I assume that the footing excavation has already been inspected. If not, and inspection is scheduled for after the rebar is complete, the inspector should insure that all is proper. I said "should". Here we would pull out the rebar, shovel out all the loose stuff and put the rebar back in place. Wet, but undisturbed, is fine for the soil conditions here. We would try to do that starting in the morning and get the concrete in the same day so that the process does not need to be done repeatedly.

To play devil's advocate here...

If there is a problem with foundations and houses shifting and cracking, perhaps having oversized footers would not be such a bad thing?

Just clean out the loose stuff and make sure the rebar is clean and not touching the mud anywhere before you pour. You might want to see if you can figure out how much extra concrete it would take to pour the footers as is. If you fill and redig, you'll likely not be able to get the same level of compaction as the surrounding virgin soil - possibly leading to even more expense and troubles down the line if the house settles unevenly. The upfront cost of a few extra yards of concrete might be cheaper in the long run.

The most important thing is that the footings are poured on undisturbed soil.

I'd do the same as bus driver suggests.

I've been in similar situations, just this year when the excavation had to be drained a number of times so footings could be formed, then poured. But your problem is compounded by the use of integral footings. They are big wasters of concrete in the first place and I don't know of anyone who uses them here.

When you say "start over" what does that mean? Build the house elsewhere on the lot? Or higher on freshly compacted material? Neither alternative makes sense to me.

Worthy - What he means by "starting over" is filling in the footers at the same location...compact everything tight and redig. After reading suggestions here it sounds like no matter how much you compact it isn't the same as using undisturbed soil. I wonder why builders around here do not form the footers? It makes sense that they should, especially in our case. My DH brought that suggestion up once, but for some reason dismissed it. I am going to visit with him and the builder about that option. I'm sure forming the footers would increase the cost, but I don't think we can get around these footers costing more than planned at this point. Thank you all for the info.

Here's a picture of our footer forms. It seems like using the wood to create the forms wouldn't be any more expensive than just digging the holes bigger and using more concrete. Maybe you can dig the water and stuff out like you said and then build forms to reduce the amount of concrete used?

Some clay soils- such as we have here- hold their shape well and make good self-forming walls for the concrete. Wooden forms use surprising amounts of both labor and material. Some soil types and site terrain require the use of wooden forms.

I had a differnt bu similar situation then yours. We had formed footers on top of grade. Now the problem we had was like yours but on a grander scale. Our basement pit flooded via underground springs. We had a geotech come out and assess the situation. What we ended up doing was to drain the basment pit by way of pump and trench (where walkout was) then have the excavator come and scrape off all the muck (about a foot). Afterwards we filled the entire basement with crushed stone then compacted it. Supposedly the stone settles to 95% compaction alone. Then the formed footers were placed atop this. 2 years later and no problems. We've had massive rains and no flooding.

So wouldn't be eaiser to drain the footers and let them dry out a spell ? Scrape off some muck if needed ???

Here's a pic of the water, digging out the muck, stoning and forms.
[IMG]http://home.comcast.net/~thomas9780/Digging%20muck.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://home.comcast.net/~thomas9780/Basement%20Stone%20002.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://home.comcast.net/~thomas9780/P0013359.JPG[/IMG]
[IMG]http://home.comcast.net/~thomas9780/BASEMENT.JPG[/IMG]

Busdriver, it's probably different because of the less clay soil type. Here everyone uses forms. Whoever you hire owns their forms and uses them time after time on each job. The labour wasn't really something we thought about, maybe because it's "normal" here. It took close to a day of labour which came in at about $400.00.

>>>>>>>integral footings. They are big wasters of concrete in the first place and I don't know of anyone who uses them here. Worthy... What are integral footings exactly? Why would and why wouldn't people use them (aside from wasting concrete)? Sorry for the newbie questions....

raam, just curious...do you know how much more this cost you? It sounds and looks like a fair amount of extra work! I know you had no choice, so this was prob. a great solution, given the circumstances.

Integral footings describes what OP has. Just looking at them you can see the amount of concrete they use and the vagueness of just where the "top" is. I couldn't imagine doing unit masonry, e.g., blocks on top of such footings.

