Pouring the Foundation Walls

Today (Wednesday) was the day for pouring the basement walls. This morning, it took just over 2 hours for three redi-mix trucks to deliver about 30 yards of 4,000 psi material into our forms. Though he usually works alone, Bert did have two guys assist for the pour today. It all went quite well. In the evening, the forms were ready to be removed. Bert returned and we took the forms down to reveal our very nice walls.  These walls are 6 feet high and 8 inches wide.

Some people who have come by have wondered if the house is going to be lowered onto the top of the walls as they are.  The fact that the frames of the egress windows extend beyond the top of the present walls has confused a few, too. No, the house is not going to be set directly on the top of today's walls. Four rows of split-face concrete blocs will go atop the foundation wall, extending it just over 32 inches in height. To accomplish that, the house will actually be lifted a few more inches to make room for the blocks, then it will be set down on the blocks once they are in place. Once the floor is poured, the house will have a basement with ceilings just over 8 feet in height.

One of our three delivery trucks, each carrying just over 9 cubic yards of redi mix.

 Pouring. Bert controls the process. Helpers pound on the inside forms to help get the mix to be settled and smooth along the forms.

Filling the forms. Reinforcing bar and the connecting brackets holding the forms are visible.

 Redi-mix is delivered into the forms.

 Helper Brad works the mix to make sure it is distributed evenly in the forms--no air pockets.

 Filled forms.

 In addition to the walls, a few small pads had to be poured in the floor of the basement. These will give extra support to the floor in the locations where support posts will be installed.

This is a failed attempt of one blogger to take a "from behind our heads" selfie while sitting next to his homeowner son at the end of the pour. We did get a somewhat crooked photo of the front porch with the filled forms under it.

 Under this ooze of concrete are some pins go through the connector strap and lock the two form panels together. Prior to removing the forms, all the pins had to be uncovered and then removed. There are 6 pins in each panel.
Below, the pins are visible just to the right of the vertical once the concrete is knocked off.

The whalers and their 2x4s that make the forms rigid also had to be removed.  This proved to be a good job for a blogger while Bert was removing forms inside the basement.

Inside wall with forms removed! Beautiful.

Outside wall with forms down. Frame is for one of the 2 egress windows. After forms are cleared, the part of the connecting strap that protrudes from the wall will be broken off and the wall will be tarred.

Removing forms from the wall.