Rod Ends SupplyHow to Form Building Footings

You should be able after reading this, to perform simple forming methods for linear footings and pier footings for a basic foundation. I will cover optional ways to form foundation walls as well. Along the way I will leave you hints that will either be ways to save money, safety items or perhaps a reference or two for you to go to for more information if you need it.

Linear Footing Formwork- Linear footings is a fancy word for strip footings that you may have seen being placed under a new house or garage. They are the first basic piece in the foundation system you will need for your project. Linear footings may form a square, a circle, an arc or perhaps just a projection sticking out from the main building that will support a knee wall or a retaining wall.

Observe therewill be several men involved as well as the use of wheelbarrows to haul the concrete and place it in the footing forms. Also note the small squares in the center of the excavation are for a pier footing that may support a column later on. The concrete is placed and leveled off flush with top of forms.

Materials: Materials for footings can range from dimensional lumber such as a 2″ x 12″ or 2′ x10″ to plywood, scrap lumber pieces, or any other wood you have laying around. Typically, footing lumber can be used over and over again to save money. 12 penny,10 penny and 8 penny common nails, some string line, pencils, level, ruler or measuring tape and a tripod and bubble level. A tripod and level can be rented by the day from most Rental centers. They will show you how to set it up and use it if you need help. A string line bubble level is approximately .00 at most home hardware stores.

Tools-Long handled pointed shovels, short handled square shovel, hammers, pick, 12 pound sledge hammer, tie wire, and a chalk line box.

Reinforcement- In most parts of the country steel reinforcement is required in foundation footings. It could be 2-#5 bars continuous or 2-#6’s and this information will be shown on your building drawings. Reinforcement bar sizes are based on 1/8″ increments of 1″. So #5vbar is 5/8″ thick, #6 bar is 6/8 or ¾” thick and so on. Bars range from #3 to ##24 but will never see anything larger than a #7 in any typical house footing. Rebar (for short) is available at home centers, lumberyards and if you have a local steel supplier in the phone book, they may deliver as well. Rebar comes in 20′ or 30′lengths with 20′ lengths which are easier to handle and are preferable. You can bend a #3, 4 or 5 in a simple jig made of stacked cement blocks or a trailer hitch on a pickup truck. It will take some effort but there aren’t that many to bend.

Cutting rebar may be done with a demolition saw or a skill saw with a carbide blade although that is much slower. WEAR SAFETY GLASSES AT ALL TIMES! Flying debris from the saw blade and sparks can cause serious eye injuries. Watch the sparks as well. Be aware of where you’re working and have a firm footing when doing this work. Make sure no one is standing in the path of the cutting debris or sparks.

Rebar installed in a pier footing. Many footings have 2 or 3 continuous bars tied together end to end for added strength of the footing. Walls may have just vertical bars or both vertical and horizontal bars in them.

Installation: Here’s the fun part where you actually see something getting done. Once you have performed the layout of the building lines, you are ready to start installing the formwork. Remember, this is not cabinet or finished work that will be seen later on. It is simply a temporary form to hold the concrete in shape until it dries. When your concrete is hardened, YOU RIP ALL THE FORMS BACK OUT! While we are here, when you have finished and poured your footings, remove ALL wood from around the work. Leaving wood in place and burying it will draw insects and especially termites. They just love damp wood. This will be a serious problem later on. Take your time to clean it all out. Start in one corner of your foundation (we will for now assume it is a rectangle) and start laying out the longest lengths of lumber you have to use. Your drawings will tell you if your footing is 20″ wide and 10″‘ deep or 24″ wide and 12″ deep and so on. The first number given such as 24″ x12″ typically means the width of the footing is 24″, and the depth is 12″. Typical means this is the size used everywhere unless the architect shows a different size in a specific place. If your footing is 24″ x 12″, you would be using 2″ x12″ x 12′ or 10′ dimensional lumber marked as SPF. (Spruce, Pine, Fir). In different areas of the country, faming lumber could be Southern Yellow Pine, white pine or other most common and cheapest wood available. Remember, this is not structural framing lumber so there is no reason to buy the highest priced wood for this work. Buy the Cheapest!