When the rains come before you've poured, you can see what happens.

ajpl's footings were not ready for pouring. There are some voids, there is loose fill in the footings and the rebar is lying on the ground, where it will do no good.

raam's surprise is what I always dread. At least, it was a fixable problem.

soonerhouse2007

Compacting, then digging it out is illogical. Just muck it out to undisturbed soil, replace your steel and pour before the skies open again.

I've never seen a foundation done here without using forms for footers, no matter the soil type. One of those regional things I guess. How do you get a smooth, even surface to rest the wall form on if you don't use a form?

I also don't see how the OP is going to put in drainage with a system like that. There doesn't seem to be room for a perimeter drain system. Also, I assume the top of the footer is somewhere near the top of the trench? How are you going to get adequate stone under the floor? Usually the stone surrounds the footer. In this case, clay surrounds the footer.

Well the extra excavation costs for digging out the muck was a few hundred dollars (just a days labor). The stoning of the pit was around $2000 ! Yeah I know but at a foot deep and approx 90x100 feet that a lot of stone. The builder paid for the goetech (around $1000 !). This fell under unforseen circumstances in our contract (sort of like hitting bedrock of something). But it's nice to know that my house is sitting on one BIG french drain. We've had massive rains and no flooding.

I think I get it: An "integral footer" is one where no forms are used? That does seem low ball to me.

Is the builder in the original post going to later, after the footer dries, use forms to make the slab? Why not pour slab and footer at the same time?

Worthy,
Is an "integral footer" the same as a monolithic slab? We have a monolithic slab for our house and it is very common in this area. Ours is very over-engineered since they found pipe clay under our house site, but everyone agrees that this house will never have foundation problems. ;-)

For those who don't know, a monolithic slab is one in which the footers and the slab are poured as a single unit. Here is a picture of ours ready for concrete:

Why not pour slab and footer at the same time?

Not on top of that clay. And not until drains are in.

raam Not bad.

My clients had to pay out about $5,000 for hand labour to dig out just a couple of sections of collapsed excavation. From massive rainstorms in Toronto in January! (Hint: it's usually snow you're dealing with at that time of year.) According to the building inspector, there were several hundred excavation collapses during that storm.

Plus they paid another $2,500 for non-native fill to ensure proper drainage around the building perimeter.

That clay looks alot like mine. Is that a problem? My clay sits a full foot and a half above grade and I have good fall away from the building site. Do I need drains in that kind of situation?

woodswell's right. An integral footing is poured at the same time as the slab--or even a foundation wall.

What I called an integral footing is usually called a trench footing--a footing poured without actual forms.

I have no experience with slab footings. In the Greater Toronto Area, virtually all new homes are built to make use of every bit of the expensive lot.

That clay looks a lot like mine. Is that a problem?

Depends if you have a basement or not.

A 1997 home built next to the one I mentioned above was built without a basement precisely to avoid the drainage problems posed by clay--and also that we're two blocks from Lake Ontario. In the city, where lots are small and expensive, I think building a basement is worth the effort. Not that I don't envy the apparent ease of slab building! I've spent too much time pumping out excavations. :-(

Worthy... I am about three months from starting to build a four car garage with an apartment above... no basement. Plenty of land though,... 32 acres.

But no money left over for a house. We will have to live above the garage for some time.

Thanks for answering.

In high clay areas in an area 120 miles east of where we currently live,post tension slabs are used.This also happened in reno,nv where a tract of homes were built on conventional footing/slabs and had major slipping/cracking problems being built over a clay base grade.Every house had to be undermined and post tension cabling installed.They say it would have been better to mow the houses down and re work with post tension foundations,as appearently "the fix" hasn't worked.

I'm still not sure why footers are poured here in southern Oklahoma without forms and why they are not poured along with the slab, but I do know it is just how it is done here by everyone. In fact we are going one step beyond the usual residential build to have bigger rebar and much more of it than is customary. We do not feel it is overboard though because of our heavy clay soil. We are building on 13 acreas outside the city limits so we are not held to city buidling codes or inspections.

Yesterday the footers were "cleaned out" by hand and the rebar put back into place. Today the concrete is to be poured....woohoo...this has been a long time coming!! I am on my out right now to watch the process and take pictures. If/when I find out answers to some of our footer/slab questions I'll be sure and post a follow-up.