Browse Forums Building A New House 1 May 11, 2011 10:25 pm Hi, Our block which is a Knockdown / re-build has been soil tested 3 times. At the moment the builders are in the process of laying down the slab, and on Monday when excavating the edge beams they came across soft spots, these soft spots has resulted in more excavating and nearly 20 cubic meters of concrete getting pumped in to fill the void.. That is a huge amount of concrete which was a total surprise.and will be a cost variation.. We have already forked out for 12 x 600mm x 3mtr bored piers at the rear of the block. Why do soil tests not pick up these issues on blocks, our block is about 650mtr2 , so its not huge Is this something we just have to put up with and just move on.? Thanks for reading Ger Re: Whats the point of soil tests?? 2May 11, 2011 11:06 pm Basically you get three test holes, so you are testing about .05% of the total site. In about 98% of the time they are representative of the whole block. Unfortunately it doesn't always work that way as there is a chance they won't always detect any problems that are not apparent on the surface. If you want certainty you would need to do a soil test every 1m which would mean the soil tests would cost more than the foundations of most houses. The Harder You Try - the Luckier You Get ! Web site http://www.anewhouse.com.au Informative, Amusing, and Opinionated Blog - Over 600 posts on all aspects of building a new house. Re: Whats the point of soil tests?? 4May 13, 2011 7:40 pm I'm trying to be nice.... WTFFFFFFFFFFFFF....... It is not up to the builder/concretor/fat bloke on excavator to give structural advice on footings!!!!!!! If the builder finds a problem he MUST contact the engineer who designed the footing. You just paid for 20m3 of concrete at, say $250/m3 = $5000. And it's wrong. You paid $5k to remove $100 of dirt. An engineer site visit is about $300. Dont pay. Call an engineer tomorrow. Call a lawyer. Re: Whats the point of soil tests?? 5May 14, 2011 12:23 pm Hi Paul, Appreciate the feed back, Your right, the engineers were called out, i've still to see the report though There is a clause in the contract for cost variation if footing excavation revealed further work requirement. UnfortunateIy i really don't know if theres anything we can do about it... If you had any ideas or suggestion i would persue them. Thanks G Ger Re: Whats the point of soil tests?? 6May 14, 2011 7:32 pm Sadly, you'll have to pay. They have followed the rules. paul Building Standards; Getting It Right! Hi All, We have a fall from road to garage front. But we cannot put a drain/grate because no discharge point put by the builder. Now they complain not enough space for… 0 7678 Hi, I have this sewer inspection point sitting in an odd spot in the rear of my yard: https://imgur.com/ghLI98q What I'd like to do is put a firepit in that corner of… 0 3919 Thanks for your reply. I will just wait and see I guess. Trying to get some more information from our builder. 9 11725 |