[overanalyze]

Hi everyone. I have a client whose house was built in 1980 in western Ohio. It is an all brick ranch on a crawl space. The crawl had no sump or drain tile and no vapor barrier on the ground. He has a very porous brick on the exterior without weep drains. We were called because he had a spot in his subfloor that was buckling. We went into the crawl space and discovered the above mentioned conditions. We have since installed a perimeter tile around the footer, draining it into a new sump pit with pump. We removed all the wet insulation and cleaned the trash out. We also installed a de-humidifier that dumps into the sump so it can run without needing dumped. (The buckled floor has gone down since this was done)
Now to the question at hand. A lot of the mud sills (not pressure treated) are crushed and/or rotting. We were planning on replacing all the mudsill at first but after doing more looking and some test lifts, we feel it may do more damage than good...like cracked drywall, door and window function..etc. We are thinking about taking more of a stabilization approach. We would put tension up on the joists and install pressure treated beams that would be permanently supported down to the footers. Our only concern is the existing sill...what are the cons to leaving it? When it gets warmer we are having the brick sealed to help with exterior moisture and then we are having the crawl space spray foamed and a 12 mil vapor barrier installed. Thanks for the insight!

 

[griz]

First thing I think of is any potential sale this condition will have to be disclosed. It will only be more expensive to deal with then. You're saying the sills untreated fir or other lumber?

 

[overanalyze]

I think they are regular spf lumber...definitelly not treated.

 

[griz]

You guys don't have building codes there?

Even the wham bam slam tract work I've done had Redwood sills then graduated to the green PT.

 

[overanalyze]

Yeah I know..I wish we had a building dept....our local builders association has been trying to get city or county to adopt ibc and employ an inspection agency for years. We have not been successful. Its sad when you actually tell potential clients that you do things to code even though there is no inspection. My company does some light commercial framing and construction as well so we are used to state inspectors.

 

[overanalyze]

So anyone have any other input...we all know regular wood was not a good idea..I am not there to dog whoever built it..just want to try and fix it the best way with the least impact to my clients home...