OK so you worked your way all around the building and find out the building doesn’t fit your lumber lengths. Amazing! Say the building is 42′ long. by lapping your forms one foot each, you will only get 39′ from 4 10′ pieces and you need 42′. Now you are allowed to cut some pieces to fit the corners. Try to keep the cutting to a minimum so you can save your lumber for another project. OK, now we have lumber laid out all the way around the foundation. Holding the lumber in place can be done by several methods and all are fine.

Formwork can be held in place by using wooden stakes, steel stakes, perforated strapping steel tape, or wood spreaders. Steel stakes are quicker but are expensive to buy. If you can rent a box of 24 or 48, do so as they greatly speed up the work. If you are using wood stakes you have to purchase some 1″ x 3″ x12′ lumber for cutting of stakes. If your ground is very soft or wet, the stakes may have to be 30″-36″ long, if the ground is firm 24″ long stakes will do. Cut a point on each stake and make a couple of dozen of them to start. Stand your first footing form directly under you layout line and drive a stake alongside on the outside! You have to be able to remove them later. Now keeping the form under your layout line, move along the board and place another stake at the other end keeping the entire length of the board under the string line. Make sure your form is in line with the foundation footing layout line. Place your second form alongside the first on the outside and lap it 1″ over the first. Drive a 16 penny duplex nail in the lap to hold it while you work along. Third form; place it to the inside of the 2nd board, lapping it one foot as well. Nail these together from the outside! Continue on around the footing until you have stood forms for the entire exterior of the footing including corners. Lapping in and out all the way around. Now start your inside form. Stand the board 24″ away from the outside form board and hold it in place with either a 28″ piece of the 1″ x3″ lumber scrap keeping a minimum of 24″ between the forms. The building inspector will check this dimension. He/she does not care if it’s slightly larger but he/she will fail it, if it’s less than 24″. Again work all the way around your footing until you have a full rectangle with a form board for both the inside and outside of your footing in place.

Now is the time to begin making your forms strong enough to hold the weight of the concrete. Starting in one corner, add enough wood stakes, nailing each one as you go to the formwork with 10 penny duplex nails. Steel stakes have pre-drilled holes in them so you simply insert the nail in a hole and drive it in. Continue this until one side is secured soundly. Now stand the inside forms making sure you maintain the minimum width required by your drawings. Install “spreaders” made of scrap lumber across the top of the forms to hold them apart and help hold them from tipping over when the concrete is placed inside. Continue on all the way around the footings until all forms are nailed and staked. NOTE: As you proceed with the formwork, using your level and tripod, make sure the forms are LEVEL! They are of no use if they weave up and down and will make installation of the foundation itself, nearly impossible. If you encounter rock or other obstruction, ask your building inspector how he/she wants to see the footing formed at that location. They may allow you to pin the rebar to the rock, ask that some of the rock be removed to provide a level surface and so on. Now install the rebar. Just slide the long lengths under your spreaders making bends at the corners. Using tie wire, hang the bars from the spreaders so the rebar is located within the bottom 1/3 of the footing height. 12″ high footing? Hang the bars 3-4″ above the ground. This will help provide the strongest footing you can make. When all rebar is complete, call for inspection and take a rest.

Placing the concrete-When pouring a large footing or foundation, you will most likely purchase the concrete from a Redi-mix concrete supplier. They will want to know, how many yards you need, what strength concrete and what time of day you would like it to be on site. Have your information ready. Order two days before you need it and check again on the day it is supposed to be delivered to make sure there will not be any delays. Weather, plant breakdowns and even manpower can sometimes delay truck delivery times. They will get there as closely to the hour you requested as possible. BE READY! When the truck shows up is not the time to find out you have a flat on the wheelbarrow or can’t find the shovels. Have your tools and manpower ready. Most companies allow up to 1 hour on site for unloading. After that you pay additional time charges for the truck and the driver. It can get costly! Unless you are superhuman and very well experienced do not try and unload 10yds of concrete with only 2 people. You most likely will spill more than you use, the concrete will get hard before you finish it and rushing around can cause an injury. Be prepared with sufficient manpower.

