5 ms·

I live in one of those neighborhoods and the thing that kills our houses (aside from leaking roofs) is poor foundations. I've literally never heard of one of th

by cp9 5y ago

I live in one of those neighborhoods and the thing that kills our houses (aside from leaking roofs) is poor foundations. I've literally never heard of one of these houses falling over because of a structural issue with the actual timber it's built from. It's either that the wood has rotten because of roofing issues or (more likely) the rubble stone foundations fell apart edit: and even if some of the wood has rotten you can almost always just replace or sister up that piece and be absolutely fine.

Gibbon1 5y ago
There is a contractor in LA that posts picture of houses they've inspected. https://imgur.com/user/AlphaStructural https://imgur.com/user/AlphaStructural What's interesting to me is you have Europeans marveling at houses built of flimsy wood instead of strong brick and concrete. Yet except for occasional water and termite damage what's failing in these houses is the concrete and brick foundations. Not the wood framing.
- handrous 5y ago
  Hell, concrete foundations fail badly enough to need repairs pretty commonly within the first few years on new houses, and I don't just mean normal settling. Doing concrete right takes a lot of waiting and is highly dependent on the weather, which usually means even more waiting (for enough days in a row of the right weather). Builders (understandably) hate anything with that kind of potential to throw off a schedule—unpredictability can increase the total time construction takes by much, much longer than the individual delays themselves—so some of them cut corners. They also don't like to let the ground sit as long between excavation and pouring as they should, because time is money. I wouldn't want a concrete house in the US without inspections so strict that the inspectors basically dictate when & how concrete may be poured, and/or laws explicitly breaking corporate liability protections for failure of concrete within some long time span, or otherwise ensuring that builders care very much that their structures last several decades without needing repair. I suspect they'd be crazy-expensive as a result.
  - Gibbon1 5y ago
    One of the things that comes up in discussions in the link above is local conditions dictate how structures are built. In Florida a slab foundation and cinder block walls is what you want in a place with Hurricanes and a high water table. On the California coast you want a stick built house. Because of earthquakes. North east the frost line goes down several feet. Lot of places you have expansive soils which will totally wreck a masonry building. Also the problem the local workforce will be familiar with local designs. And likely to make mistakes if forced to build something different.

by cp9 5y ago

Gibbon1 5y ago

There is a contractor in LA that posts picture of houses they've inspected. https://imgur.com/user/AlphaStructural https://imgur.com/user/AlphaStructural What's interesting to me is you have Europeans marveling at houses built of flimsy wood instead of strong brick and concrete. Yet except for occasional water and termite damage what's failing in these houses is the concrete and brick foundations. Not the wood framing.

handrous 5y ago
Hell, concrete foundations fail badly enough to need repairs pretty commonly within the first few years on new houses, and I don't just mean normal settling. Doing concrete right takes a lot of waiting and is highly dependent on the weather, which usually means even more waiting (for enough days in a row of the right weather). Builders (understandably) hate anything with that kind of potential to throw off a schedule—unpredictability can increase the total time construction takes by much, much longer than the individual delays themselves—so some of them cut corners. They also don't like to let the ground sit as long between excavation and pouring as they should, because time is money. I wouldn't want a concrete house in the US without inspections so strict that the inspectors basically dictate when & how concrete may be poured, and/or laws explicitly breaking corporate liability protections for failure of concrete within some long time span, or otherwise ensuring that builders care very much that their structures last several decades without needing repair. I suspect they'd be crazy-expensive as a result.
- Gibbon1 5y ago
  One of the things that comes up in discussions in the link above is local conditions dictate how structures are built. In Florida a slab foundation and cinder block walls is what you want in a place with Hurricanes and a high water table. On the California coast you want a stick built house. Because of earthquakes. North east the frost line goes down several feet. Lot of places you have expansive soils which will totally wreck a masonry building. Also the problem the local workforce will be familiar with local designs. And likely to make mistakes if forced to build something different.