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Working on the green roof dream Friday, November 18th, 2011 Written by Marcus de la fleur
The green roof, or to be more precise, a vegetable garden of the roof, has been on our wish list for a while. Early on in the project, we conducted a structural analysis to determine if adding a green roof would be feasible. We found out that it is feasible, but we need a few additional structural supports. While we were working our way up through the building, we began to install those supports in the basement. They included additional spread footings and pipe columns which added capacity to the interior load bearing wall. The additional structural supports required on the first floor are all carpentry related. We began with the re-framing of the interior load bearing walls.
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The studs in those walls were 16 inches on center, but did not line up with the floor joists above. This does not make for a good, or in our case, sufficient load transfer. Our structural engineer recommended that we either move the existing studs under the floor joists or add additional studs. To save some materials, we opted to move the existing studs.
We had to be very careful while pulling out the the nails at the top and bottom of the studs to prevent the ends from being damaged. Once they are damaged, we would have to cut the ends off, which would leave us with a stud too short for the wall.
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If you look carefully at the time lapse, you may see that we forgot to add one stud under one of the floor joists. Rest assured that this got fixed. Share
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Tags: framing, green roof Posted in general construction | No Comments »
Pipe column details Thursday, October 14th, 2010 Written by Marcus de la fleur
The time lapse of the column installation shows the process OK, but doesn’t give much away on the structural anatomy. For those who are interested, here are some more details starting from the bottom up. Earlier this year, while preparing for the new basement floor, we poured a four by four foot reinforced concrete spread footing at each pipe column location, which is centered between each existing column.
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On top of the spread footing, we prepared the thermal breaks for the 18 by 18 inch footing pedestal, which got filled with concrete during the basement floor pour.
The top of the pedestal is at the same elevation as the new concrete floor. The pipe column bottom is welded to a ½ inch steel plate, which in turn is anchored into the spread footing pedestal with ¾ inch concrete anchor bolts.
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Going all the way to the top of the pipe column, we have another ½ steel plate that is welded to the pipe column and the existing WF steel beam.
To add rigidity to the assembly, the design called for a ½ inch stiffener steel plate to be welded into the WF beam right above the pipe column. In some
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instances, like in the above image, we had enough room to fit the stiffener plate.
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In other locations, we had the floor joist right above the pipe column. Rather than tinkering around with the existing floor joists we opted to install two stiffener plates that were offset by a few inches from the column center line. Do you need similar work done? Here are the resources I used: Structural design by Louis Shell Structures http://louisshell.com/ Installation by UV Metal Arts Chicago http://uvmetalarts.com Share
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Tags: basement, green roof Posted in general construction | No Comments »
Vegetable garden support… Tuesday, October 12th, 2010 Written by Marcus de la fleur
That is the answer to the question in the last post. How do those steel pipes and plates support a vegetable garden?
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Well, let’s take a step back. In April, I was contemplating our dream of a green roof, or more precisely a vegetable garden on our roof. A structural analysis showed that this would be possible at reasonable cost.
The analysis also showed that we would need additional steel columns in the basement to support the weight transfer from the roof. Since then we had excavated and poured the required spread footings. All that’s missing now are the actual pipe columns.
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The materials are on site and we have the expertise of Yuval and Adam who will prepare and install the assembly. This involves quite a bit of grinding on the pipe column ends to get them ready for the weld joints.
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In the basement, the existing steel work got polished at the various welding locations. Once that was done, Yuval clamped and tack welded the top plates of the pipe columns to the existing WF steel beam that runs from front to back through the basement. We now could transcribe the location of the bottom plate on the spread footing pedestal with the help of a plumb line, set the plate in place and squeeze the pipe column between the top and bottom plates.
Installations like this call for non-shrink grout under the bottom plate to fill any gaps and make the installation a little easier. Yuval exercised great precision when measuring the lengths of the columns. So much precision that we could, with the help of a hammer and wood block, nudge the pipe column between the two plates. I was ready for the non-shrink grout, but I had no place or gap to put it. Once we had the pipe column centered and plumb, Yuval finished the welding around the top plate, welded the pipe column to the top and bottom plate, and welded the stiffener plates into the existing WF steel beam right above the columns. That is a lot of welding with a lot of sparks close to a lot of 100 year old floor joists and other framing lumber. We were very careful to have a water sprayer and two fire extinguishers nearby – very nearby. Last task: painting all blank steel with primer and anchoring the bottom plates with ¾ inch bolts into the spread footing pedestal.