After the concrete is placed in your forms and roughly troweled off to the top of the forms, take a few minutes break. The concrete will start to setup and if your plans call for vertical bars in the footings for the new foundation walls, this is the time to install those. They should all be pre-made and laid out roughly where they are to go in the footings. Again, plan ahead. You may “stab” these rebar into the wet concrete, wiggling them around slightly to get the concrete to fill in around the hole you made. Your plans will tell you if the bars go on the inside or outside “face” pf the wall or in the center and how far apart they are to be. “Inside” and “Outside” face simply means the inside or outside of the new all. Most times the bars are to be placed 2″ away from the face. Your drawings will tell you this information. Starting in one corner, install one bar in intersection of the corner and then measure whatever dimension the drawing shows for centers. 32″ on center (O.C.). Just measure over 32″ and install the next bar and so on. When you come to the next corner, make sure one bar is at the corner intersection center again. You can add extra bars of you have a question, just don’t add too few.

Next day. Now that you found the muscles you never knew you had (just a little sore?) it is time to strip all the formwork off the footings. Yes all that great form work you did is now just scarp lumber pile material. Take ALL wood out of the foundation area. Rotting wood underground draws termites and other nasty insects! Footings are complete.

Foundation forms completed and filled with concrete. Not child’s play!

Foundation walls: Walls may be constructed of concrete block units (Masonry or CMU), poured concrete, pressure treated wood and today even Styrofoam foundation blocks are available. Whatever the type you are using, if you did a good job on your footings and they are nice and level, the walls are going to be easy to install. If your foundation is masonry, your work is done. Your mason will now layout the wall locations, lay the CMU, pour the CMU cells that have the rebar in them and install the straps for the sill plate for the house, shed, garage, etc. Make sure his contract includes all this work and materials. If the foundation is concrete, the concrete contractor will bring all the forms with him. Again, make sure all the formwork, wall ties, rebar required, windows and other accessories are included in his contract. It is possible for a homeowner to form and pour a foundation but it is not child’s play. For rentals, rebar installation for the walls, actual placement of the concrete, how to use the trucks properly and possibly the use of a concrete pump are all best left to the pros. Concrete is extremely heavy when wet. Improperly constructed wall forms can result in a “blow-out” of the formwork and serious injury or death can result.

Footings are the basic and first building block of your project. Sheds may sit only on 4 solid concrete blocks but those are the footings. They too must be solid and level to provide a good footing for your shed. Take your time and do it right and the rest of your building will be easier to keep plumb and level.

Hopefully this has given you lots of ideas and information on the right and wrong ways to install footings. Whether it is a large or small project, the theory is the same. Take your time to read your drawings, always use safety glasses when using a power tool or placing concrete.

Pete

Your Friendly Building Inspector

http://www.Wagsys.com

BICES-Building Inspection & Code Enforcement System Software

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Rod Ends SupplyFishing Secrets: Florida Canals

Fishing Secret #1

Fishing the Florida canals are absolutely gold mines within a couple mile radius of where you live. Most canals are over looked for the more popular lakes. Or they aren’t accessible or private. I have found that these very canals deserve a second look. I’ve caught all my big bass in these local overlooked canals. Most people end up spending half the day getting to the place, fighting the traffic or compete for a fishing spot since everyone else is there. You also spend a bunch more money for this mini vacation, fish all day and maybe catch nothing!

The easiest method of accessing these canals is to simply walk to them. Carry your fishing pole and a few choice lures. Keep it simple. Work your banks, find the hidden spots. Remember there has been hardly any fishing pressure so expect to see action. Walk slow tossing your bait and be ready.

A real fun time and easy to put together is using a canoe. Just toss it on the vehicle and away you go. Canoes are great. They are quiet in the water and allowed to be in all bodies of water. Some canals and lakes are “non-motor” use due to aquifer drinking water rules. Canoes are light and easy to move around. They allow you to bring more equipment and paddle to remote parts of the waterway.

Of course if you have a motor boat and some canals have boat ramps. You can enjoy both longer drives to untouched fishing paradise and expect a fine fishing day.

