composite steel decking

[Firebrick43]

So I am finally getting to build a garage. Already have a pole barn but this will be attached along with a mother in law quarters to the house. Its actually my wifes mother in law.

Any way the basement and main floor walls are going to be icf forms, more than likely amvic blocks. The dealer/contractor I am talking to is going to quote me their amdeck which is an insulated form for the main floor. He has done very little of it as he states its expensive and it needs engineered adding more expense. He as done safe rooms and porch floors about 10' but no long spans due to the expense of the forms/engineering.

So I have started to look at hollow core decking and composite steel decking.

I have read up on a lot of the installation manuals that many of the composite decking manufactures have but there is little about the joist. Also there is so little on forums and there seems little said on forums when I search other than it cost around 6 to 10 dollars a square foot. I am putting in radiant flooring so it would be cost effective at this price compared to a wood deck sufficient to support a thin slab and will be a good tornado shelter.

Area to deck is 28' wide and 49' long with a beam support down the middle.

Has anyone used a steel concrete composite decking? Some refer to them a s a suspended slab. Any advise? Who to start contacting. Most of the guys i know that are residential builders in this area go glassy eyed and get confused.

Thank you

 

[rustyjames]

Composite steel/concrete deck is commonly used in commercial/industrial type structures. The deck is typically over beams or bar joists.

 

[readhead]

Did one last week. You need to get an engineer involved. This was a garage. Set the beams and decked it in one day with two guys.

 

[Firebrick43]

Did one last week. You need to get an engineer involved. This was a garage. Set the beams and decked it in one day with two guys.

Do you have a ball park idea of the cost per square foot for the deck? Assume a double garage? Did you add studs? Weld or screw down the deck? What kind of span? I know I will need an engineer but should i pick a system first and then see one or let the engineer pick the brand? Not even sure where to higher one.

Thanks

 

[bczygan]

Very standard commercial construction.

Metal pan form, bar joists spanning from masonry wall to steel beam and steel reinforced concrete floor.

Manufacturers based on local suppliers and best cost.

Any good commercial contractor should be able to engineer and price.

Bill

 

[matt_i]

I would google up "spancrete hollow core plank" for some ideas. I believe they can be precast offsite and assembled.

The problem I see is that the expense is not just in the slab/floor, it will be everywhere...hvac (maybe there's no AC)...electrical...everything has to be planned and engineered and it has to be built by someone who can follow the drawings exactly, it cant just be nailgunned together and everyone following has to clean up the previous trades' mess.

 

[readhead]

No square foot price since they are all different. You don't pick anything. You take your plans to the engineer and they will come up with a design based on the buildings requirements.

The one we did last week had W10's on 4' centers with 1 1/2" B deck. The deck is usually welded down or Hilti has a system to shoot it down. The seams are Tek screwed together.

Make sure you have a concrete guy that is familiar with pouring on steel deck. Since the water has no where to go you need to pour early and be ready to wait to finish. If it is cold be ready to heat the area below.

This is very common commercial construction. We do it a lot here for residential work mostly because of terrain issues or to create usable space.

 

[wssix99]

I just got done with the structure of a 4 story ICF house and also considered these types of systems. All of the points above regarding the added cost and engineering are certainly in play, (you can't avoid them, no matter what you do - the benefit with wood is that your truss company will provide that service for you, painlessly) but the deal-breaker for us was time. Using a concrete decking system will double or triple the construction time of your shell. (With Mom moving in, maybe that's a good thing???)

Obviously, I haven't used a composite steel decking system, but getting to your list of viable options here is a very simple academic exercise:
- Your contractor will likely only work with one type/brand of block. So, that's the system that you'll be constrained to use.
- Your engineer will be limited to construction methods that the block maker supports and has tested. You can find those in the Amvic ICF Technical Manual. (They do list composite steel decking.

If you really want to build the bunker, you'll be pioneering and will need a contractor who will be willing to go through the journey with you. As noted above, composite steel decking requires spot welding of the deck and is typical of commercial construction - so you may need another contractor to come out and do that part. In my area, I couldn't possibly pull this off without a full union decking crew (ironworkers) and that would be even more expensive than typical residential carpenters. (The thing that makes the AMDeck system work is that carpenters and your mason can place the whole thing.)

http://www.amvicsystem.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/completeICF_Technical_manual.pdf#page=120


Another data point on the composite decking - If you look on page 109 of the ICF technical guide, (page 121 of the .pdf) you'll see there are special bearing plates that you'll need to fabricate, and place for every steel truss. These are a MAJOR PITA. We had many of these as we had to pocket steel beams in to our walls at various locations and they require a similar detail. You just have more - because you'd have many more trusses. You have to get the plates just right. (Ideally, you'd put them just a little low so you could shim them up during placement and welding of the trusses.) Then, you have to shore up the ICF around where the trusses penetrate the forms, so concrete doesn't leak out when you pour the next lift. (This takes a ton of effort.)

