Evidence of Stem Wall Foundation Water Damage

Excess Water & Trapped Moisture Cause Serious Foundation Damage Eliminating the Cause and Repairing the Damage is Important – Foundation Inspection & Repair Scottsdale Arizona

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For more information contact

James Belville (602)418-2970
Concrete Repair

As a few breaks in it articulating and these cracks are starting to become a little bit more numerous so I am going to recommend rain gutters for this house

The last thing that they do when they build these houses is they take the paint down to the top of the dirt

The dirt gets wet below the paint line the moisture goes in comes up and the efflorescence salt deposits cycle continues and eventually chews into the concrete delaminating the paint

So anytime you paint your home just go down a little bit deeper get below the soil moisture content

This is also a hurricane strap right here hurricane strap comes up as I spoke earlier should be repaired

Coming around this is the the angle or the degree and recognizable from this angle of the crack as a hurricane strap tension ties however this hurricane strap evidently has touched the reinforcement steel or may have and started a low-voltage electrical current it’s running through this foundation now and busting out the entire side

Now if we remove this you’d be able to see that number four half-inch rebar back behind in there about three inches expanding and rusting

It expands up to five times the size so it will expand to two and a half inches

So this electrical drive needs to be taken care of because it will go all the way around the house now so the repair would be move the decorative rocks back excavate the dirt all the way down this vertical wall chip everything out this chipping cracking and flaking and remove that reinforcement steel that’s on the interior expanding and replace it with a new number four barb that’s encapsulated with rust inhibitor epoxy which we do

This continues here are some more vertical breaks is settlement now settlement occurs when the soil can no longer hold the vertical pressure that is being applied

So these vertical breaks are very numerous in an ideal situation one to two vertical breaks or settlement cracks which a lot of people describe I only see one or two within 20 feet

When there’s a lot more and they’re more condensed that means that this area is moving a little bit more than what it should

We have this nice little area for the water to be drained away from it but it’s very close to the home so with this evidence over here we got oxidized rebar we have vertical breaks and we’ll get into the garage in these other rooms here in this geographic area to find other issues

This continues all the way down and this looks to be either a hurricane strap or an anchor bolt so the repair would be from just around the corner from that hurricane strap all the way around just past this corner

This trash can and the patio slab running this direction says that this side right over here is getting a little bit too much water and the expansion joint right in there is serpentining

So expansion is when moisture is present there’s dirt debris left over so all the evidence is here from saturation and this footing is moving down slightly even though the patio here is poured non monolithically and is poured separately would be considered a floating slab

Because of the expansion around this column it can follow the foundation down and when it does it’ll cause this crack right here

Nothing structural yes I’m just pointing out and describing what you’re seeing

Then this becomes a lot more stable over here this the soil or the dirt grading here seems to be improved and we don’t have a lot of rainwater coming off the roof here in this location

The paint is peeling off because the paint’s painted down to the top of the dirt the dirt gets wet below the paint and that fluorescent salt deposit gets trapped in behind the paint and peels off the paint

The white stuff right there is a fluorescent salt deposit seems to be pretty stable over here on this side

Here are these vertical breaks here there so to make improvements rain gutters even though you have a driveway here this slab is right here there’s an opportunity for settlement in this area

Not allowing any moisture in this area by capturing the moisture over here six inch aluminum seamless with a bracket to hold that ring gutter out level to capture maximum amount on the water out there so it runs over the sidewalk down the valley gutter

Going into the garage this is a control joint this control joint is opening the reason for a control joint is to control the crack in a straight line that’s why it’s called a controlled joint and it’s doing exactly what it’s designed to do however when this crack opens up and continues to get wider and wider then that means this slab and this slab are heaving upwards opening this crack butterflying

As we come this way the crack starts to identify itself even more and getting a little bit larger then I look over here on this side where these two walls come together and they’re shearing in there

There’s a little bit of separation based on this evidence there’s just too much water over here on this side so this interior garage floor is considered a floating floor

I’m standing on this is the interior floor where the interior floor meets the perimeter stem wall foundation there’s a discrepancy right there it’s gone down maybe a half an inch or so

This foundation and the interior floor is important with the perimeter foundation wall so they can move independently

This is considered a construction joint this separation right here is nothing to be considered repaired or anything like that it’s doing what it’s supposed to however the foundation has moved down slightly

The evidence is also on the outside that we viewed earlier and shearing crack running right down this wall where a perimeter wall meets an interior while sitting on top of an interior floor where they meet if the foundation is moving differently than the interior floor it’ll see it right here shearing

Going inside when homes move enough it will cause water leaks in your roof over here is some shearing in this in this bedroom wall

We’re just on the other side of the wall where we’re just at right there so that’s definitely evident

These are all facts I did do my initial investigation before rolling this video then we get here to this floor tile the grout is opening up it seems like that it has been filled before and it’s in a straight line

So what this would suggest is that this could be the keyway joint that runs through the interior floor all the way through from one side to the next

Keyways maybe this one are different types but I’ll just explain this a keyway is approximately three and a half three-quarter inches to four and it’s a tongue and groove that’s placed prior to pour because we do know all concrete is going to crack and we want to control this crack in a straight line

However when a home moves because of the crack has been identified by inserting this keyway joint

This keyway joint has become the weakest link and can heave upwards and it seems like it has slightly and this is caused by saturation of the soil on the exterior sides

So when the exterior goes down is going to heave up the floor and this is the case

This completes my evaluation of this home for more information contact James

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James Belville – Foundation Repairman™ – (602)418-2970

Foundation Repair Expert – Concrete Repairman® LLC – a fully licensed, bonded and insured foundation repair company serving customers in Scottsdale and surrounding areas in Scottsdale Arizona. We have over 30 years of experience installing and repairing home foundation cracks, floor crack structural stitching, floor leveling, stem walls, post tension, monolithic and resurfacing foundation damage for homeowner, and commercial clients in Scottsdale Arizona.

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