New construction often requires many different services from your Houston commercial concrete contractor. From creating walkways to pouring parking lots, concrete is essential for your new building. However, perhaps even more important is the building foundation. Foundations are critical for a successful construction project, as it performs several important functions for your building. There are many types of concrete building foundations to choose from, and multiple factors affect the type of foundation you should choose.
Work with an Experienced Houston Commercial Concrete Contractor for Foundation Creation
Building foundations may not look like much, but they are incredibly important. That’s why it’s important to work with an expert contractor with experience creating foundations for commercial buildings. Otherwise, you risk using the wrong type of foundation or an improperly created foundation for your building. The best time to create the right foundation is during your Houston commercial construction project. Later repairs or modifications can be incredibly expensive, difficult, and inconvenient.
Foundation problems are notoriously difficult to repair. Some common signs of an issue with your commercial building’s foundation include:
- Interior cracks
- Exterior cracks,
- Sinking
- Foundation movement
- Uneven floors
- Malfunctioning doors and windows
Therefore, an improperly installed foundation can cause many problems for your commercial property. You want to ensure your building’s foundation is done right the first time.
What Does a Foundation Do?
Foundations are essential for a safe, long-lasting building. Most commercial building foundations today are made from concrete, a strong, durable material. Your Houston commercial concrete contractor performs sitework and pours the concrete to create a sturdy base for your building.
Building foundations must properly distribute weight to the soil underneath. This involves distributing weight evenly. Because commercial buildings create a lot of weight and stress, the foundation is critical for ensuring your building is safe. Improperly engineered foundations may be vulnerable to sinking, tilting, or otherwise moving because they may not properly transfer weight to the soil.
Also, foundations create a surface for construction. No matter the type of building, building material, or construction method, you need a solid, flat surface to begin. The concrete foundation helps create this surface for construction to continue.
In addition, building foundations anchor the building. This means that foundations help prevent the building from moving due to conditions like extreme weather, changing seasons, and other conditions that would otherwise cause the building to move from side to side and, eventually, fall. As you can see, it’s important to get the foundation right for your building.
Your Houston Commercial Concrete Contractor can Help You Choose the Right Type of Commercial Foundation
Now we understand why the foundation is so important for your commercial building, you might be wondering how to choose the right type of foundation for your Houston commercial construction project. Generally, this is best left to engineers and concrete specialists to decide. Choosing the right type of foundation for your commercial building requires a lot of specialized knowledge, so you should leave this to the professionals involved with your project. As a Houston general contractor offering design and engineering services, we can help not only design and build your building, but also pour the concrete for your foundation and other structures.
What Affects the Type of Foundation for Houston Commercial Construction?
There are many factors of your construction project that affect the type of foundation best suited for your building. For example, the soil conditions are a pretty big factor for the type of foundation you need. Some soil is better for bearing loads from buildings than others. Therefore, understanding the load capacity of the soil on your construction site is important. Also, your plans for the building also play a significant role in the type of foundation needed. The size, building material, occupancy, and many more details affect the weight and stressors the foundation must support. In addition, let’s not forget that climate has a big impact on the type of foundation needed for your construction project. For example, you typically need different foundations for buildings where the soil freezes or where you commonly experience high winds, flooding, and hurricanes.
Common Types of Foundation from Your Houston Commercial Concrete Contractor
Now, let’s talk about some of the most common types of foundations for commercial buildings. There are any number of options to choose from for your foundation. However, there are some that are more common for most commercial construction projects. Here are some common types of foundations your Houston commercial concrete contractor can create for your building.
T-Shaped Foundations from Your Houston Commercial Concrete Contractor
T-shaped foundations are commonly used for tall buildings or where the soil is prone to freezing. This type of foundation has a flat slab on the soil that is connected to small “feet” underneath to help anchor the concrete slab to the soil. The foundation feet look like inverted T’s, where the horizontal piece is wider and attaches to a thinner vertical piece that attaches to the larger foundation slab. This type of foundation can help distribute weight more evenly for tall buildings.
Slab-on-Grade Foundations
Slab-on-grade foundations are another common option. These are also commonly used in residential applications. Slab-on-grade foundations are one slab several inches thick that sits directly on the soil. These work well as a general foundation where there are average to light loads from the commercial building. Slab-on-grade foundations are an economical choice. Also, because the foundation is in one singular piece, it may be less prone to pest infestations.
Mat Foundations from Your Houston Commercial Concrete Contractor
Mat foundations are somewhat similar to slab-on-grade foundations. They sit directly on the soil and don’t feature any footing underneath the soil. However, these are better for higher loads from commercial buildings. Mat foundations are heavily reinforced to handle higher loads than slab-on-grade foundations. They work well for buildings that create more significant loads. Your Houston commercial concrete contractor may also recommend it when the soil has low weight bearing capacity.
Pile Foundations
Pile foundations are a deep foundation that are typically incredibly labor-intensive. Generally it involves drilling deep into the soil and creating concrete columns supported by hard rock under the ground. Then, the concrete slab sits on top of the columns. Contractors typically recommend these for oversized loads where the soil is weak.
Keeton Construction Services Construction – Houston General Contractor, Concrete Contractor, and Trusted Construction Experts
When you need construction specialists, choose our team at Keeton Construction Services Construction. Our team offers high quality, turnkey construction services for all your needs. We are experienced concrete and construction professionals. Our experts help with a wide range of commercial and industrial projects. Our team works on projects of all types and sizes and are proud to tailor each project to your needs and budget. Contact us today to talk about your construction needs.