Well, I took the plunge a month ago and bought a 210 (its mostly your guys fault I used to be satisfied with my humble 55 now I find myself not able to stop drooling over all the projects I see go on here). Anyway, buying it was the easy part, getting the house to support it was another...
As luck would have it, the perfect spot for the tank ends up have joists that would run parallel to the tank. The plus side is that its near a corner of outside walls, but then theres that 2500 lbs on 2 joists problem. Since my wife was gracious enough to encourage the tank, I thought I should at least return the favor and double check with a builder. The advice I got was sister the joists, bolt/screw them together, and put in some cross bracing.
The tank will run directly above the heating duct, parallel to it. Notice the sistering is already complete (unfortunatly didn't get a pic before I started).
The joists are sister-ed, glued, screwed, and bolted. Hey Im down there anyway why not...
I ended up doing both sides of the beam, even though the tank is on the other side. This made the traffic area around the tank and no bounce, no echo, and just feels incredibly solid its amazing what $50 in lumber can do
However when the builder found out I only had 2x8 joists, which apparently only have an 11 span anyway, mine are nearing 8, they were mostly sure sistering would be enough. Okay, I guess Im putting in a beam as well.
Heres what digging looks like in a 3 tall crawlspace.
Of course I wanted the concrete (near the wall) on top of the footer, so it would have no settling, which meant not digging a hole, but something that resembled more of a grave (which I have to admit, felt kind of weird digging).
I spent a while digging, so your going to get two pictures for that, grin.
Apparently 12 wide concrete tubes, actually do take 11 bags of concrete. I was hoping the directions on the tubs were mistaken, but apparently theyve done this a few times. Mixing 11 bags of concrete in the crawlspace (as to not get mud on your wifes white carpet), was interesting
Finally heres the added beam. I checked around and it appears from home inspection forums, that steel tele-posts are only considered temporal structure, at least that seemed true for WA sites. Inspectors indicated they would flag a home with teleposts, required a permanent non-adjustable column (either 4x4 or fixed steel posts). Seemed odd (ie: 4x4 would be preferred over steal), but I just went with the flow and did exactly the same type of columns that were already used in my house:
Since I was down there, I replacement/beefed-up an existing support on one of the other beams (directly under the corner of the tank). You guessed it, 4x4 was getting cracked. Apparently inspectors have never seen a cracked, warped, rotted 4x4, grin.
aWell, hope you enjoyed this more than I did, grin. Now I need to actually start working on the tank itself (more to follow later).
Thanks
Ed
As luck would have it, the perfect spot for the tank ends up have joists that would run parallel to the tank. The plus side is that its near a corner of outside walls, but then theres that 2500 lbs on 2 joists problem. Since my wife was gracious enough to encourage the tank, I thought I should at least return the favor and double check with a builder. The advice I got was sister the joists, bolt/screw them together, and put in some cross bracing.
The tank will run directly above the heating duct, parallel to it. Notice the sistering is already complete (unfortunatly didn't get a pic before I started).
The joists are sister-ed, glued, screwed, and bolted. Hey Im down there anyway why not...
I ended up doing both sides of the beam, even though the tank is on the other side. This made the traffic area around the tank and no bounce, no echo, and just feels incredibly solid its amazing what $50 in lumber can do
However when the builder found out I only had 2x8 joists, which apparently only have an 11 span anyway, mine are nearing 8, they were mostly sure sistering would be enough. Okay, I guess Im putting in a beam as well.
Heres what digging looks like in a 3 tall crawlspace.
Of course I wanted the concrete (near the wall) on top of the footer, so it would have no settling, which meant not digging a hole, but something that resembled more of a grave (which I have to admit, felt kind of weird digging).
I spent a while digging, so your going to get two pictures for that, grin.
Apparently 12 wide concrete tubes, actually do take 11 bags of concrete. I was hoping the directions on the tubs were mistaken, but apparently theyve done this a few times. Mixing 11 bags of concrete in the crawlspace (as to not get mud on your wifes white carpet), was interesting
Finally heres the added beam. I checked around and it appears from home inspection forums, that steel tele-posts are only considered temporal structure, at least that seemed true for WA sites. Inspectors indicated they would flag a home with teleposts, required a permanent non-adjustable column (either 4x4 or fixed steel posts). Seemed odd (ie: 4x4 would be preferred over steal), but I just went with the flow and did exactly the same type of columns that were already used in my house:
Since I was down there, I replacement/beefed-up an existing support on one of the other beams (directly under the corner of the tank). You guessed it, 4x4 was getting cracked. Apparently inspectors have never seen a cracked, warped, rotted 4x4, grin.
aWell, hope you enjoyed this more than I did, grin. Now I need to actually start working on the tank itself (more to follow later).
Thanks
Ed
