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Clay can be a total pain in the ass to work with, it's more stubborn than concrete to remove, but you'd be hard pressed to find a material more solid to build o

Clay can be a total pain in the ass to work with, it's more stubborn than concrete to remove, but you'd be hard pressed to find a material more solid to build on than rock. What's your beef with clay? The kind of glacial packed clay mentioned in this article is the sort of stuff even a power shovel has trouble with. It looks like light coloured slate, dry, brittle, and dense. I'm not sure what your preference for sand is other than it's easy to work with. That stuff can shift, it bloats when wet and heaves with frost, settles like crazy under pressure. Sure, it's easy to remove, but it's so variable I have no idea how you'd get anything to stay level on top of it.

Gibbon1 10y ago
Not sure but my understanding is high clay soils expand and contract seasonally due to moisture changes.
- astrodust 10y ago
  In a location with a variable water table this could be trouble, but I'm not sure it's going to be much better in the same situation with sand. I wonder what kind of foundation these homes are built on. Do they include a full basement?
nucleardog 10y ago
> Sure, it's easy to remove, but it's so variable I have no idea how you'd get anything to stay level on top of it. Living somewhere built on what is apparently some of the most variable types of clay and that experiences temperature swings of ~150F throughout the year: we don't. Any basement more than 30 years old is cracked and heaved. Houses require constant adjustment of the teleposts to avoid large cracks forming in the house built on top of the foundation.