^ Obviously screwing the placement of these plates up is a disaster. It's so critical that my wife and I were involved in every single one, placement and patching around the ICF. We had three eyes on getting the levels in the ICF wall correct and also making sure we didn't have blow-outs around these things. (Before and during the pour.)

Sorry - for all the grief that they gave us, we didn't get any close ups of the plates or the pockets in the ICF...

So... Given that you will be paying a premium for this product and/or paying for your contractor to ride a learning curve, I'd definitely push for the AMDeck product. Given that you'd need specialized labor, welding, steel trusses, (and more engineering) and would have much more painful wall connection details - it's not going to gain you anything. ... That's probably why Amvic invented Amdeck.

 

[Firebrick43]

Thank you readhead. I will start looking for an engineer. The erection and all the utilities will be done myself. I have actually core drilled penitrations before in composite decking and familiar with the design. Where I work is 40 acres of it and as a maintence mech I have to often work with it. Just have never been involved in the initial design as it was built in 82'
The only subs on construction will be the concrete guys and excavator which is also selling/consulting/assting in the icf walls.

The hvac will be in slab hydronic heat and mini split ac with an air source heat pump and a wood stove backup.

I have looked of hollow core already and depending on cost it may be the choice. Either way it's also going to be a good excuse to purchase a mag base drill and a Hillti drill I have always wanted

 

[wssix99]

it cost around 6 to 10 dollars a square foot.

The other thing we had to deal with this stuff was the cost of time. The materials may be 6-10 a foot, but when you are pouring a floor, you have to wait for weather and then your crew has to go away for several days while the floor cures and they can start in to the walls again. During this time, they have started other projects so they can keep earning a living - but they may not be able to get back to you right away until they finish their side projects.

^ This was a concern every time we had to wait for the concrete to dry and was another area where having wood floors made things much easier. We worked hard to time our wall pours for Fridays. Monday was strip & prep. Floor trusses came Tuesday and we were off to work on another floor uninterrupted.

 

[WNYflyer]

Note that "Composite" steel deck was developed to act both as the form for the wet concrete and as the bottom steel tension reinforcing for suspended slabs. Because it act as the slab reinforcing the theory is you can get away with thinner slabs and use less rebar/mesh also. Since I do primarily industrial work and such we never use composite deck because we are always worried about future corrosion of the composite deck. If the composite deck corrodes then you are of course compromising the slab reinforcing.

Instead of "Composite" steel deck we use "Non-Composite" steel deck (often called "Form Deck"). The "Non-Composite" is used only as a form for the wet concrete and associated construction loads. Then you have to add more rebar/mesh to act as the suspended slab bottom reinforcing. The deck could corrode away in the future for all we care.

Basic point is you really need to be aware of any potential for any futiure corrosion of the deck when choosing which type of deck to go with.

I have used Hollow Core Planks before the only hiccup I have had with those was the fact that the have some camber to them. You need to we aware of any camber especially if you have any conditions where the ends are cut on a skew/angle. Again you always need to be aware of the potential for future corrosion if any with whatever system you choose.

 

[Firebrick43]

Wssix99 thank you for your experience. I had glossed through the amvic manual which is where the idea of using a composite deck. Tips such as the bearing plate is why I am asking questions. Looking at the drawings it seems trivial but your detailed description paints another picture, one I would like to avoid. That means I will probably drop the idea of a composite deck. I don't need that kind of stress during the pour. As far as slowing down the project, that is ok to me, would like to enclose by winter but mom will not retire until late spring of next year then we need to sell her house and such.

This is mostly a DIY build, be my second house and have several pole/ shop buildings. It is my first experience with icf. The contractor that I am working with will be acting as a consultant, checking my work, and running the pour as well as providing bracing. I will be doing all reinforcement and prep work but all the pour will be some one else as I know I am not efficient enough to do it in the time frame required.

Do you use amvic forms?

wNYflyer, i had looked into the form decks, but the weight increase would cause in quite some increase in footer and foundation size. To be honest I don't know how the hollow core plank would compare weight wise? I was aware of the camber, no issues with it as its a rectanglar build.

