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Found 92 results for the keyword(s) ‘Concrete’

• Article

  Vapour barriers in basements

  One of our viewers is about to insulate his basement and he has been told that he should not run the vapour barrier all the way to the floor. Fact or fiction? You should run the vapour barrier wherever there is insulation to keep the moisture on the warm side of the wall. And in a basement insta...
• Article

  Good and bad techniques in insulating basement walls.

  The national building code requires a minimum level of insulation in a basement that reaches about two feet below the outside grade level. The objective is to make this storage space a heatable space. Hence some materials and techniques have developed that satisfy this minimum code requirement th...
• Article

  Prepairing concrete prior to painting.

  "How can I paint my concrete floor when there's white powder on it?" White powder is salt deposits called efflorescence that is there because high quantities of moisture are migrating through the floor. You need to solve the water problem first or no paint will stick. So find out why there is wa...
• Article

  How do you trace drains under the basement floor?

  The most effective technique, one that can save you hundreds of dollars of erroneous digging, is to use a "sonar probe".         This gadget is often combined with a video camera designed to look inside sewer pipes.           An emitter probe is snaked into the drain line. You walk...
• Article

  Fixing small cracks in a foundation wall.

  Randy in Winnipeg has found small cracks in a foundation wall and wants to know how to fix them. Right up front I want to make the statement that it is often not worth the bother to fix a small crack in a foundation wall that is not moving -- especially if no water is coming in.  The best way to...
• Article

  Insulating a foundation with embedded floor joists

    Certain parts of Canada, particularly in the Winnipeg region, have a traditional construction technique that presents serious challenges when you want to insulate a basement -- the ends of the joists are actually embedded in the concrete foundation wall.  Chris, from Winnipeg, asked for some f...
• Article

  Raising the Driveway Slab

  Lokesh from Newmaket has a problem with his concrete driveway not being level. It actually flows water into the house. If you don't want to dig it all up and start over (which sometimes is the cheapest solution), you can actually raise the concrete slab to level it or even slope it away from the ...
• Article

  Basement Perimeter Drainage and Leaking Foundations

  This article deals with walls below grade, foundation walls.  For insulating above grade cinder block walls see How do you Insulate a Brick and Block construction as well as Insulating an Above Grade Block Wall from the Inside. The best way to prevent water from leaking into the basement is not ...
• Article

  Peeling paint on a foundation wall.

  Michele in Hamilton, Ontario needs to repaint her cinder block walls on the outside of the basement. But a close look at a photo that she sent us showed a lot of deep holes or pock marks in the blocks. Not only the paint was peeling off, but the block itself was breaking off.  This is a sign o...
• Article

  Attaching a deck to a house

  The old days of stacking structure In the old days, before we had specialized hardware like joist hangers, we would always create beams, or low lying ledger boards and place the joists on top of them with some kind of toe-nail attachment. The arrival of joist hangers When joist hangers came in...