give us a hand on houses

[Tankman]

Most often specified are Hilti epoxy coated anchors. I have used these in Washington state numerous times.

 

http://www.hilti.com/holcom/page/module/home/browse_main.jsf;jsessionid=B0578F7EDA0A7575EC31236BFF329CBB.node1?lang=en&nodeId=-8730

 

Is the basement finished? If not, fiberglass the inner walls. You only need to go up from the floor a foot or two. Weeping basements are common in the Northeast.

 

On the outside of the dwelling, pile up gypsum. Get this from your local agricultural supplier.

 

The gypsum will cut through the soil going, down, down, down.

Hydraulic pressure from the water laden soil will follow the trail the gypsum makes. Gypsum does not, a good thing, adjust pH. We don't want to kill a nice lilac bush do we?

 

http://www.usagypsum.com/consumerproducts.aspx

 

Sand piled around the footing will also work into the soil without danger of pH change. Pile it up it'll disappear soon enough.

[Dana W]

Is Autocad the preferred application for home and office construction?

 

I want to know if homes are typically drawn from a solid wall construction design, or with all the studs, joist, sub-floors ? I learn a great deal of construction methods from the TV show Holmes on Homes and how homes are constructed. I would like to give it a shot on designing a home in auto-cad but want to know if cad is only used to show only solid walls or stud construction?

 

Also, my dad is getting ready..some time to put in Seismic anchoring of his home to the foundation. Has anyone had experience drawing up the proper anchor points for home construction?

 

As you probably know, there are very specific standards and practices, rules, and laws to be met in any industry. Residential home building is no exception, and as far as how much impact that has on the person designing the home, it is probably the most regulated outside of Virginia Class Submarines. It will take a beginner literally a year or more to learn to produce usable working drawings for a house, let alone design one from scratch. That being said, don't let that stop you. You need to get started today, right now.

 

You sound like you have the interest to learn about how houses are built, but I think you may want to take some intermediate steps in the learning process.

 

For a very very first step, check your local educational and government institutions. In my area, there are often classes for learning to read blueprints (drawings) available. Sometimes they are sponsored and/or offered by the local builders. Sometimes there are prerequisites that require you to be already employed in the industry, and sometimes not. At the least you need to be fairly good with plane geometry conceptually, and have some sort of mechanical intuition, and know the difference between a 2x4 and a shovel.

 

You can go to a nearby subdivision under construction, go to the General Contractor's trailer or ask to see the boss, and offer your services as an unskilled laborer. You'd be surprised how much that will teach you just listening to the tradesmen talk during the day while you are sweeping, or digging, or loading, or unloading, scraping paint off windows, running to the supplier for another 20 lbs of nails....