I’m going to build a garage/shop on our property this summer. I rarely frame new construction and have some questions about how to make this particular project easy. Rectangular foorprint about 24×36, 9′ ceiling height, some sort of loft space above. The foundation will be a perimeter footing/stemwall and the floor will be a slab. Since the top of the stemwall will be +/- 12″ above the floor, I won’t have a clear deck to frame the walls flat and then raise them. I realize I could set the sills on the stemwall, and then toenail every stud in place, sticking up in the air, but I’d sure rather frame all four walls flat on the deck and then raise them, if possible. Maybe I could find cribbing to use temporarily to create a flat platform at the height of the stemwall…?
Second question is above holddowns. If in fact I find a way to frame the walls flat, what’s the preferred anchor? I’d usually use 5/8″ anchor bolts embedded during the pour, but it sure would be hard to get the walls in place with those in the way. I know that Simpson makes anchors designed to wrap over the plate once it’s in place.
Suggestions from folks who do this all the time?
Replies
Why do you want a 12" stemwall? Is there a drainage/slope issue?
If you need to have a stemwall, it's really no problem to frame the walls by laying the top plate on edge out in the floor, prop each stud up on an angle onto the stemwall and bang away as you please. Yes, it will take a little more manpower to raise the walls but you didn't say if that mattered much.
Anchoring is the same as any other poured foundation. Set the bolts as the concrete starts to firm up in the stemwalls, paying attention to door openings. Then you can either lay a treated plate all around the perimeter and build on top of that, or you can drill out the plate as it lays on the stemwall as described above, on edge. Then stand it up and work it onto the anchor bolts.
Otherwise pick whatever other method you (and more importantly, your building inspector/local code prefers) and fasten with say wedge anchors (redheads) or whatever.
Edited 2/9/2005 2:32 pm ET by Mad Dog
I built my shop 6 years ago and it has a 2' high concrete wall that is actually a retaining wall on 3 sides.The wall is 3 courses of 8" concrete block. When I framed, I used some extra block and built 2 sets of scaffolding to support the framing at the same height as the concrete wall. I stacked 3 blocks and laid some 2x8 on top [basically a workhorse]. For my anchors I imbedded the usual anchor bolts and fastened down PT 2x8 to cap all of the block. It was easy to install the wall [flipping it up] on top of this and then securely nailing it down to the PT. Hope this helps you Peter