Thank you again gentleman

 

[readhead]

I understand your desire to be informed but you may become to informed. I've been involved in concrete and steel decks for over forty years. It is very common construction and is not complicated. ICF 's present some unique challenges but it's been done before. The EOR will design and seal the design. They will specify the material required.

 

[wssix99]

Wssix99 thank you for your experience. I had glossed through the amvic manual which is where the idea of using a composite deck. Tips such as the bearing plate is why I am asking questions. Looking at the drawings it seems trivial but your detailed description paints another picture, one I would like to avoid. That means I will probably drop the idea of a composite deck. I don't need that kind of stress during the pour.

That detail is a total PITA. The other thing to consider is that Amvic's composite deck detail doesn't tie the concrete floor in to the wall. The steel trusses are only tied in to the wall (I hope they don't rust!!!) and the concrete floor is just a topping that sits between the foam wall blocks. (Structurally, I don't see you getting a lot of benefit over a wooden floor.)

The AMDeck system ties the concrete floors in with the wall, making them a monolithic structure; walls and floor. If you want Tornado/bomb shelter performance, I'd think that's the route you'd want to go.

As far as slowing down the project, that is ok to me, would like to enclose by winter but mom will not retire until late spring of next year then we need to sell her house and such.

This is really ambitious. It took us 3-4 weeks per floor, and we had a full mason and carpentry crew. We did have complex floors, at height, on a tight site, with structural columns in the ICF, a radiused wall (that alone took one dedicated person) but I would expect that a simple rectangular house with a concrete floor could take 4-8 weeks per floor, depending on the size, number of windows, and heights of the walls. (Assuming a crew of 2 or 3 people.)

^ You can go "Lego-fast" like you see in some videos if you are doing short lifts, don't have a lot of windows, and don't care so much about the walls being straight or plumb. If you want the things straight, flat, and plumb, there is a lot of tweaking, gluing of blocks, etc. that goes on. There's also the "make up joints" that they don't tell you about but put in the fine print... The blocks aren't that precise and some may be 1/8" off in dimension from one another. (This can add up big time along the course of a wall!) So you have to cut the wall in the middle somewhere (usually through a door or window opening) and "unzip" the wall so you can pull it apart and make the corners of the building plumb to each other. This takes a lot of time and tweaking, also. See the lines over the door and under the window with the cross bracing attached to the outside across the cuts:

^ BTW-This caused some havoc with our siding plans because we had one place, at this make-up joint, where the 8" webs were anywhere from 8-9". (Industrial metal siding and some other treatments became a lot more work with the inconsistency.)

Do you use amvic forms?

No, we used Logix. Very similar in features, though. We liked Amvic but our Mason was in the Logix camp and they worked out just fine. I'm not sure I would personally use anything other than Amvic or Logix, though. Some of the other block systems don't seem to be backed up with the engineering, testing, or features around the webbing. (Lite-Deck is the competing product to AMDeck, which one would typically use with Logix or other non-Amvic systems.)

Thank you again gentleman

Better watch out with this. My wife is the ICF expert and my general contractor. I'm just the labor/help.

The hvac will be in slab hydronic heat and mini split ac with an air source heat pump and a wood stove backup.

Where are you building? We found that there are no good models for HVAC calculations on these houses - ESPECIALLY if you are going to do the floors. We have a ground source geothermal heat pump and the thing is way oversized - even though we fudged the math to downsize it to begin with. (The house is even more efficient than PCA's concrete house modeler predicted.) No worries - we planned for that, too and I plan to use the excess capacity in our geo well to heat the garage. (We currently have that area and some make-up heat radiant floors on a gas boiler.)

Anyway, it sounds like you are on to this - going lean with the boiler and planing for make-up heat in the unlikely event you need it!

I have looked of hollow core already and depending on cost it may be the choice. Either way it's also going to be a good excuse to purchase a mag base drill and a Hillti drill I have always wanted

You'd have to check the details on hollow core and Amvic. I didn't see a detail - do they have one? I would think that hollow core would also be fine for you, if Amvic has an acceptable cross section and installation detail. Either way, your radiant should be installed as a separate pour on top of your primary concrete floor - so that will take care of any bows or imperfections in the surface of the pre-cast floors.

Either way, you'll need the Hilti. Be sure to get one with a chipping function. It will be your most used tool!

