Foundation necessary under Brick steps
distinctivebuilders
| Posted in General Discussion on
I am Building a new house with a brick front stoop and steps. The stoop is 5′ x 10′ and supports columns and a roof structure. My question is should I extend concrete wing walls out from the foundation to have a solid support for the brick stoop? the wing walls are expensive and I would prefer not to use them but I am concerned about the ground settling under the stoop because I have to add so much fill-approx 10 ft of fill. Someone suggested to just add a 6″ slab with rebar on top of the fill and this will compensate for any settling. What do you guys think.
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might need more than 6". If it is that big of a stoop and supporting colums, than yes a slab of some thickness shold be poured
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Edited 1/2/2008 10:31 pm ET by andyfew322
You need a foundation that goes down to undisturbed ground and below the frostline under both the brick stoop and steps. The only way to get around it might be to excavate below the frost line and to undisturbed soil and then fill the hole partially with gravel, but I'd only do that under the steps. The steps would then have the slab & rebar under them, and the rebar needs to tie into the foundation of the porch (stoop). Even then you would be risking the possibility of differential settlement between the steps and the porch which would really suck. The porch needs footings and a foundation.
BTW how high above finished grade will the porch (stoop) walking surface be?
You need a foundation that goes down to undisturbed ground and below the frostline under both the brick stoop and steps.ALL THESE STATEMENTS ARE TRUE but, undisturbed gound is not correct, that term needs to be change to "compacted soil"
I purchased a home that has foundation walls under a front landing but not under the concrete steps leading to the landing (also concrete). As expected, the steps separated from the landing and now I have to repair it.
To do this right I will either have to dig down and put a foundation under the steps or drill and epoxy anchor bolts to secure the steps to the landing. There are only two steps but they are approx 15 feet wide. Me thinks I will try the anchor bolts and pour new steps in the spring. This should only cost me a few hundred - to put a foundation under will likely be a few thousand.
Do it right the first time - go with the walls and put a cold storage room underneath.
Putting a room under it creates another question - how to keep the water from seeping through the bricks and raining in.
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Either the wings or piers to undisturbed soil and below frost line. then a slab cap to start the bricks from.
variables to deciding would be soils types and your climate zone.
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As per other posts....take the footings/piers to undisturbed soils AND be aware that in areas of overdig at foundation walls there is a need to determine how deep and how close to the excavated area CAN the load be placed without caving/settling off the undisturbed soils into the fill area.
Your soil type will determine the angle from the bottom of the foundation overdig to the bottom of the position for properly placing a footing. Locally our soil types call for a 30-45 degree angle.
The other option would be a constructed "grade beam" to span the fill area and extend away from the house foundation a great enough distance to catch undisturbed soil outside the 30-45 degree tilt back line.
It would be good to have more details of your exact conditions at site to give a better response to your question.
Clear as mud?..............Iron Helix
when we have a substantial entry such as you are decribing.. we use 12" CMU's to build up our wall..
after the foundation is stripped , we lay them up dry to the dimensions of the structure.. we also build some dry piers inside the structure.. and we drill holes into the concrete at the level of the top of the wall... these CMU's lay on undistrubed earth and also bear on the protruding footing
when we pour the basement we pour a 6" slab on top of the CMU's and tie it to the foundation by inserting rebar dowels into the holes we drilled
the top of the 6" slab is just below grade and the mason lays up his steps on top
Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Now there is a good idea. I don't normally think in terms of mixing poured and CMU, but that is ideal.You pour the footing for all this same time as the wall footing though, right?
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you can.... but in the past, i've just made sure the excavation it was going on was truly undisturbed earth
i figure since we are allowed by code to pour a 12" wall with no footing.. by using 12" cmu's i was getting the same bearing...
and bringing some internal cmu piers up to bear the slab also spread the bearing...
tried a lot of things short of pouring a whole wall just for the entry.. but the cmu's have worked well for us
and laying them up dry with no mortar makes it a piece of cake
Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Do you fill (to any extent) the cmu cores when pouring?
Or, the bottom layer could be solid 12"wide retaining wall blocks. 6" thick. It's what they use for those big walls along highways.
Edited 1/3/2008 4:40 pm ET by peteshlagor
yeah, landscape blocks would work fine... don't know which would price out better
no, we choked the cores, except the top , so the slab would lock the topMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Just before the weather went sour this fall I finished (almost) repairing our front stoop. The block had been layed almost dry, with no core fill, and frost took a big chunk out of one corner as a result. Lifted the broken slab up, jacked the corner blocks into place, core filled them, then epoxied the broken chunk back before skimming the whole thing.I think in frost country you at least need to core fill down to about a foot below grade.
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That makes the picture more clear in my head.
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You only need the foundation if you want the steps to remain connected to the house.
What was suggested to you is a floating slab. Consult an engineer for the correct thickness and rebar specs. If you compact the soil at 6" intervals as you backfill you'll have a good foundation for the floating slab. This method is considerably cheaper than building concrete wing walls. Another option, maybe the best, Pour footings for cmu's.The block walls will support the columns,roof and the stairs.
mike
that would only work with no frost in southern climes.
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