equipment nor experience. Contracting The Hoover Home Institute, "Carpets the plumbing and wiring may be nec- and Rugs," The Hoover Company, North essary to meet building codes. Pouring Canton, Ohio. and finishing a concrete slab floor on House and Garden, "Carpet Takeover and the Rug Boom," Vol. 141, March 1972, grade requires a certain amount of pp. 86-91. skill, extra help, and some equipment. Mechanics Illustrated, "Consumer's These are all expensive parts of the Guide to Vinyl Floor Coverings," Vol. 68, building process. Although you won't February 1972, p. 98. save as much on the total cost by con- NAHB Research Foundation, Inc., tracting part of the work, you can "Manual of Lumber- and Plywood-Saving reduce the construction time. If this Techniques for Residential Light-Frame work is done by reliable contractors Construction," P. O. Box 1627, Rockville, you can be more assured of getting a Md. 20850, 1971. National Forest Products Association, loan to cover the building costs. "The All-Weather Wood Foundation-De- As other new materials and methods sign and Construction Requirements," become available, you must decide Technical Report 7, 1619 Massachusetts whether they are better and less ex- Ave., NW., Washington, D.C. 20036. pensive than time-tried ones and Parents Magazine, "There Are Nine whether they will last for many years. Major Kinds of Resilient Floorings," Vol. This is not easy to judge. Get all the 47, August 1972, pp. 76-77. information you can and take time to Plastics Pipe Institute, "Standards for study manufacturers' claims. If pos- Plastic Piping," TR-5, 250 Park Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10017. sible, inspect installations in your area . "ABS Plastic Piping Installation before you make your decision. Better Procedures" TR-12, 250 Park Avenue, be safe than sorry. New York, N.Y. 10017. . "PVC Plastic Piping Design and Installation," TR-13, 250 Park Avenue, For further reading: New York, N.Y. 10017. American Wood Preservers Institute, U.S. Department of Agriculture. "Forest "FHA Pole House Construction," 1651 Old Products Laboratory Natural Finish," For- Meadow Road, McLean, Va. 22101. est Products Laboratory, FPL-046, Madi- Anderson, L. O. Wood-Frame House son, Wis., 1970. Construction, Agriculture Handbook 73, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Washing- ton, D.C. 20250, revised 1970. . Low-Cost Wood Homes for Pressure-Treated Rural America—Construction Manual, Agri- cultural Handbook 364, U.S. Department Wood Foundations of Agriculture, Washington, D.C. 20250, 1969. The Carpet and Rug Institute. "Carpets & Rugs-The Now Way to Choose Them," rioMES ARE NOW being built with Dalton, Ga. 30720. foundations of pressure-treated wood Good Housekeeping, "Preventing the Most Common Problems With Resilient walls instead of masonry block or con- Floorings," November 1972, p. 234. crete. Builders and homeowners select Haynes, B. C, Jr., and J. W. Simons. treated wood foundations because they Surface Bonding of Concrete Block Walls want the advantages of a warm, com- as Related to Structural Properties, Re- fortable, and more attractive house. search Bulletin 110, University of Georgia They want a house that can be built College of Agriculture Experiment Station, faster in all types of weather and at Athens, Ga. 30602, 1972. less expense. . Surface Bonding of Concrete Block Walls Without Mortar Joints, Agri- culture Information Bulletin 343, U.S. De- AUTHOR GERALD A. KOENIGSHOF iS Branch partment of Agriculture, Washington, D.C. Chief, Forest Products Requirements, For- 20250, 1970. est Service.

258 Top and above left, build- ____ ing lot is excavated, then ^^ ,.~"£^ gravel or crushed stone is "Sj^^m placed in the excavation. -^^B^^fl Left, pressure-treated wood IL' *^^Cvr^ij basement foundation is set on gravel in excavation. Above, crawlspace founda- tion is set on crushed stone in trench.

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isïjj ■'•EßtX. House foundations of pressure- Wood for house foundations pres- treated wood may be used for basement sure-treated with waterborne salt is or crawl space walls. These walls are odor free and clean and has an attrac- framed with lumber and plywood just tive appearance. The treatment destroys as are typical above-ground wood frame the food value of the wood, making it walls except that the lumber and ply- immune to decay and rot by fungus or wood are pressure treated. To construct to attack by termites. A special quahty a basement with treated wood walls, mark put on each piece of lumber and the ground is excavated, then gravel or plywood assures builders and owners crushed stone is spread over the excava- that this material has been properly tion. Next, a treated wood footing plate treated for residential wood founda- is placed on the gravel or crushed stone tions. fill. Finally a treated wood stud wall Treated wood foundation basements sheathed with treated plywood is set in are more comfortable to live in for place on the footing plate. several reasons. To construct a crawl space wall of Insulation can be added to a wood treated wood, a trench is excavated wall for less than the cost to strip a around the perimeter of the house loca- masonry wall. This provides a wall that tion, gravel is placed in the bottom of has one-fourth the heat loss of a con- the trench, and then a footing plate and ventional basement wall. Although wall similar to a basement wall are set heating and cooling costs are reduced on the gravel. After framing the upper by a small amount, a more comfortable portion of the house, a concrete slab is living space is probably more important poured in the basement and earth may to the homeowner. be backfilled against the wood founda- Walls are easily finished by the tion wall. Crawl space walls are tem- owner or the builder because no strip- porarily braced and backfilled immedi- ping is required. Paneling or gypsum ately after erection. wallboard can be applied by nailing How long will a treated wood foun- directly to the studs. dation last? Properly pressure-treated Treated wood foundation basements wood foundations are expected to last have proved to be essentially leak free as long or longer than the average life and to provide dry living space below of wood frame houses on masonry or grade; this is attributable to the porous concrete foundations. gravel or crushed stone fill under the Skyscrapers and large highway floor and wall, in combination with a bridges are often supported by pres- sump where soils are poorly drained. sure-treated timber pilings that provide Water from rainstorms cannot be many years of service. Some of these trapped outside the wall, and the pressure treatments are unacceptable ground water table is held well below for house foundations because of their floor level. odor, unsuitable appearance, or capa- Inspections by the Forest Service city to soil clothing or irritate skin found that studs in treated wood foun- when touched. dation walls are nearly as dry as studs in the walls above grade. Occupants of houses with treated wood foundations often stress their satisfaction with a basement that is warm and damp free. Treated wood foundation walls offer unlimited combinations of attractive wall finishes both inside and out. Inside wall finishes may be essentially the same as used in conventional above- Quality mark required on lumber or ply- wall wood frame construction. The out- wood used in residential foundations. side may be brick, stucco, or wood sid- 260 Finished home with wood frame foundation has appearance of conventional house.