We didn't have to do any coring as we planned out our penetrations really well by using PVC sleeves to block out the pipe and utility penetrations before our pours.

 

[wssix99]

Floors are one of the most complicated decisions of the whole ICF process. Even if you choose wood, the tie-ins to the ICF have numerous details. Some are very easy to install but take more time on the carpentry side of things. Others take more time on the ICF side of things (and are less expensive material-wise) and make the carpentry go much faster.

 

[Firebrick43]

We are building west of Lafayette Indiana. About two hous south of Chicago off of 41. We are going to see how solar hot water works, there will be 500 gallon heat storage tank in the basement. Also the small wood stove will have a water jacket as well to put as much heat as possible into the slab. A traditional gas furnace/ac is going in the basement as well but that will be for the existing house.

http://www.amvicsystem.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/cad/pdf/AMVIC-FLR-002.pdf

Here is the detail for hollow cast planks.

 

[wssix99]

http://www.amvicsystem.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/cad/pdf/AMVIC-FLR-002.pdf

Here is the detail for hollow cast planks.

Interesting. Those look like a definite step up from the composite deck and a lot less labor/grief to install. However; the "bearing plate" detail would make or break the installation. I guess that is left up to the hollow core floor supplier? (I suppose those wouldn't be too bad if one set them like a lintel in the wet concrete and had a good laser level to get them right.)

We are building west of Lafayette Indiana. About two hous south of Chicago off of 41. We are going to see how solar hot water works, there will be 500 gallon heat storage tank in the basement. Also the small wood stove will have a water jacket as well to put as much heat as possible into the slab. A traditional gas furnace/ac is going in the basement as well but that will be for the existing house.

Have you looked in to geothermal at all? For heating, it does exceptionally well in our area. With the extension of the tax credit through the end of 2016 (if you can get your install done by then) it would probably cost you less than your planned system and have much lower operating costs. (Gas is expensive. Stealing heat from the devil is free.) You can run multiple heat pumps (water to air for the existing house, water to water for your new hydronic floors, water to water with remote air handlers or water to HVLP air for your new AC, etc.) off a single well system. You can also take the waste heat in the summer and use it for your residential hot water.

I have heard great things about solar hot water in our area. (In my case the wife and I don't use a lot of hot water, so we'd have a long payback.)

 

[Firebrick43]

Isn't geothermal heat pump pushing 10k? Current house is well insulated and we get by on 300 gallons of propane ~350$ a year and 2 cords of wood in the stove. I expect better with the new part.

 

[ssdave]

If you get an engineer familiar with the composite floors, and tell him what you are doing, I think you could readily get a design that would be easy to do yourself.

I've done exactly one in my career, and it was for exactly the situation you're in; it was a garage over a daylight basement made with ICF. I was the engineer on the project, helping out a contractor friend working for another friend that was the owner. It was quite inexpensive; the way we did it was buy the corrugated steel pans and use LVL beams to support the steel. We got a bunch of pallets and cribbing, and blocked up the floor during the placement and curing. The floor needs held up until the concrete is placed and cured, then it holds itself up plus the load. We had to bridge in some camber, to account for the sag; I calculated that and it came out right when we removed the cribbing. After placing the steel pans, they were bolted to the wood supports, and then there was a lot of work by the owner welding the studs in place. Sealed the edges with foam and backer rod so it wouldn't leak, and it was ready for concrete. The placement of the slab was routine, just like any garage floor on grade.

This type of floor is ideal for a DIY guy, a lot of labor in placing the pans, cribbing, and welding the studs, but not a lot of cost in the materials. If it's designed using raw materials instead of a system, the materials are just the steel and concrete cost.

 

[wssix99]

Isn't geothermal heat pump pushing 10k? Current house is well insulated and we get by on 300 gallons of propane ~350$ a year and 2 cords of wood in the stove. I expect better with the new part.

The actual unit is the same as any other boiler or conventional system, so that would be a wash with all the new equipment you are buying.

The incremental cost is in the geothermal well. That cost depends on if you do a geothermal field or a vertical well and then how big those need to be. (The geo fields are generally less expensive than having a vertical well drilled.)

We have a 5 ton Geo Unit and our vertical well cost us around $15K. The tax credit is a 30% tax rebate on the geo equipment, the well, HVAC labor, and all the attached pieces. We spent $90K on our geo unit, well, and duct work, so our tax rebate was $27K and we ended up majorly in the black our fist year.

