How to dig a trench under the foundation of a house
This article is about how to dig a foundation trench for a house, deck, or any other structure. A foundation is essential to the long-term rigidity and longevity of your structure, so it's important to pay attention to our guide. Remember that you must hire a qualified engineer to determine the depth of your foundation as well as the amount of rebar to be used. In this article, we will show you a few basic techniques for digging a foundation trench.
You must understand that the structure of the soil affects to a large extent the depth and size of your foundation. In some cases, in addition to the foundation, poles are required. Therefore, it is better to evaluate the quality of the soil before purchasing it or before starting the construction of a building. Before you start digging a trench under the foundation, you must carefully prepare the site. You must remove trees, shrubs and their roots. If large old trees grow on your site, it is better to move the construction to another place, otherwise you will have to spend money on cutting them down to the root.
Read also How to make a foundation for a house with your own hands
To dig a trench for the foundation, you can rent a hydraulic excavator, hire a few people, or dig the trench yourself. Obviously the first option will get the job done quickly, but in some cases a hydraulic excavator will not be able to reach a narrow or isolated area. In this case, the only way out is to hire 3-4 people to dig a trench under the foundation with a shovel, or else dig it yourself. From our experience, digging a foundation trench with shovels is better and cheaper than renting an excavator. First of all, when digging a trench with equipment. the trench may accidentally collapse; when digging a trench by hand, you have more control over the process. However, if we are talking about a large area, then it is best to use an excavator.
Preparing to dig a trench for the foundation
materials
- boards
- pegs
- leg-split
Tools
- protective gloves, goggles
- tape measure, carpenter's pencil
- hand saw/circular saw
- hammer
- level
- shovels
- wheelbarrow
Advice
- thoroughly clean your tools after completing a project
Time
- several days, according to the soil
Foundation trench marking
The first step is to lay the foundation of your home. In order to do a good job, you need to build something like the one shown in the picture below. In the future, such "pegs" will need to be securely driven into the corners to mark the future foundation.
Read more How to mark the foundation
Next, make the markup correctly and drive in the stakes.
Smart Tip: measure all the distances several times, measure the distance of the diagonals.
How to dig a trench under the foundation
Once you've made sure your house is set up correctly, you can start digging a trench for your foundation. As we said, there are cases in which you cannot rent a hydraulic excavator, so you must use the traditional method of digging a trench with shovels. Although this may seem like a simple process, we can assure you that it is difficult, but if you pay attention to our recommendations, you will find it easy.
First, it is necessary to mark the marked lines of the future trench on the ground. It is important to foresee where you will throw off the soil.
Smart Tip: Before digging a trench for the foundation, you must remove the plants that will be in the path of your house. Use a shovel or saw to remove shrubs and their roots.
If you have to dig a trench next to your house, you should pay special attention to how this may affect the structural rigidity of your house. You need to make sure that you do not damage the foundation of the house while digging trenches.
Read also How to make a foundation from FBS
Work carefully and patiently, any mistake will create more problems for you. Oddly enough, there are many people who think that the foundation is not important, it is not visible. Nothing could be more wrong, so make sure you build your foundation according to plans or your safety is at risk.
Smart Tip: When expanding your home, in most cases, you will also need to reinforce the foundations of your old home to make sure it will support the old and new structure.
If there are concrete obstacles in your path, use a concrete breaker or jackhammer. Concrete stones are found if you are building an extension.
Smart Tip: when using a jackhammer make sure you use safety goggles and ear protection.
Keep digging the foundation trench according to the plans, and make sure you stack soil next to the construction site, later on you will need earth to fill foundation.
Smart Tip: the remains of the soil taken out of the trench can come in handy in order to later apply it on your site. If you don't need it, you can give it to someone who can use it in their garden.
You can transport soil with a wheelbarrow. A wheelbarrow is a handy tool because it allows you to transfer it to the ground from the construction site without much effort.
Read also How to make formwork for the foundationSmart Tip: make sure that the wheelbarrow wheel is inflated, otherwise it will be more difficult to transport the soil.
You can also make bridges so that it is easy to transport soil on a wheelbarrow over them.
Smart Tip: cover the trenches at night so that no one can fall into it and injure their health.
When digging a foundation trench, it is important to make sure that the bottom of the trench is perfectly level.
Use a laser level or water level to make visible the marks on the four posts set at each corner of the trenches. Next, use a tape measure to measure the distance from the marks marked with the laser level to the bottom of the trench. If the four depths are equal, this means that the corners of your trench are at the right level. If the depths are different, you must adjust them accordingly.
Read more about How to fill the foundation
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