the basement again, so footers can be poured for the rest of the wall.

In the mean time, Martin has put hard insulation behind the finished retaining wall. Eventually we will back fill to bring the sand up to the bottom of the foundation. For now though, this corner needs to be fairly open because our water pipe and electrical lines are coming in here.

finishing the basement

Right now the basement is partially dug out. The foundation walls are in, but the rest of the basement needs to be finished. 

 Because we are working with sand, we couldn't dig down the 6 feet and 8 inches that we needed for a full basement, so the foundation walls are about 3 feet deep. We need to dig out the rest of the depth, but 3 - 4 feet in from the foundation wall we put in. Then we will build half walls. After those walls are finished, we will put in slabs that go from the top of the half walls to the bottom of the foundation walls.

 We will have a center area of the basement that will be the full depth of 6 feet 8 inches and it will be about 14 feet wide.  The north end of the basement, under the 11 foot addition we put on, will be closer to a "full" basement.

 This is what we are starting with.  It looks like this week we will get started with pouring footers for the half walls and laying block.

first floor walls

Except for framing in walls for a pantry, the first floor interior walls are done.

Below is the downstairs full bathroom.

 The basement stairs are framed in also.

west wall is plumb

 Martin is back at work at an tigin.  He spent yesterday making the west wall plumb. He had to set up a winch and ropes. Before he pulled the wall in, he had to remove the shims and extra board that he had to have in place to fill gaps while the wall was canted.