Garage pads

[Chump]

Curious on people's opinion on my garage floor. is this excessive? I feel you can almost trip over these. Complained about it when we took pocession and the issue has only gotten worse. Built a new house with sabal. concrete is probably close to a year old now. Looks way worse then my 8 year old 26x26 garage Pad. Any advice?

 

[Summitric]

My 22 year old garage isn't near that bad.... Has 1 full crack with a 3rd crack from the middle and that's it... None of that fine cracking you have there... Wow

 

[Bigblack]

I would say it's bad....much worse than my old house with 15 year old 30x30 pad. My new place is a year and a half old (been through 2 winters here) and both garage pads have zero cracks. Both however, were saw-cut when new for expansion joints. Getting warranty out of a home builder will be like trying to find the lost city of Atlantis, only harder.....

 

[Summitric]

New home warranty program(alberta govt program) should be able to take care of that...?

 

[sirkdev]

Thats not good only going to get worse, I'd be after somebody to replace the pad

 

[Keith Brown]

Concrete is unpredictable I have prep a half dozen jobs for myself (always hire the finishing work) The ones I did years ago that weren't prepped worth a sh!t are flawless to this day. Then five years ago I poured a 6" slab with 5/8 rebar on 2ft centers C/W excellent compaction, Insulation and I heated the space before freeze up. It cracker so bad in the first year I had to grind it so you didn't trip on the crack. Its the sh!ts but I think your chances of getting warranty are slim, you might get a repair job from your contractor but I would let it go for another year or two till it settles down then do your fix up and epoxy. I think it might have something to do with the ground its poured on???? That my two bits for what its worth.

 

[dogsmack]

Without being around at the time of prep or install it is anyone's guess as to what is wrong. Bad concrete, rebar spacing is excessive or not even present. Something as simple as not laying poly down under the rebar before pouring and bleed water leaving to fast can be factor. I deal with concrete daily and like Kieth Brown says it can be a pain in the whole. Done to the letter of every standard known to man and it turns to garbage in a year. Do a half ass job because it doesn't really matter and well you get the point.

If the house is only a year old I will say that is unexceptable and something has been done wrong. Ask around and see who the builder used to supply the concrete. Some are not as good as others. PM me if you have more info.

 

[gates559]

That sucks, but its pretty common throughout Alberta. Its about 99% a waste of your time to call New home warranty. Its not a structural defect.

It really doesnt matter if it was prepped well or not, 3/4 of the land in Alberta is built from fill made from 100 year old loon sh#t! the homes settle from being built on jello.
Not to mention the Alberta building code for insulation sucks, so its pretty easy for the ground to freeze under your home.

However after saying that, if it were my garage there's no way I could handle that, I'd redo it or likely sell the house because there will be bigger problems down the road.

Hows your foundation look?

 

[Chump]

Got ahold of ANHW and got the exact specs on what they consider excessive. The cracks are Def exceding the 3mm they call excessive. I'm really thinking it was just a lack of or hack prep. gone around with my 6' level and found that Everything settled around the piles. Creating high and low spots everywhere. I'm getting over 1" height differences over 6'. Far out of there 1" over 10' tolerance. Got concrete guys and builder showing next week to figure this out....note to self don't ever use cs concrete

 

[niner]

What do you mean by the conc settled around the piles? Was your pad poured with piles under the slab? If they poured piles under the slab than that is probably why you have horrible cracking. For piles to work properly on a slab you need a lot of rebar with a lot of concrete compared to a slab poured on a properly compacted pad.

 

[john s]

Bet the ground was not compacted before the gravel and concrete. There are million dollar homes on the site I'm working. And the foundations are getting back filled with no compaction at all.


Sent from my iPhone while wishing the snow was gone so I can go dirt biking.

