Saturday, March 18, 2017

California cripple wall upgrade

Reference


This is a typical California cripple wall upgrade.  It is for a 1906 single story house on a slab.  The crawl space was built to allow services.  Just look at that original electrical wire!  I hope it was abandoned and real electricity put in, just like my old 1900 house.  I left in the wires because they looked cute, just like gas lamp pipe.  :)


What happens with these houses is that at a certain range of PGV, the cripple wall jumps off the foundation, or suffers shearing damage.  The destroys the whole house.  With the upgrade, this house should survive up to 50 cm/s before the shear damage in the rest of the house pulls all the nails.  These houses have no shear resistance that you get with good frame sheeting.

The big goof is that this sort of upgrade is being sold to BC house owners of 2 story brick homes with a basement.  It does nothing.


No comments: