Large crack on the outside of the home
As you can see, some of these bricks are cracked completely in half. This is because the corner of the home is sinking and settling unevenly from the rest of the home. If the entire house settled perfectly even, you probably wouldn't have these cracks, but that never happens. If one corner rests on loose dirt, it will sort of twist on the rest of the walls as it settles and that will create what you see here.
Small excavation needed
One of the best things about the helical pier system that DryZone offers is that we don't need to excavate the entire house. This is much less expensive then some other options for repair. Most of the time the crew will use hand held shovels to dig a trench down to the base of the wall. Also in this picture are the holes drilled into the footer. A footer is the base of the wall. It is wider and thicker then the wall to provide support. In order to get a clean section off, we drill holes and then chip away at that section. This makes a nice pocket for our strong steel bracket to attach directly under the wall.
After the helical pier is driven into the ground
When the helical piers are installed it looks a lot like a giant screw being driven. The foreman will check his gauges often to see if the resistance on the steel is where it needs to be. What he is trying to accomplish is to reach a soil that will support the home better than the top layer on which the home currently sits. When he is satisfied with the depth and level of resistance, he removes the driver and starts adding the brackets that hold the steel pole to the house.
Installing the brackets on the helical piers
After the piers are at the right depth and resistance, they will need to be attached to the home. Remember the piece of footer that got removed? These heavy steel brackets will basically replace those sections. The steel pier is cut to length, the bracket is slipped over the top, and the entire assembly is inserted under the cracked wall. Most of the time, this process is repeated several times because it takes more then a couple piers to fix the typical problem. As with any foundation problem, all systems are custom made to fit each home/problem perfectly.
Getting ready for the lift
Most of the time when we talk about lifting a house it is a very small amount. The main purpose of these helical piers is to stabilize. All of the lifting equipment is connected together and the lift is done very slowly and evenly. Along the way, DryZone's foreman will take notes and measurements to ensure a job well done.
Up close on the bracket and lifting equipment
This should give you a great idea of how technical the whole process is. You can also see the the bracket is directly under the main weight of the wall. If we tried to lift without chipping the section of footer away, it could snap off and cause damage. Once everything is done, we can safely say the the problem is a thing of the past.
Crack monitor
A crack monitor is a small gauge that will show you whether or not the crack in the wall is getting worse. Its pretty simple, two pieces of plastic with a graph imprinted on them. If the crack moves, it will be visible on the monitor. These are a very economical way to let you know that your house is now properly stabilized using a helical pier system by DryZone.
After the job is completed
When we are done, we clean up and fill in the holes. Its as if we were never there, that is except for the fact that your home is now resting on heavy duty steel supports. That great feeling of relief comes standard with every DryZone foundation repair project.