An average day

[JCraver]

It's all interpretation, which is why I "let" them do it here. Until the code says "anchor bolts must be tied in place prior to placement of concrete" or some such, we're stretching (IMO) to tell them they can't.

Commercial is a little different, and I almost buy that you can stretch it enough to get there. But it's still a stretch. Thankfully, most plans have a note that covers it.

 

[Inspector Gift]

Simpson StrongTie's requirement for anchors, state they are to be installed "before the concrete pour". All proprietary anchors are to be installed per the manufacturer's listing and per the engineering.

Special Inspection for anchors cast in concrete is required per IBC TABLE 1705.3 and ACI 318.17.82.

 

[conarb]

Most Engineers, as well as most Building Officials, have seen the voids often left to one side or the other of a “wet set” bolt or dowel or strap – sometimes obviously reducing it’s structural capacity and increasing liability to the Engineer, Building Official, Owner and Contractor. When embedded dowels, bolts and straps are “wet set” we would recommend that a randomly selected portion of these embedded hardware are pull tested to full rated capacity prior to acceptance by the Engineer or Building Official.

I disagree, I come from an era where all foundation bolts were wet-set and tried to continue to do so until retirement, what I do is have the mudsills drilled with the bolts in the holes and lying on the forms for the inspector to see, I say "try to continue to do so" because most foundations are now formed and poured by cement masons and not carpenters. We get a much better embedment and seal between the concrete and the mudsill when we wet-set, my procedure is to set the mudsills/bolts on the wet concrete having a man on the forms with a sledgehammer and a surveyors' rod, I try to be on the transit myself and tell the guy with the sledgehammer and rod when to stop pounding the mudsill down into the concrete. If the bolt is cast in the concrete you have to set the mudsill on dry concrete and it's impossible to get complete embedment and a good seal, to do it right you have to grout under all mudsills, a long labor-intensive procedure, I remember an old inspector who checked the embedment of the mudsill in the concrete with a cigarette paper.

Where this all broke down was when the unions lost control, in the union days a cement finisher couldn't build forms higher than 12", carpenters built the forms and set the mudsills, cement finishers were confined to flat work, or nothing above curb height and don't have the ability to set mudsills.

Were I an inspector today, which I would never be, if the bolts were hung to be poured in I would require a grouting inspection because most are just going to set the mudsills without grouting them in.

 

[linnrg]

for plates with nelson studs or other structural embedments, or large diameter anchor group for columns they are usually template arranged and attached to the forms (accuracy). All small j bolts are typically wet set hereabouts. I have a ACI 318-08 Appendix D does not state anything against wetset.

 

[mark handler]

Some Problems with wet setting bolts

Many installers push the aggregate out of the way and the steel is then covered by just the cream, sometimes with a void over it, with few or no rocks to really hook it down, it's easier to pull an anchor back out.

Second, the hand set bolts are commonly, NOT ALWAYS, misplaced and is it is almost impossible to maintain the min 3" of cover from the outside of the concrete so the steel is much more subject to corrosion from moisture and oxygen. Rust is much bigger than the original steel. Steel rusting and swelling is every bit as powerful as wood swelling, it'll bust concrete as it rusts.

The verticality is, many times, compromised and the framer has to oversize the plate holes.


The inspector allows wet set bolts... We can save money....Nice bolt withdrawal

 

[JCraver]

Some Problems with wet setting bolts

Many installers push the aggregate out of the way and the steel is then covered by just the cream, sometimes with a void over it, with few or no rocks to really hook it down, it's easier to pull an anchor back out.

Second, the hand set bolts are commonly, NOT ALWAYS, misplaced and is it is almost impossible to maintain the min 3" of cover from the outside of the concrete so the steel is much more subject to corrosion from moisture and oxygen. Rust is much bigger than the original steel. Steel rusting and swelling is every bit as powerful as wood swelling, it'll bust concrete as it rusts.

The verticality is, many times, compromised and the framer has to oversize the plate holes.


The inspector allows wet set bolts... We can save money....Nice bolt withdrawal
View attachment 2717

The difference in your pic is that you're on a commercial job there, and I'd bet a $100 bill that there was a note on the plans about the anchor bolts. You're not going to have the potential for that type of lever situation in 99.99999999% of residential wood-framed jobs.

 

[JCraver]

I disagree, I come from an era where all foundation bolts were wet-set and tried to continue to do so until retirement, what I do is have the mudsills drilled with the bolts in the holes and lying on the forms for the inspector to see, I say "try to continue to do so" because most foundations are now formed and poured by cement masons and not carpenters. We get a much better embedment and seal between the concrete and the mudsill when we wet-set, my procedure is to set the mudsills/bolts on the wet concrete having a man on the forms with a sledgehammer and a surveyors' rod, I try to be on the transit myself and tell the guy with the sledgehammer and rod when to stop pounding the mudsill down into the concrete. If the bolt is cast in the concrete you have to set the mudsill on dry concrete and it's impossible to get complete embedment and a good seal, to do it right you have to grout under all mudsills, a long labor-intensive procedure, I remember an old inspector who checked the embedment of the mudsill in the concrete with a cigarette paper.

Where this all broke down was when the unions lost control, in the union days a cement finisher couldn't build forms higher than 12", carpenters built the forms and set the mudsills, cement finishers were confined to flat work, or nothing above curb height and don't have the ability to set mudsills.

Were I an inspector today, which I would never be, if the bolts were hung to be poured in I would require a grouting inspection because most are just going to set the mudsills without grouting them in.

I don't think I've ever seen an embedded plate. Our old, old houses are all on brick, block or stone foundations, but even on the newer old houses, when these farmers started forming basement walls with 2x's, they didn't embed the plates. Maybe those union concrete guys should have poured your walls level so you didn't have to do all that nonsense...

 

[mark handler]

The difference in your pic is that you're on a commercial job there, and I'd bet a $100 bill that there was a note on the plans about the anchor bolts. You're not going to have the potential for that type of lever situation in 99.99999999% of residential wood-framed jobs.

You dont know that.
we use steel all the time in high seismic zones.

 

[ICE]

Years ago when I lived in Manitou Springs I built many foundations. The sill was nailed to the inside of the forms. The anchor bolts hung through the sill. The concrete was placed up to the underside of the sill. Hard to get that wrong.

 

[conarb]

Some Problems with wet setting bolts

Many installers push the aggregate out of the way and the steel is then covered by just the cream, sometimes with a void over it, with few or no rocks to really hook it down, it's easier to pull an anchor back out.

Second, the hand set bolts are commonly, NOT ALWAYS, misplaced and is it is almost impossible to maintain the min 3" of cover from the outside of the concrete so the steel is much more subject to corrosion from moisture and oxygen. Rust is much bigger than the original steel. Steel rusting and swelling is every bit as powerful as wood swelling, it'll bust concrete as it rusts.

The verticality is, many times, compromised and the framer has to oversize the plate holes.


The inspector allows wet set bolts... We can save money....Nice bolt withdrawal
View attachment 2717

First of all you appear to be taking a random shot posting it to make your point, we see no evidence of what's under those bolts, are they MB or JB? This came up referencing wood mudsills, take a look at this picture:

This is a recent picture of some templates holding bolts in a remodel job, note the already installed bolts in the upper right corner, also note that we have removed the steel template plate and made a plywood plate for easier nail attachment to the adjacent forms, also note in the lower right there are some templates with J Bolts instead of those steel plates designed for higher loads. These bolts and their templates are for steel column bases like you showed above, how do you know whether the engineer calculated something like this in the picture you posted? In the same job there are both embeded 3x8 redwood mudsills and 3x8 redwood mudsills that I hung the bolts from Simpson bolt hangers.

BTW, all jobs with steel columns like you posted require special Inspection, your picture shows a failure in either engineering or special inspection and has nothing to do with the point here about mudsill bolts being hung in place for inspection vs mudsills with bolts hanging from them to be embedded in wet concrete.

 

[mark handler]

Unless the inspector is on site observing the bolt insertion, there is no way to determine the proper embedment is being done.are they using the proper length bolts.

When I practiced Architecture, I had a note on the plans that All embedments, shall be wired in place prior to placement of the concrete.

In a housing tract, 1/2"×8"s vs 1/2"×12"s saves a lot of money.

 

[ICE]

There is no legitimate argument that condones wet setting anchors. Sure there's practitioners here that make the claim that it's no big deal....only because that has been their habit. As an inspector I need a consistent, proven method. Wet setting is haphazard. Wet setting requires a level of trust that nobody deserves.

 

[ICE]

"also note that we have removed the steel template plate and made a plywood plate for easier nail attachment to the adjacent forms"

So you guys didn't have a drill motor?

 

[conarb]

There is no legitimate argument that condones wet setting anchors. Sure there's practitioners here that make the claim that it's no big deal....only because that has been their habit. As an inspector I need a consistent, proven method. Wet setting is haphazard. Wet setting requires a level of trust that nobody deserves.

Wet-setting has been done forever when we had real carpenters building the forms and pouring the concrete and I never had any problems, the secret is a good guy on the vibrator.

So you guys didn't have a drill motor?

I had concrete finishers building the forms and pouring, that's just the way they preferred to do it, I've argued this with them before, were I to build anymore I'd cut up a lot of plywood and bring it to the steel contractor's shop and have them use it for templates to begin with, doesn't make sense to have the steel fabricator build them with steel templates then to change them on the jobsite to wood templates.