Canals that run along the interstates and turnpikes are phenomenal places to explore. Drive into neighbor hoods with canals. Locate the hidden treasures of pristine fishing secrets. If canals have lakes attached to them be ready for an explosive fishing secret experience. These combo lake and canal places are excellent because fish love where the water flows and bait fish hanging around these places. Golf courses are real fishing secrets. Be respectful when walking on the greens reaching these lakes. Not all golf courses have picky security out there. I have fished while people are playing. Just be quiet and respectful. Let them go first and have fun fishing.

I like to have at least two fishing poles, handful of favorite lures. I set up one with a top water lure and the other with a plastic worm. Working the banks and points slowly will produce bites. Remember to always release your catch.

Catch and Release is the practice of releasing your catch back to the water. This is a MUST if we want to experience the joys of fishing. By releasing the fish back to the waters we assure our future days and our grandchildren’s grandchildren the same opportunity to experience this for themselves.

It’s a real gold mine within arm’s reach. Take the time to explore your local canals. These canals won’t let you down.

Happy Fishing Days!

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Rod Ends SupplyExtended Quilt Care & Hanging Display Quilts

Aunt Mable spent two years making that charming quilt with the quirky border for your cabin. You can extend the life of her efforts by taking the time to implement a few preventative steps and cleaning precautions. Today’s hand stitched cabin quilt with the quirky border could be one of your family heirlooms someday.

Sunlight and artificial light will cause fading and in time, fabric deterioration. Light damage is irreversible. If you choose to display your quilt try to place it in a location where the light is distributed evenly on the entire quilt. Never use nails, staples or pins to hang a quilt. Instead, sew a sleeve or tube of fabric along the top back side of the quilt, stitching through all layers every inch or so, then run a rod through the sleeve and attach the rod ends to the wall (wood curtain rod and wood curtain hangers work perfect). This distributes the weight of the quilt evenly and eliminates stretching and maintains the quilts shape.

Even hanging display quilts need cleaning. Occasional light vacuuming and airing will remove surface dust. Do not through your quilt over a clothes line and beat it. If you hang it outside on an overcast day and either lay a sheet over it or at least hang with the backing face up to prevent sun damage to the top.

Do not dry clean a soiled quilt unless directed to do so by the manufacturer. Improper dry cleaning with harsh chemicals may damage your quilt. To wash it safely first test for color fastness by gently rubbing each fabric with a wet (water only) cotton swab. If no color comes off then the dyes are set.

If you choose to machine wash your quilt use the gentlest cycle with warm/cold water and a very mild detergent such as Dreft, Ivory or Orvis. Orvis is an extremely gentle, Ph balanced detergent that leaves no residue. It is used for animals and can be purchased at your local feed supply or veterinary hospital. Never use bleach. Remove the quilted item from the washer promptly. Leaving them in the washer too long will have your quilt smelling like mold or mildew quickly. These odors can be very difficult to wash out.

Dry your quilted items in the dryer. If you choose to line dry, hang the quilt with the backing facing the sun and put a clean sheet over it to protect from sun exposure. While the quilt is still damp it can be fluffed in the dryer to reduce wrinkling.

For cleaning your quilt to preserve as a future heirloom it is preferred you hand wash with cold water and a mild detergent letting the quilt soak for up to four hours in the tub. Squeeze out excess water by pushing the quilt against the side of the tub, never wring it out. Rinse several times. If you have very hard water with a lot of minerals you may wish to do the last rinse with distilled water. This maintains the crisp colors. Again, gently squeeze out water and lay flat to dry. Lay a sheet over the quilt if you are drying it outside.

If you plan to store your quilt use an acid free box with only one item per box, acid free tissue wrap, an old pillow case or a piece of pre-washed muslin. Be sure to replace the tissue wrap or wash the fabric wrapper once a year. Also, refold the quilt along new fold lines.

Never store quilts in plastic bags, cardboard boxes or blanket chests. Besides poor air circulation they can also be stained and the weight of stacked quilts can cause fibers to break down.

Museum quality, heirloom and antique quilts need to be preserved and cared for by specialists and should be referred to a professional quilt conservator.