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We have support in place, but no vegetable yet. Hmm, I wonder when we will get our first harvest? Share
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Tags: basement, green roof Posted in general construction | No Comments »
Pouring the spread footings Wednesday, May 12th, 2010 Written by Marcus de la fleur
I look at this as the warm-up or test run for the basement floor pour. I only needed 3 ½ cubic yards of concrete for the spread footings. I will need close to 23 cubic yards for the concrete floor. Don’t think that I mix 3 ½ cubic yards of concrete myself. Not only is it a lot of work, but I also have to get the mixture right, such as the cement water ratio of the concrete. If not, the concrete won’t have the right strength. The footings require a mix with 4000 psi strength once the concrete is cured. I have it mixed at a nearby concrete plant to our specifications. The plant also takes frequent quality control samples. This way I don’t need to lose sleep over getting the right mix. We have the 3 ½ yards delivered to the house. The concrete truck managed to back up to the basement back door, with the chute reaching down to the bottom of the stairs, where we were positioned with the wheelbarrows. Hauling the concrete to the spread footings turned out to be tricky. I had ordered the mix with a number 5 slump, which is pretty liquid. It’s almost like pushing a wheelbarrow filled with water around. We only filled the barrows half way and still had to be careful not to spill the precious cargo.
We filled each footing with three inches of concrete, which served as bedding for the rebars. With the reinforcement now in place, we fill the forms to the top. I rented a small concrete vibrator, which compacts the mix and causes any air bubbles or pockets to rise to the top. The other added advantage is that the process causes the concrete to float to a level finish. All that was left to do is to add a troweled finish.
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Tags: basement, flooring, footing, green roof Posted in general construction | No Comments »
Spread footings Saturday, April 24th, 2010 Written by Marcus de la fleur
I am still stuck in the basement, and will be for a while. We have figured out the new sewer layout and know the scope of structural work needed for the green roof. Now it’s time to bring the shovel out of retirement. We start with the excavation for the spread footings, which will accommodate steel pipe columns to manage the extra load of the planned green roof.
The spread footings take up some space, each four by four feet to be exact. We have to snake the sewer lines in between the existing and new footings from one side of the basement to the other. By excavating the four by four patches first, we can determine the exact run for the new sewer lines and make sure they won’t end up under the footing. Share
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Tags: basement, footing, green roof, utilities Posted in general construction | No Comments »
The green roof dream Thursday, April 22nd, 2010 Written by Marcus de la fleur
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A vegetable garden on our roof has been on our wish list for a while. The question is if we can pull it off. There are structural and budgetary challenges and they are closely linked. We have some very impressive steel columns supporting an equally impressive steel beam running near the center of the basement.
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This assembly supports the interior load bearing wall of the 1st and 2nd floor and appears so sturdy that I was convinced it would support a green roof. The actual roof structure, the 2 by 10 old growth joists running across the building, did not generate much confidence. I assumed this was the weakest
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structural link and would not support the extra weight of the airy vegetable plots.
How much structural reinforcement is needed? Are we talking about $500, $5,000 or $50,000? To find out, we need a feasibility study from a structural engineer. I got Kerry from Louis Shell Structures (LSS) to take a look at the house and structures with me. He was very happy that I had all the walls open. He actually could look at and measure all load bearing components, which we did for about two hours. To accommodate the vegetable garden, I assumed a growing medium depth of 6 inches and a drainage layer depth of 2 inches. All in all, a load capacity of 80 pounds per square foot (psf).
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Kerry took all this information back to his office and began to crunch numbers–a lot of numbers! Lo and behold, the results were somewhat unexpected. What I assumed to be the most solid component, the steel columns and beam, turned out to be a weak link. And what I thought to be the weakest link, i.e. the roof joists, appeared to be rather sturdy. Almost all roof joists are fit to support the additional 80 psf, with the exception of the long span area over the dining room and the kitchen.
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Over the dining room area, I will need to sister the existing roof joist with two 2 by 10s (one on each side). Over the kitchen area, I only would need to add one 2 by 10 to each existing joist. All roof joists will need vertical blocking over the load bearing wall. And that is it for the roof structure!
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As for the interior load bearing wall on the 1st and 2nd floor, we need to add some minor reinforcement. All typical door openings need a new 2 by 8 double header to transfer the load.
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The larger opening for the French doors has to be reinforced with a double-LVL header (2 by 9 ¼ inches).
