Where are you? That's totally unacceptable. I hope you haven't paid them yet.

We are in Seattle area. Sigh. I was hoping that it is me over-picky about it.

Visually they look pretty bad. If the individual locations are correct sawing to square may be possible. Who knows how much labor and blade expense it would take. Ask your building inspector what he'll accept.

As much working with concrete I am doing / have done - sawing this size of thing horizontally is very unlikely to happen - it would likely be a specialist (expensive) and it doesn't look like these "craftspeople" are into specialization.

The forms they are using look like flimsy garbage bags. Couple that with a wheelbarrow full of concrete slamming into them (or a concrete pump) and Salvador Dali pillars are the result.

Do. Over.

It definitely looks like very sloppy craftsmanship, but it MIGHT be structurally sound. Have a structural engineer look at it and give you their professional opinion in writing.

Oh my goodness! That at least looks terrible. I know building practices vary but here they use actual wood forms for footings/pedestals....it looks like they used flimsy plastic? And then put those on an uneven ground. And possible kicked them over. You need to talk to your builder/GC....get a structural engineer in. This may be a do over.

Agree it might be structural - but attaching the posts to this may be "suboptimal"...

I would start checking/rechecking the licenses of the people on site. I thought those were garbage bags full of SAND....ouch.

Start talking to the GC IMMEDIATELY! Make sure you check your contract to see if you have any recourse with stuff like this if it FAILS inspection. You do NOT want to pay for this twice.

This is a NEW build? I thought the work looked as if they were reconstructing an old foundation so that a new house could be built. I would start checking how straight the forms are, etc.

1. Call city for immediate inspection;

2. Call general contractor for onsite discussion and ask how he intends to make this a correct and proper concrete work.

   This is probably one of the worst workmanship examples of concrete work that many of us will ever see.

   Based on your other thread of concern about concrete honey combing, if you have a structural engineer, you should request a site visit and a written report on this situation and the honey combing. Do not hesitate.

I'm trying to figure out what those pots of concrete were supposed to do in the first place.

Or is all this a big leg-pulling stunt that I don't get?

Reminds me of Goblin Valley in Utah.

If they're flat on top and will transfer the load to the ground, other than cosmetics, I don't see the issue.

The concrete muffins could make sense if this is a post and pier foundation house as below.

Over to you Wei Chen.

Seems obvious that the foundation design is some sort of individual post and pier design, with possibly a shear wall landing on a continuous foundation amidships.

Worthy, in your great range of experience, do you think it's possible or reasonable to get post anchors into many of those sloping top individual piers which could be aligned and have adequate bearing for the posts? Many (?) of those sloping top piers appear a lot different that those in your photo above where bearing is easy with the metal post bases...

Having practiced in the Bay Area seismic zone (which is similar to Seattle's zone), looking at the top photo where it appears the forms ruptured and concrete has run out the bottom of the forms, it makes me wonder if these footings were bored and whether or not more reinforced concrete is "down in a hole" for each of these piers...or not?

When the big ones comes and all those lateral forces start going back and forth (not to mention up and down), are those piers going to remain anchored, or will they start to skate across the ground surface?

At the end of the day, why didn't they simply use sonotube forms and do a proper job?

Where's the project structural engineer and her/his site visit and report?

wimply plastic is likely a lot cheaper than the sonotube forms...

Exactly, jannicone! The owner should:

1. Immediately request a site inspection by the city building inspector;

2. Request the project structural engineer visit the site, inspect and give the owner a written report;

3. Have an on-site meeting (after 1 and 2) with the general contractor; ask if this is the standard of work acceptable to the GC; and request proper corrective action;

4. Stop all progress payments until the work is back to "the standard of the trade"...

If the owner accepts this foundation work, things are likely to only get worse, since everything in construction depends on the proper foundation work.

This project is starting off badly, and if allowed to proceed, may only get worse hereafter.

I find these something that would knock a chunk off the price of the house on resale even if they are declared functional. A lot of buyers would just pass.

Hi folks: followups from me.

City inspector raised a few things in the report. But the condition is either to address them or approved by EOR (structural engineer). Our builder went to talk to EOR.

After a day, without visiting the site, the engineer approved all conditions as it is (just based on a few photos we sent out as examples), except pouring some more concrete on one of the pedestals. We are now asking him to do a site visit to evaluate these issues. But that would require a few more days.

First, I am not an engineer but have worked on a lot of different projects with a lot of engineers. So, my two cents....

In order to generate strength the concrete needs to be in solid forms. The weight of the concrete pushing down and against the forms is what generates part of the strength. E.G., if you pour a 6' high formed wall or Sonotube then the concrete at the bottom will be the strongest. These do not look like they would have benefited from this and I'm surprised the engineer approved them after looking at the photos.

Some look like they may be off kilter enough that they are no longer laying flat and solid on undisturbed soil.

Building inspectors are often, like TSA agents, one job removed from flipping burgers. They are looking only for minimal code compliance and very often miss code compliance issues. NEVER rely on a city/county building inspector for anything from a quality standpoint.

It is possible that these are structurally OK. But this does at a minimum exhibit exceptionally poor craftsmanship and oversight on the part of the builder and as mentioned above, most people considering purchasing this house in the future will be concerned about these. Also, the worksite is a mess which further indicates a quite poor builder.

If you want to continue with this builder then I'd hire an independent engineer to look at them. Personally I'd stay clear of this builder.

For comparison, builders here will use solid forms, a considerable bit of rebar, and will level the forms so that the resulting pours are all within about 1/8". Better builders will frame and pour footings first, then put forms on top of the footings and do a second pour with all of them within about 1/16".

