Heavy rains are one of the biggest catalysts of foundation wall failure.

HYDROSTATIC PRESSURE & YOUR FOUNDATION WALLS

When it rains, the soil surrounding your home becomes saturated, which is good for plants and grass. But when that rain continues, and several inches accumulate over a short period of time, the loose backfill soil surrounding your home will oversaturate. Like a towel that’s dunked in a pool, oversaturated soil is essentially rendered ineffective.

When this happens, all that rainwater will funnel quickly through your soil and can push against your foundation walls. This is called hydrostatic pressure, and it basically turns your walls into the Hoover Dam.

Over time, that pressure build-up can cause your walls to crack horizontally. When this happens, watch out! Wall cracks start off thin – the size of a credit card - and will widen over time. Please know that failing walls NEVER fix themselves, they just WORSEN over time and become more and more expensive to fix.

Fortress' Remedies to Failing Foundation Walls

Fortress installs three different engineer-designed and tested wall repair solutions to repair horizontally cracked, bowed or buckling foundation walls. Each wall can fail differently and thus each wall requires a unique repair application. It is important you don’t install a single solution for every wall, as that solution may not always be the best fix for the issue at hand.

One option for foundation wall repair is GeoLock Wall Anchors™, which are versatile and able to stabilize most failing walls. The anchors are sized to perform in various soil types and have a bearing surface of up to 480 square inches! This is dramatic, ensuring 10 times more contact with the soil, and wall anchors provide the best opportunity for wall straightening.

Power Braces™ are another way to fix failing basement walls and feature a patented design that allows for potential straightening over time. With their clean-cut appearance, the beams have a zinc coating which makes them resistant to corrosion and reduces abrasion and wear.

The preferred repair action for a cracked wall that has also begun to move would be CarbonArmor®, which is designed especially for basement walls. This product uses carbon fiber-reinforced polymers or CFRP’s. Carbon fiber is 10x stronger in tension than steel. And THAT is important for strong adhesion between the concrete wall and the carbon fiber fabric.

But regardless of the application used to repair your home’s specific needs, each of these patented systems is engineer-designed and tested to permanently stabilize and potentially straighten your foundation walls back to their original position, saving you far more costly repairs down the road!

If you’re looking for contracting experts in Fairfax and the surrounding areas, look no further than Fortress Foundation Solutions. We are the premier foundation repair and waterproofing professionals!

Call us today at 1-434-473-7012 or contact us online for a free estimate!