Rebuilding The 11 Dollar House™ (continued from Page 1)

April 26, 2007 The Big Day

Of all the things that have happened or will happen to the house, moving the house off the old foundation ranks as one of the biggest. The guys at Triple H Transport (1994) Ltd. showed up bright and early, and got to work.

If you ever need a house moved and you live in Alberta, give them a call. You can check them out at the Triple H Website. From here on, I'll let the pictures do most of the talking.

They have to get the foundation pretty level on top so that they can put down planks and rollers to get the house moving.  That's what all the sledgehammering is for (it's not all hydraulics and cable winches!)

Next, they put a couple of wide, thick planks in between the sill plate of the house and the existing foundation wall, and between the planks they put about 18 inch lengths of heavy pipe. The pipes act like rollers, and from there, it's a pretty straight ahead roll. They attach a cable to one end of the house with a few well placed brackets. To the cable they attach a hook and chain connected to a winch on the tractor trailer, and before you can say, "Where'd the house go?", it's rolled on back.

We actually missed the roll off because we came at lunch to see how they were doing. They were eating their lunches and warned us they'd be done lunch in about half an hour. We went to do an errand, and when we got back 45 minutes or so later, the house was sitting on the back of the lot.

You get the idea from the pictures about the rough shape the foundation was in. In the process of rolling the house off, bits of the wall came loose, and the concrete was both crumbly and crooked.   

May to July 2007

In the first nice days of May, just before the old foundation was going to get torn out, I took our two oldest kids over and let them tear around the ruin a bit. It might be the most fun anyone ever had in that miserable basement.

Sometimes, bad things must come to an end, too, and in the first week of May, the excavator (technically, a Grade-All) came and got rid of all the junk, excavating out a bit more besides so that the new footing and foundation could go in.To see what happens next, go to Page 3. Otherwise, jump to Page 1, Page 4, Page 5, or Page 6.