ing or virtually any other finish used in In Fern Cliff, Va. the Farmers Home conventional construction. Textured Administration demonstrated the speed plywood and wood stains make avail- of constructing a house with treated able many combinations of color and wood foundations. texture that are pleasing to look at. Starting in the morning with a raw Treated wood foundations are being building lot, a treated wood foundation used in all price classes of homes. was installed by 10 a.m. Backfilling was Families have benefited from treated completed by 11 a.m. A sectionalizcd wood foundations in two ways. They house had been placed on the foimda- have obtained more living space at less tion by 11:30 a.m. cost and their houses are constructed By mid-afternoon the telephone, much faster. water, electricity, and heat systems The Farmers Home Administration were in operation. The farm family office in Richmond, Va. has recently started moving into their new home at developed house designs using treated 3:30 p.m. and by 4:30 p.m. the yard wood foundations. These designs pro- had been land.scaped. vide 53 percent more living space at Treated wood foundations can be in- only 8 percent more cost than was pos- stalled in approximately one-sixth the sible with previous designs. time required to install a conventional Crawl space foundation walls have foundation. Factory fabricated treated been most typically used to keep struc- wood foundation walls for an entire tural costs down. By switching to a basement are often erected in only one bi-level design, where the lower level hour. uses treated wood walls, it is possible As a result, owners and builders to provide nearly twice the living space benefit by using treated wood founda- at essentially the same cost as a house tions because they eliminate costly con- on a crawl space. Owners can easily struction delays at the job site. finish off the inside of treated wood An interesting feature of wood foun- foundation walls with gypsum wall- dation walls is their resistance to crack- board or wood panehng. ing caused by settling soil. Small As a result, families now can get amounts of soil settlement under con- more attractive and comfortable living ventional concrete footings can result space at less cost. in unsightly large cracks in conventional

490-100 O - 73 - 18 261 I Treated wood foundation, started at 8:30 a.m., has been installed by 10 a.m. Sectional- ized house is placed on foundation by 11:30 a.m. Family starts moving in at 3:30 p.m. Landscaping is finished at 4:30 p.m. masonry or concrete walls. Treated ply- installation of prefabricated wood wood and lumber framing used in wood foundations. foundation walls acts like a large dia- As a result, builders using wood phragm or deep girder that effectively foundations have been able to extend "bridges" the areas of soil settlement. their building season into periods of Cracked wood walls are unheard of. wet and cold weather. Hence the name Often people ask how gravel footings "All Weather Wood Foundation" ac- under a basement wall can support the curately describes one advantage of house without settling. No concrete the system. footings are used. Wood foundations are usually sup- The answer is that soil under the plied by qualified fabricators who footing ultimately supports the house custom design and fabricate treated above. Footings are only as effective as wood foundations. All sizes and grades the soil which supports them, regard- of materials are selected on the basis less of the type of footing used. The of the soil characteristics at the site, footings must be deep and wide enough lateral loads from soil pressure on the so downward loads are adequately dis- walls, downward loads on the struc- tributed to the supporting soil. ture, and strength properties of the Coarse sand, washed pea gravel, and lumber and plywood used in the %-inch crushed stone are excellent foot- foundation. Thus, a treated wood ing material because they are classified foundation is engineered to meet job as a noncompressive soil. In addition, requirements. stone and gravel footings of this type Conventional foundations are usually are easily leveled during construction. not selected on the basis of engineer- Because of their porous nature these ing design but rather as specified by the types of footings are a key factor in pre- local building code. Because of this, a venting water accumulation outside the conventional wall may be stronger wall. Preventing such water buildup than necessary, which is wasteful of outside basement walls is important in material, or may not be strong enough, preventing basement leakage. which results in an unsafe condition. You may hear a treated wood foun- Collapse of masonry walls during dation referred to as the "All Weather rainstorms—in addition to problems Wood Foundation." Wood foundations with leakage and cracked walls—led can be erected in colder and wetter the National Association of Home weather than is possible with conven- Builders and the Federal Housing Ad- tional systems. ministration to seek better ways of Mortar for masonry block cannot be building basement walls. Research by placed during raining or drizzly the Forest Service, the American Wood weather, and concrete will not cure Preservers Institute, and the National properly in below freezing tempera- Forest Products Association resulted in tures. Muddy sites prevent trucks from the promising new idea of building delivering heavy masonry or concrete better foundations by using pressure- products but do not stop deliveries and treated lumber and plywood.

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