Archives: Foundations

How To Insulate A Concrete Floor

By Todd Fratzel on Basements, Foundations, Insulation

Insulating Concrete Floors If you live in a cold climate then you’re no stranger to cold concrete floors in the winter. If you’re planning on finishing a basement or portion of your home that has a concrete floor then it may be a good idea to insulate it before installing basement flooring. Concrete floors are…

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Stamped Concrete

By Todd Fratzel on Driveways, Foundations

Stamped Concrete Surfaces Recently I had a reader ask me what my thoughts and experieces were with Stamped Concrete. Stamped Concrete is textured and/or colored concrete that resembles stone, cobbles, pavers, and other decorative pavement surfaces. The process of stamping concrete must be done at the time the concrete is placed while it’s still “soft”…

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iPhone DIY Concrete Application

By Todd Fratzel on Foundations

iPhone Concrete Application Recently I was asked to help out with some Imperial volume conversions for a cool new iPhone Application, DIY Concrete,  that helps the user with calculating volume and pricing of concrete. If you own an iPhone and you work with concrete either professionally or with DIY projects then you’ll want to check…

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Diamond Polishing Concrete Slabs

By Todd Fratzel on Foundations

Polished Commercial Building Slabs We are completing a 36,000 sq. ft. commercial building for a client and on of the exciting new construction techniques that we’re using is diamond polishing of the slab. Traditionally a large building like this would have the slab coated with an epoxy finish to protect the slab from liquid spills…

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High Tech Tools For Large Concrete Slabs

By Todd Fratzel on Foundations

Concrete construction has been transformed significantly in recent years by the use of laser guided power tools. This week I had the pleasure of watching some really great laser guided equipment used to pour 200 yards of concrete for a large slab. I thought it would be fun to give some examples of these impressive…

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How To Remove Ground Frost Before Mother Nature

By Todd Fratzel on Foundations

Deep Ground Frost Here in New England it’s not uncommon to find frost over 4 feet in the ground after a long cold winter. Before building a foundation all of the frost has to be removed from the sub-grade. You can let mother nature do the work and wait weeks or even months for the…

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Walkout Basements

By Todd Fratzel on Design, Foundations, Framing

Walkout Basements Add Value Walkout basements are very popular in this part of the country. A walkout basement has many benefits but the biggest one is the ability to have normal doors and windows in the basement along some of the walls. Walkout basements are exactly what the title suggests, a basement that has an…

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Foundation Slabs

By Todd Fratzel on Foundations

If you’ve been following the Total House Construction Series – Foundation to Finish then you know we’ve been pouring the concrete foundation. Well the concrete is finally finished now that the foundation slabs have been poured. This new house has a unique feature in the basement. The home owner wanted a walkout basement with a…

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