 

[camoJoe]

build a garage/shop for the toys, concrete guy used 8 " of gravel as a base, with 10mm rebar spaced a foot apart, criss cross offset to 6" with bend stirrups on each end foot long by 10 inches thick, slab is a foot thick on all edges for a foot long then tapers out to center to 4" thick, the guy did all the finishing by hand , no power trowels used, fantastic job, no pilings used, no cracks seen, about year and half old now, very pleased.

 

[Chump]

I install hardwood in new house's every day. And every pad I've seen getting preped have piles underneath.... I have pictures of the rebar before they poured the pad. I'll have to have a look at them and may post them later. Hoping there gonna do more then fill cracks or try to level it. The builder sure wasn't happy when I told them I've already contacted anhw. Probly why I got called back so quick.

 

[X-it]

Concrete is unpredictable for sure, nothing will fix that the way you want it. Although this should do the trick Ultralock Black Garage Tiles
Best thing I have ever found for stopping cracking is paper machine fabric under the slabs that stuff is amazing. Of coarse the cost is over the top unless you get the stuff used.

 

[niner]

If your pad is supported by piles the whole floor needs to be suspended from those piles. Could be totally hollow under neath the concrete as the piles are carrying the load. If they are pouring piles and then placing a 4-5 " floor over top there will be major cracking as the ground settles a little the piles will not.

 

[dogsmack]

I install hardwood in new house's every day. And every pad I've seen getting preped have piles underneath.... I have pictures of the rebar before they poured the pad. I'll have to have a look at them and may post them later. Hoping there gonna do more then fill cracks or try to level it. The builder sure wasn't happy when I told them I've already contacted anhw. Probly why I got called back so quick.

Piles under garage slabs? If that is the case compaction be it important after a year is technically no longer an issue. If so the slab will be floating tied into the piles siting on some sort of void form which is designed to crush if movement happens. Curious to hear what the builders have to say once they do a site visit. I am not current with today's building codes but when I did my garage slab a couple years back it was a 6" 32mpa slab with some air entrainment just in case the heating failed. Installed in floor heating that snapped into the rigid insulation. This allows me to install concrete anchors for the vehicle hoist later without worry of hitting a heating line. No piles but 100% compaction, 20mm rebar every 12" and all corners have tie bars. I've noticed a couple of hairline cracks exactly where I expected them to happen. I just wish now I didn't have the finisher "burn" the finish (it is pretty shiney), I just looked into some acid coloring and I have to take that finish off to do it . But that is another matter.

Let us know how it goes. A man's garage is his caslte.

 

[CatMan16]

This is how my 24x24 was done. It has been almost 3 years now and I don't have any cracks so far. I didn't get any pictures of the rebar before they poured it.

 

[dogsmack]

This is how my 24x24 was done. It has been almost 3 years now and I don't have any cracks so far. I didn't get any pictures of the rebar before they poured it.

Can you tell me how deep those piles go into the ground? What was the reason to excavate the entire foot print in the first place? Certainly looks like the garage slab would be solid with all that under it indeed. I know Red Deer has a water table close to the surface in some of the areas as well, maybe this is why.

 

[CatMan16]

I don't really know any of the specifics. Maybe someone in construction can help out. I am not sure if the pilings are even directly in contact with the slab. After they filled and packed it the tops of the pilings were not exposed. I am in the north end of Red Deer and the ground is fairly sandy.

 

[Modman]

If its a new house, its very likely that the site was not prepped and compacted, and now you have settling. Very typical of new homes in Alberta, very sketchy building and inspection practices in the last few years when the boom was on. I'm scared to see what lots of these communities will look like in 20 yrs. Our community is about 10 yrs old and along many of the water and sewer force mains in the front streets are big sinkholes where the pipes are clearly leaking and undermining the asphalt.

In your case, there could be water beneath the pad, that is causing heaving or possibly froze in the winter as well. There are solutions to it, but the builder should be solving the issue as that is excessive on a new house. I would contact the new home warranty folks and talk to them, this isn't the first time this has been as issue in the news.

Calgary homeowners upset over floor cracks in new garages - Calgary | Globalnews.ca