By keeping your quilt out of harmful light, cleaning carefully, hanging your quilt properly and storing them properly you will decrease the damage to your quilted items. Following these basic procedures will greatly increase the life of your quilted treasure. That cabin quilt with the quirky border and fond memories of Aunt Mable will be around for your family to enjoy for years to come.

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Rod Ends SupplyCloset Organizing Tips – How to Design a Closet

The most effective way to make full use of the living space in your house is to have great closet space designs. Having a convenient place to put everything eliminates the temptation to just put things down and worry about them later, and it makes it easy to find them in future. The best closet design isn’t something another person sold to you; it is the closet design that suits you best.

Start with the door. The amount of space you have in a room and where it lies will help you decide what kind of door to put on your closet. Ordinary doorknob doors will work if your closet is in a corner and the door opens out to be flush against a wall, but you need plenty of space in a room for this to be efficient. This is most often used for a very small closet or for a walk-in closet. If your closet has a wide opening, it may be wiser to use a folding door, sliding door, or bi-fold door. Sliding doors only leave half your closet open at any given time. Folding and bi-fold doors need a little open space in front of the closet, but allow you to open your closet completely for full access.

Next, consider what your needs are. Do you have a lot of clothes that need to be folded and put on shelves? Or tons of shoes that need a home? Clothing that hangs “short”, like skirts and blouses, can be hung on racks with only 2.5 to 3 feet of clearance between them, which doubles the effective space in that section of your closet. Suits and dresses need at least 4 feet of space, so must be hung singly. You may also have non-clothing items you want in your closet: games, supplies, costumes, etc. Make sure you plan a space for these things as well.

Sketch out what you think your closet design should look like at the end, and don’t forget to use all the space available: the floors, the shelf over the hanger rod, the back and side walls. Look at every opportunity to save space you can. If you have more stuff than you have space, then focus on getting things you use frequently in the most accessible spots. Anything you don’t use at least once a month, consider storing somewhere besides your closet, like in your coat closet for things like wedding dresses and suits, or underbed storage boxes for things like seasonal clothing.

If you run short of ideas for how to design your closet, you can find many of the best closet designs in online catalogs. While your closet is individual and unique to you, you can often find ideas you would never have considered by checking online: rods that pull out for deep closets, lazy susan designs, or plastic storage containers, for instance.

When you are certain you have a handle on how to design your closet, start by removing everything that you can store elsewhere: in that front closet, underbed storage, or other storage spaces. Throw out as much as you can, too; this is an opportunity to get rid of those clothes you are never going to wear again. Now you have something you can work with!

Pick up the supplies you need to reorganize. You can get do it yourself closet systems that have everything you need at a good price, and add to this system any special organizers you have found that will keep you organized. Do it yourself closet organizers are available in a wide variety of styles and sizes, so choose a core system that works well in your closet but leaves a little extra space for personalization. Install your organizer, and then put your things back neatly. Anything that needs repair, cleaning, or modification should be set aside; don’t put these things away until you’ve addressed their problems.

Once your closet is together, you need to keep it uncluttered and neat. When you catch yourself tossing things in or not putting things away, stop a moment and ask why. Do you need something else in your system? Go get it. Do you have too much stuff in your closet again? Toss things you don’t need anymore or store things that aren’t being used. Your organized closet is more than just a point of housekeeping; it will save you time (looking for things), save you money (by keeping you from repurchasing things), and keep you looking stylish. Maintaining the closet organizer is not a difficult task. Take care of it so it can take care of you.

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Rod Ends SupplyTransformer supervision

As part of the vital systems of transmission and distribution transformers are constructed and is expected to be unfailingly reliable. However, internal defects such as partial discharge may occur, and the problem with these deficiencies is that if not corrected, may eventually become catastrophic defects that can cause power outages and property damage for the user end.