 

[mark handler]

The issue of the voids or just "concrete cream" is usually only an issue with dynamic loading, earthquakes and wind. The anchor bolts transfer the dynamic forces into the foundation. the bolts are useless if there is a void or lack of bonding to the concrete. And when it occurs, like it did in the Northridge and the Loma Prieta Earthquake, the contractors do not look for the reason something failed. How can we patch it up and move to the next piggy bank.

Forensic Engineers and Architects Did look for the reasons. Undersized and improper bolt placement failures were observed, time after time.

The existing retrofit guidelines, such as the very dated Appendix chapter A3 of the International Existing Building Code, does not incorporate modern developments in wood frame retrofit construction, new hardware developments, or earthquake retrofit engineering knowledge gained from the Northridge and Loma Prieta Earthquakes. It also neglect to address the variety of framing configurations found under old houses are not even addressed by these guidelines.

 

[ICE]

Wet-setting has been done forever when we had real carpenters building the forms and pouring the concrete and I never had any problems, the secret is a good guy on the vibrator.

There’s few real carpenters left and any procedure that relies on a secret is doomed.

 

[conarb]

There’s few real carpenters left and any procedure that relies on a secret is doomed.

When we hang the bolts in under columns, like I showed above, we grout under the steel column bases, I'd say if you hange the bolts then install the mudsills after the concrete is dry you should grout them as well. As a carpenter I always used the business card test, if the mudsill isn't embedded in the concrete may be able to stick a business card between the mudsill and the concrete, actually when I was an apparentice they used a cigarette paper to test if the mudsill was tight to the concrete, almost impossible unless you grout the mudsills in.

Do you guys who require the bolts be hung in place also require grouting the mudsills? You certainly require grouting under the column bases.

 

[ICE]

Do you guys who require the bolts be hung in place also require grouting the mudsills? You certainly require grouting under the column bases.

Well no...the energy code requires caulk.

 

[conarb]

Well no...the energy code requires caulk.

I always wondered why the enrgy code required caulk, a properly seated mudsill doesn't allow air to pass. If we have a mudsill that is not properly seated, either embedded or grouted, where is the support between bolts, I've seen bolts at 7' centers, you would allow an unsupported wall for 7'? We have special inspection on everything we do here because of steel columns, I doubt that any special inspector is going to allow ungrouted mudsills if he can see under them, it also violates my construction standards if, as I said above, I can slip a business card under any mudsills or column bases, time to put that in the Tiger Code.

 

[linnrg]

well maybe one of those earthquake or wind test places could test the wet set versus tied in place - I would bet the results would be either or is just as effective. Otherwise Me thinks there would be such a definitive statement(s) in the ACI book

 

[JCraver]

You dont know that.
we use steel all the time in high seismic zones.

You're right. I did leave in a 00000001% chance I was wrong...

 

[classicT]

As a present building inspector and former special inspector, I always want to see AB's in place. ACI 318 requires reinforcement to be in place, although Appendix D does not stipulate beyond definitions (Cast-in Anchor - A headed bolt, headed stud, or hooked bolt installed before placing concrete).

Per the definition, which fits our typical installation of hooked bolts for residential plate attachment to foundation wall, anchors shall be installed before the placement of concrete.

Now, in reality, I don't get what I always want - for residential, the plate anchors are 90% wet-set. As a jurisdiction, we have decided to accept wet-set anchors for plate attachment - all hold-downs or embedded bolts (for steel frames) are required to be in place prior to placement.

For commercial construction, everything to be in place prior to placement with special inspection.

 

[conarb]

You're right. I did leave in a 00000001% chance I was wrong...

Where in Slobovia do you live? When a SE plan checker finally relented and stamped my plans she said: "This house should have been all steel." I said: "It's got a full steel frame." She said: "But look at all the wood you are using, do you know how many trees will die so you can build this house?

 

[ICE]

As a present building inspector and former special inspector, I always want to see AB's in place. ACI 318 requires reinforcement to be in place, although Appendix D does not stipulate beyond definitions (Cast-in Anchor - A headed bolt, headed stud, or hooked bolt installed before placing concrete).

Per the definition, which fits our typical installation of hooked bolts for residential plate attachment to foundation wall, anchors shall be installed before the placement of concrete.

Now, in reality, I don't get what I always want - for residential, the plate anchors are 90% wet-set. As a jurisdiction, we have decided to accept wet-set anchors for plate attachment - all hold-downs or embedded bolts (for steel frames) are required to be in place prior to placement.

For commercial construction, everything to be in place prior to placement with special inspection.

I don't agree with the premise that the definition of a cast in place anchor serves to ban wet set anchors. At a framing inspection do you regularly find missing and misplaced anchors?