Lean­ing Foun­da­tion Wall? What to Expect from an Engineer’s Report

May 8, 2016 • By Matthew Stock.

A large num­ber of cracks, par­tic­u­lar­ly if they are on an angle or are sub­stan­tial in width (more than 1÷8” wide), in a foun­da­tion wall are good indi­ca­tors that the wall is expe­ri­enc­ing what is referred to an inward move­ment. Essen­tial­ly the wall has frac­tured and is rotat­ing into the base­ment due to extreme pres­sure being placed onto the wall by neg­a­tive grad­ing, frost in the ground, tree roots and gen­er­al over sat­u­ra­tion of the soil against the foun­da­tion. If a home­own­er sees these types of cracks in a foun­da­tion wall, a con­sult­ing struc­tur­al engi­neer can be called to help assess the dam­age and rec­om­mend a course of action.

As with any pro­fes­sion, dif­fer­ent engi­neers will take dif­fer­ent approach­es to each par­tic­u­lar prob­lem they are hired to inves­ti­gate. Regard­less of the way they approach the prob­lem, every con­sult­ing engi­neer should pro­vide a min­i­mum lev­el of ser­vice and infor­ma­tion to the home­own­er. The home­own­er hires an engi­neer to gath­er infor­ma­tion, assess this infor­ma­tion and pro­vide an accu­rate descrip­tion of what is occur­ring and prop­er repair meth­ods so that the home­own­er can make an edu­cat­ed deci­sion on how to pro­ceed with a repair.

What Should an Engi­neer Do for a Home­own­er with a Lean­ing Foun­da­tion Wall?

Some home­own­ers are great DIY­ers and love infor­ma­tion, some home­own­ers want noth­ing to do with main­te­nance and repairs. Regard­less of what cat­e­go­ry you may fall into, a con­sult­ing struc­tur­al engi­neer should pro­vide a min­i­mum of ser­vices so that you can make an edu­cat­ed decision:

Site Visit/​Inspection – This is the first step in the engi­neer being able to devise a repair plan. The site vis­it is where the engi­neer starts to gath­er empir­i­cal data about the con­di­tion the foun­da­tion wall is in. This data can­not be gath­ered by ​“eye-balling” the home. A few tools are need­ed to be able to gath­er accu­rate infor­ma­tion and a good con­sult­ing engi­neer should come equipped with some ver­sion of the fol­low­ing. A good cam­era proves very use­ful to doc­u­ment the cracks in the foun­da­tion and the site con­di­tions. A lev­el, prefer­ably a laser lev­el but a 6 – 8 foot would work, and a tape mea­sure is used to deter­mine how out of plumb the wall is.

The engi­neer should mea­sure the wall in mul­ti­ple places along the length to get an accu­rate rep­re­sen­ta­tion of how much the foun­da­tion wall is lean­ing in. This is what deter­mines the sever­i­ty and extent of the dam­age as well as the repair method. Once the repair method is deter­mined he or she should pro­vide and inspec­tion report as well as a repair plan.

Engineer’s Report/​Repair Plan- A let­ter with a stamp is not a report or repair plan. Often times a let­ter is pro­vid­ed stat­ing that a struc­tur­al issue is present that has the con­sult­ing engineer’s license seal embossed on it. While in some rare cas­es this may suf­fice, a detailed report of the sit­u­a­tion cou­pled with a plan on how to repair the issue is much more ben­e­fi­cial for the homeowner.

A qual­i­ty con­sult­ing engi­neer report will describe in detail, sub­stan­ti­at­ed with pic­tures and mea­sure­ments the dam­age that has occurred from the lean­ing foun­da­tion wall and any oth­er struc­tur­al issues that may be present. It will also include a spe­cif­ic repair plan, typ­i­cal­ly in the form of a draw­ing, that can be used for per­mit­ting as well com­plet­ing the repair work. As an exam­ple, if a foun­da­tion wall is found to be lean­ing inward, the foun­da­tion will require a sta­bi­liza­tion tech­nique such as car­bon fiber straps, steel beams, or even pos­si­bly exca­vat­ing and straight­en­ing the wall. The engineer’s report should spec­i­fy, typ­i­cal­ly on a draw­ing, the num­ber and spac­ing of car­bon fiber straps to com­plete the repair. This repair plan should take into account the size and con­struc­tion of the home, con­di­tion of the foun­da­tion, site con­di­tions and oth­er fac­tors that con­tribute to design­ing an accu­rate repair plan. It may even indi­cate oth­er issues such as yard drainage that should be addressed as part of the repair.

When a con­sult­ing struc­tur­al engi­neer is hired to inspect foun­da­tion prob­lems, a home­own­er should be spe­cif­ic about their expec­ta­tions and should ask for a full site inspec­tion and repair plan as part of the con­tract. Once the repair plan is obtained, the home­own­er can then have an expe­ri­enced, well versed foun­da­tion repair con­trac­tor sta­bi­lize their foun­da­tion and repair their home.

At U.S. Water­proof­ing, our high­ly trained foun­da­tion repair team works reg­u­lar­ly with struc­tur­al engi­neers to deliv­er the most cost effec­tive and com­plete solu­tions for even the most dif­fi­cult foun­da­tion prob­lem. If you have a lean­ing foun­da­tion wall and want a free con­sul­ta­tion, please con­tact us.

Tags: structural foundation damage, structural foundation repair, foundation cracks, home foundation repair, foundation damage, foundation repair, foundation repairs, engineering

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