Control Transformer: What is

* Data Acquisition
* Development of sensors
* Data Analysis
*Development of links between actions and omissions

Easily avoided

Disasters of this nature is very simple, and consists of monitoring of transformers. Transformer monitoring and detecting problems before accidents can be prevented uncontrollable failures that are expensive to fix and can cause loss of service. Transformer monitoring primarily involves the acquisition of data, the development of sensors, data analysis and development of the causal relationship between the extentThe values ​​and the lack of transformers.

Installation of monitoring equipment in the transformer is usually done for two reasons:

1. Transformer monitoring functions to detect the main defects of development, before bringing the catastrophic failure
2. Control functions allow a processor may change the status periodically

Surveillance equipment

Monitoring equipment is permanently mounted on the transformer and line 24 / 7. Cost of reliable, low-surveillance is a necessary condition. The failure rate of transformers are generally low (0.2 – 2% processor / year), and the high cost of systems to prevent failures can not be justified, especially when the cost of redundancy is available limited and indirect. To stay within this cost barrier, a compromise on the characteristics of
monitoring equipment is necessary.

Transformer Monitoring: Parameters

* Oil temperature
Humidity levels *
* OperationCooling fans
* The levels of electrical charge

In most cases it is sufficient to provide a reliable warning, without an analysis and diagnosis on line, provided that the diagnostic methods are available manually or automatically to control the alarm. In particular in relation to energy distribution networks in the United States, most of the population is aging transformers, and most of the defects arising units.Monitoring can expect from these teams should be designed for installation inTransformation could back a few decades.

The detection of defects in the development

Parts of the main transformer to check is the isolation of high quality, winding temperature, oil quality, and moving parts such as media converters (RBC). Follow the winding and insulation systems for oil and gas partial discharges are crucial and monitoring the temperature of the load on the other hand, is considered basic information and should be included in anytransformer supervision.

OLTC failures are usually caused by mechanical failures in the bearings, springs, wells and points, followed closely by electrical faults, such as the transition resistors burned, suffocated contacts, and insulation problems.

Some of the control parameters of the processor and better application of the sensors are discussed below:

* Dissolved Gas Analysis (DGA)

A diagnostic method, the gas in oil analysis is to analyze the concentration of typeproduction rates and gas generated. Several types of gas are produced on the basis of the types of defects, for example, overheating of cellulose leads to the formation of carbon oxides, but an arch leads to the generation of acetylene.

Depending on the criticality of each unit, the oil samples are taken manually at regular intervals (between 12 and 24 months) and gas are extracted from these samples. Gas sensors are usually the first line option in the design of full-time surveillanceADI systems, simply because the analysis technique is well established and accepted, and the sensor is actually capable of detecting a wide range of types of failure.

Partial discharge (PD)

Partial discharge testing of transformers, is a valuable tool for assessing the integrity of the transformer together, however, real online

time monitoring of partial discharges is generally more expensive and complicated. For example, fiberglass rods that act as waveguides inThe main tank is applied to large transformers, but the cost and complexity of installation of this system was not suitable for online monitoring.

There are several advantages for monitoring of the DP, but it was difficult to design applications in the field because of the difficulty of separating the internal and external sources PD. The sensors are tested and developed countries are currently equipped with acoustic sensors on the outside, which are more profitable, butare sensitive to ambient noise last open station.

* Temperature
The load capacity is limited by a transformer winding hot spot. The hot spot is usually estimated indirectly by measuring temperature and current load of oil. An alternative method is that the temperature sensors are installed in the coil of the fiber during the production process. These sensors are available in two variants – the fibers that measure the temperature in asingle point, and distributed fibers that measure the temperature along its entire length. All of these systems is expensive, especially the distributed fiber sensor is more expensive to install and can be applied to the new processors.

New techniques

The condition of isolation can be judged by other parameters such as levels of moisture and particles. Interpretation of data with these parameters is not simple, but new techniquesdeveloped software to analyze the huge amount of historical data and identify patterns of failure progression. If damage is detected, similar to a transformer in service, corrective measures to be taken.

Other types of line sensors have been studied. Examples of such systems are in-line measurements of moisture content in oil, the static electricity with oil, optical sensors and pump control.

The on-line measurement of moisturecellulose fiber-optic techniques are studied. In general, these systems do not have a strong coupling is so important and frequent failure.

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