Sounds tastier than it is…

I went from an engineered septic to now an engineered foundation. I’m so fancy…

dos equis is fancy

Here’s what I learned this week… There are lots of engineers. Structural, Civil and geotechnical. Somehow I need all of their services… I mean… Somehow I need to PAY for all their services. When you are fancy, you pay to be fancy.

It's all about the benjamins

For anyone who is crazy enough to attempt what I’m doing.

  1. Paid a geotechnical engineer to write a letter saying I could use the geotechnical study but required I use a “waffle type” foundation. Making my newly minted driveway and home pad void and a waste of money ☹
  2. Called the guy at wafflemat and he told me that for nearly $30,000 he could hold my hand through the whole process and build a wafflemat for me (how sweet). But he’d also need me to complete my septic system before he would begin work (even sweeter)
  3. Contact structural engineers in Brentwood and Santa Rosa to see how much and how soon they could engineer a foundation for me. Turns out… even though they engineer structures/foundations they must make sure with the geotechnical engineer that they are doing quality work. The geotechnical engineer must agree to the plans they build.

And here in lies my problem. My engineer is out of town for another month. He didn’t leave detailed notes so the engineers could build it without my input. I was pretty sad about all this. How am I supposed to build a home when the most important part needs to be designed. And the designer cannot do it without an engineer who is far far away.

sun breaking through

Well, I’ve felt moved by God to come here and do this, and not one step of it has been convenient or easy. At midnight last night my geotechnical engineer responded to my emails to him. He gave details and said that whatever structural engineer can contact him directly for questions and he will respond.

Hallelujah!

Stay tuned for what ends up happening on this wafflemat. My hope is to do a lot of the installing myself to save money. The boxes are about $9 each currently. Wafflemat.com provides a spec sheet to help figure out how many boxes and how much concrete you will need.

Finally, the lesson I learned this week is. Geotechnical engineers and structural/civil engineers work hand in hand on wafflemat foundations in liquefaction areas. They are not isolated, and need to communicate. Also foundations, septics, things to do with homes come with a much longer guarantee. If my foundation fails, I can contact my engineer that made it and potentially sue him. If my septic fails, same thing. This whole time I thought workmanship like this was like that of a new cell phone. A 1 or 2 year warranty. If it lasts longer than that… you’re on your own. These guys plan to design quality work that should not fail. I guess that’s why it costs about 30 new Iphone Xs.