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Some of the studs in the load bearing wall do not line up with the floor joists, which prevents proper load transfer. To solve this problem, we either need to add studs, or move the existing studs under the floor joists.
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Last but not least, we have the unexpected weak link in the basement. It turns out that we will need to add a 4 inch steel pipe column half way between each existing steel column. The new columns will require a 4 by 4 foot concrete spread footing.
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As for the budget, I think we are probably in the $5,000 range for these reinforcements. I am not sure when we will be able to put up the green roof. What I do know is that we should take care of the reinforcement now, while we have the chance. Share
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Tags: green roof, wish list Posted in design | No Comments »
Dusting off the wish list Thursday, September 3rd, 2009 Written by Marcus de la fleur
We are anxious to start with the design, which will lead us to plans and specifications and ultimately to our green building permit. We have been deconstructing for a while to (hopefully) uncover all problems and develop an inventory of what needs to be fixed. Interestingly enough, most problems we unveiled during deconstruction were water related: The damage to framing in the basement (see 04/23/2009 post), the jungle of existing and abandoned utilities (see 05/28/2009 post), water damage in the bathrooms (see 08/01/2009 post), a disintegrated roof drain (see 06/09/2009 post) and the mystery of the missing cold water line (see 06/22/2009 post).
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We’ve begun to have a pretty good idea what the green rehab will involve. This is a good time to go back to basics – to revisit our project principles and take another close look at our wish list. I am talking big picture here, looking at the goals of resource efficiency and zero energy. I am not ready to get distracted by low flow water fixtures and LED versus CFL’s. Rather, I have to think about big ticket and building related items such as the envelope and energy sources: 1. Super insulated and airtight building envelope, that helps us with reducing our heating and cooling needs. We intend to get away without central air conditioning. 2. Solar hot water system for space heating and domestic hot water. We should be able to downsize the solar hot water system, because of the super insulated and airtight building envelope. 3. Cast iron baseboard radiators for space heating. We are concerned about overheating the interior because of all the insulation and think that the small size of the baseboard radiators may prevent this. 4. Biomass backup furnace for those stretches of overcast days in November and December when the solar hot water system needs some help. 5. Passive ventilation systems to keep the air fresh and healthy in our airtight envelope. 6. Heat recovery system for ventilation. We want the stale air out, but would like to keep the energy in (warmth or coolness). 7. Sunroom for preconditioning. Our back porch faces south and we have the dream to convert it into a four seasons or sun room that can preheat or precondition the air for the rest of the building during the cooler months. 8. PV array system with battery backup for electricity production, which should help with our zero energy goal and small carbon footprint. 9. Wind turbine for electricity generation. 10. Vegetable garden on the roof, which will help with the longevity of the envelope (in this case the roof), help with insulation (particular with the heat gain), and provide fuel for us, the inhabitants of the structure. This sounds all very good, but we have to start separating the wheat from the chaff. Do these wish list items actually make sense? Do they fit our budget? Will they work together as a system and get us to zero energy, or will they be counterproductive? We have to find out through more research and the design process. Share
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Tags: green rehab, green roof, research, water, wish list Posted in design | No Comments »
Front porch roof – starting over Tuesday, August 18th, 2009 Written by Marcus de la fleur
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The front porch itself is in pretty good shape, with the exception of the roof!
It is falling apart (or down for that matter), has some water damage and does not drain properly. In fact, the roof slope is draining the water towards and then into the building. I discovered the associated water damage in the basement back in May (see also 06/09/2009 post). Fixing won’t suffice! We decided to start over.
There were a couple of items we wanted to get out of our new roof. First, it was important to us to adjust the roof drainage. Water should flow to a low point at the west side, where it is drained through a small pipe, downspout nozzle, rain chain and splash pad into the front yard. Drew, who volunteered to help me with some work, suggested the west side, where the nozzle, rain chain and splash pad would not interfere with architectural details, such as along the north side. I also wanted to have the opportunity to install a small green roof or planters in the future. We substantially upsized the framing and mounting for that reason. Last but not least, we would like the option to install and swing sometimes down the road, which the new framing would allow us to do. Share
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Tags: drainage, green roof, images, water Posted in general construction | No Comments » Newer Entries »
Follow our journey of a deep energy retrofit (or energy efficient rehab) on a 111 year old masonry two flat in Chicago. The goal is to turn the building into a zero-energy home with a sustainable and resource-efficient landscape. Search for:
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