The purpose of this is so that the length of wood used as support is as identical as possible for ALL piers which results in floors and structure above remaining more stable and level over time. If this is not done, as appears above, then as the differing lengths of wood (due to differing heights of piers) and shims compress they will do so unevenly. This all kind of goes back to starting with a good foundation rather than trying to make up for it later.

I am terrified for you for the rest of your build based on this post alone. We are building our house with the help of my father in law and none of us have a contractors license, this is how our footings looked with forms and then a pic of my son standing on one section where piers will sit.

edited to add: our stemwalls were poured in a second pour, after the footings were done. The mudsill is all level on top of the stemwalls and so the floor joists have gone on very nicely. No shimming.

You don't have to remind him of anything. Simply ask for a site inspection and a written report on his firm's letterhead. He'll get the implication...and fully understands his professional liability.

^^^ Actually, Mickey D's would never fill a shake that full.

That is the beverage's position in the lap of the driver just before going off the road.

That may be the worst concrete workmanship for a simple isolated concrete footing that has every been seen...or mebbe not! But the cheap plastic form wasn't anchored, the concrete spilled out of the bottom, almost turned the form over, and at the last moment someone walked over with a 2X4 on edge and attempted to level a portion of the top of the pour...or as much that could be leveled...was there an excavated hole beneath the form, for the concrete? Looking at it we'll never know...

Thanks a ton for the super informative suggestions. I wouldn't haven't known that much without knowledgable people from this forum. Now we need to seek advice on how to terminate while minimizing the loss.

Updates: We'd are pretty sure to part away from current GC. After a few rounds of discussions, he still refused to admit the quality mistakes and deem it normal. We'll meet onsite with the structural engineer (his long-term partner) tomorrow. Here are our situations:

Other than quality issues listed in this thread, we suspect that the project has deviated the design, e.g. foundation wall was changed from 2 feet to 3 feet without notifying us. Is it regarded as a change of order without notice?

Can anyone please share insights on what I should discuss in the meeting with GC? Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

You might want to request to see several of the other projects where this "normal" craftsmanship has occurred; making sure those home owners are aware of the craftsmanship in question and find out if they have experienced any negative effect.

Do you have an architect involved in the project?

Hi Mark, we has seen the craftmanship from the same builder 1 year ago. They are much better than ours, we won't complain if our project has similar quality

.

Unfortunately this is a design-build project, so the architect is basically part of builder's team.

Some background: due to city code, the ground floor has to be set at a certain elevation. (274'). In the original plan, the joist should be laid on top of the foundation wall. As a prerequisite, a lot of dirt must be removed from backyard.

The GC did not remove the dirt from backyard, as a result, the joist will be underneath the foundation wall. I suspect that due to this, he has to raise the foundation wall so that the joist can be installed inside the foundation wall with joist hangers. As we know, joist hangers installation needs to be very careful, other it could lead to squeaky floors.

In the end, we understand that there will be deviations from original plan and we are open to fix along the way. But doing a change-of-order at this scale without notice is kinda beyond our expectation. I want to if builder made such a change without our notice, what's the industrial standard way of resolution?

A side by side of the pic you posted above and your house look like those funny Pinterest "fails".

He either no longer cares, or hiring is so tight he's hiring blind people now.

Did the contract stipulate the removal of the soil/material from the back yard? Look closely. This is pretty important.

IF (BIG 'IF') your contract stipulated removal of soil/material from backyard then you have the beginnings of a 'broken contract'. And IF the GC decided to add height to the foundation (from 2ft to 3ft in height) without notice, then yes we are now firmly into the "without notice" blurb in the contract.

By the looks of the photos from another build 1 year ago, I would say this firm has lost sight of it's workmanship ratings. Your foundation looks NOTHING LIKE the build from the previous year.

Notice in your 'example' photo (from 1 year ago) the earth has been excavated around the EXTERIOR of the foundation wall? That is missing in your build. The ONLY THING I can think of for this, would be the PROPERTY LINES of the other homes are SO CLOSE to your foundation that they CANNOT move the earth...because it isn't your earth to move. Any thoughts on that?

Anyway, if you feel like you want to part company with this firm, you will probably want to speak with a lawyer who deals with realty and contractual law in the building sector.

Check your contract. If it is SPECIFIED (and you paid for it...or will pay for it) then he's in the "wrong". If it is NOT specified and you did NOT pay for it...then there is no breach of contract.

Thanks for the great tips, SJ and other awesome folks. Today we met with the GC and EOR. Here are updates:

1. GC admits he commands the change of foundation wall and ground floor from the design. This is a change or order without permission, his fault.

2. The structural engineer came on site with GC. He looks concerned about the foundation as we point out, but won't speak out in front of GC. He said that he will give a written report later.

3. We ask for further actions from GC, he said that he won't commit to do anything before seeing the engineer's report.

Right now we are totally concerned of the foundation's strength after seeing that engineer's face. We'll hire a 3rd party concrete testing company to do more fundamental structural/strength testing.

Again, thanks a lot for the helpful answers, I wished I would have come to you earlier. Any further comments/suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

@Mikey...at least things are moving along now. You are welcome to hold-off on the independent concrete testing. The engineer may require a full-redo which would mean all of this gets ripped out anyway. I would hate to see you add more into these concrete pillars only to have them ripped out at the end of the day.

At this point, you will waste some "time" waiting for the engineer's report. I would hate to see you waste "money" as well. And worse case scenario means you need to test the concrete because the engineer says it is "OK". At that point what is one more week?

OP, you’ve written pretty much the same story and reply in this thread and your honeycomb thread. What’s your end game?