Custom home renovation with no drawings 1

[Said the Sky]

Hello,

I have a 30 year old custom home renovation, was cast with concrete foundation, likely typical 8" wide concrete walls on strip footing, however I don't know the size of the footings and no drawings available, nor bearing pressures, however we can get some tests done to verify this.

The house was a two story home with a entire floor added where the roof use to be, and a new roof build above that. There are quite a bit of beams added with substantial vertical point loads coming down on foundation exterior concrete walls. There was even an elevator added in.

how would you go about finding the information required to do any checks? I believe if it is 8" wide walls it will be acceptable, it takes quite a bit of load to overwhelm 8" wide concrete walls, however the strip footing I am a bit concerned about the point loads coming down. I would of course check it assuming the load distributes in a 2 vertical to 1 horizontal uniform load on the strip footing and any overlap of point loads adjacent to each other.

 

[gte447f]

I agree with HouseBoy that the foundation questions are not insurmountable, but I doubt the client has a reasonable budget or expectations even just for you to adequately investigate and make a determination about the foundation, let alone the risk of you getting involved downstream of everyone else's shoddy work. I would let this one pass.

 

[XR250]

If they are using LVL's for rafters, they clearly have the budget for you!
I would def. give them an FU price and see if they bite.

 

[gte447f]

XR250, that is an astute economic observation! If an engineer is willing to deal with the headaches, then I like your style of going for the jugular giving them an FU price and seeing if they bite. You are right they probably have the money, but I would be willing to bet they don't place much value on the professional engineering services.

 

[XR250]

Honestly, in this economy, everyone is getting the FU price from me and not complaining much. I ain't here to suffer.