Plumbing and "Makeup"

"Makeup"... what?? 

I have watched a lot of house from start to finish, but I guess I wasn't in the conversations.  I have learned a lot of new lingo in regards to concrete.  I should share some...

Form Setters -  A group of short, strong guys that swing 20 pound sledge hammers with ease.
Poly - Poly (something) that comes in several thicknesses measured in "mils" 
Makeup - Another group of short, strong guys that use flat shovels to dig trenches and "makeup" your slab.
Float - Put in place by the Form Setters.  Consists of more forms above the level of porches, garages, etc.

Well, today started out with a lot of questions   I knew the makeup guys were coming, but didn't know when.  I rolled in at 0805 and they all jumped out of their trucks.  Were they waiting for me, or did I just happen to be right behind them??   I say that because they obviously didn't need me for anything.  Without a whole lot of communication (other than some grumbling spanish comments about the mud), they just started digging.  30 minutes later they brought out the trencher...

The slab sits on 28 inch tall, 12 inch wide beams.  These beams are dug into the select fill pad, and then the whole mess is reinforced with cables and steel.  In a nutshell, the makeup guys are there to make this happen. 

Here is a picture of them getting started.

BEAMS...

A lot of this is dug by the trencher... Let me try to attach a video for the machine freaks...  It has a 12 inch wide chain a does a really good job of pulverizing what comes out of the trench into a fairly fine consistency.  This dirt subsequently is moved around and used to form the "pads" that make up the little islands around the beams.  On top of the pad will be 5 inches thick concrete (a little thicker than normal because of my radiant tubing taking up some space, I think the engineers were covering their rears a little here).

Well, this blog thing wouldn't let me download a video of the trencher... Sorry, how about a picture?

It has tracks, no wheels.  Makeup guys said they had not used it in about a month because everything had been so wet... 

So, at the end of the day, picture 120 foot slab x 80 foot, give or take.  A beam in each direction every 10 feet, plus a continuous beam under the perimeter of the ICF (living space).  By the time these guys left, they had this whole thing dug.  No breaks, no whining.  Smiles and jokes all day. 

Tomorrow they come back to finish some pads, and then poly, cables, and steel. 

Cool thing was that I had a much better idea of how the house lays out...  I could see where the walls were in relationship to the porch front and back, etc.  Looks great.  We are VERY happy with all our layout choices...

Bad thing was that chain trenchers and PVC pipe do not play well together.  I was briefed to anticipate this, because it just happens, but the trencher "nicked" 4 pipes.  The good news was that the plumber had just showed up to take a look at his penetrations. 

There is a long standard of fighting between plumber and concrete men as a result of the pipe issue.  But in our case, a deal was to be made...  Plumber would fix pipes without a penalty to concrete guys if concrete guys would clean up the mess about to be made by the plumber. 

So, a few hours later, 1 trip to HD for some couplers, and lots of measuring, and viola.... pipes are now where they should be. 

Everyone left in the dark, except for me, who stayed behind to pick up trash so the racoons didn't have a party out there tonight...

One more thing... At some point I was telling of the problems with rolling the radiant PEX into their respective lengths... Well, last week I finally broke down and went out and bought a sheet of plywood, had the guys cut it into two 4x4's, and turned it into a spool.  Did the ladder trick with the shovel again and much better succes....

Here is the spool...

1000 foot doesn't look like much...

Here is 4000 feet safely secure on my back patio...

Ok, it's late...

Goodnight!