If you can pay your HVAC invoice by the end of 2016 and take advantage of the geothermal tax credit, you could deduct off of the radiant boiler, all your radiant tubing, (maybe your floor topping also), a water to air unit for the main house, and the shared well system. It would require some math to figure out where you'd stand. Geothermal also requires some technical know-how to run. Not because its complicated - but because there are so few service companies around who are familiar with the concept. (Inside the box, the units are just like any other heat pump but in the upper midwest there are very few residential HVAC companies with heat pump experience. Down south, it's a different story.)

 

[Ironcrow]

If you get an engineer familiar with the composite floors, and tell him what you are doing, I think you could readily get a design that would be easy to do yourself.

That's what I did. The architect/engineer specified Vulcraft 3VLI-18 steel decking on a CMU wall. The #5 rebar in the wall is bent down into the deck. The deck is poured 5.5 inches thick with #3 rebar on 1 foot OC grid. Vulcraft is puddle welded to a W16x50 beam that bisects the garage below. Each sheet of decking is crimped the adjacent sheets with a special tool the Vulcraft supplier loaned to me. During the pour I cribbed under the deck with 4x4 columns on a 4 foot grid. I cribbed it solid to the decking so there would be no "belly" (3/4" specified) in the garage ceiling when finished. I did all the work myself as owner/builder.

 

[readhead]

Ironcrow, that is an excellent example. As you saw it was pretty easy. What you did is one variation that uses shoring instead of joists. The decking you used had button punched laps instead of screws which is more common on deeper deck. Did you keep the shoring in place for 28 days?

 

[Ironcrow]

Yes, shoring for one month. I was certain shoring it to ensure no belly (just cosmetic for what I was doing) would not make any difference. It, technically, makes the deck slightly stronger in bending once concrete cures. However, the engineer didn't even blink and said the span tables do not assume any decking sag and approved the addition of the shoring, which was not required in the drawing.

I spent the next two years re-using the 4x4s all over the jobsite, for temporary hoists, scaffolding, braces, shoring, cribbing...

 

[Firebrick43]

That is a similar pan to what I was looking at first. 5" slab on it will span the 14 feet I need if I look at the charts with an 85lbs live load. How far did you span iron crow? What welding process for the puddle welding? Did you use studs?

Thanks

 

[Ironcrow]

13.5 feet. With 5.5 inches I was right at the design limit for span (mostly driven by the deck's ability to support the wet concrete without buckling). Theoretically I could have placed the concrete without using any shoring. Besides not wanting the 3/4 inch belly in the garage ceiling, this is the other reason for shoring - wanting to work safely with the pump, crew, and wet concrete 15 feet in the air.

Puddle weld - I just went down the beam, burned a hole in the deck sheeting with the welder and puddled it to the beam. No studs.

 

[Firebrick43]

So the icf guy submitted his quote. As he said it will be expensive, 15$+ a square foot. I Can't swing that. So I have a distributor quoting some Vulcraft 3vli18 decking. Talked to an engineer this morning and will meet with him Wednesday. He said it should cost approximately 500$ to do the calculations and provide a stamp letter laying out beam sizes and spacing as well as concrete reinforcement and specs. Drawings are more and he said with the simple layout should not be required.

 

[Firebrick43]

Quote for decking was 2.71 a square foot. They said until you get over 5000 square feet custom length are not reasonable. 24' and need 28 so I will be cutting and joining together. Need to see if but welding is acceptable. To the installation manual robin!

 

[Danno1]

Puddle weld - I just went down the beam, burned a hole in the deck sheeting with the welder and puddled it to the beam. No studs.

Plug weld...



.

 

[Ironcrow]

Plug weld...



.

Whichever?
http://www.structuremag.org/?p=918

 

[wssix99]

So the icf guy submitted his quote. As he said it will be expensive, 15$+ a square foot. I Can't swing that. So I have a distributor quoting some Vulcraft 3vli18 decking.

The ICF guy submitted his quote for which system? Are you leaning back towards composite deck and dealing with the pain of steel trusses in the ICF?

 

[Firebrick43]

The icf guy submitted a quote for the amdeck forms. It was going to be nearly 10$ a square foot for just forms and would still need to be engineered.

Using the composite deck pan from vulcraft 3vli18 i can span the 13.5 feet i need without steel trusses. Still have to put a single beam down the center but i would need that no matter what. It would be tied into the wall just like the amdeck detail. I will probably use some shoring for safety and to prevent belly as ironcrow

Thanks Wssix99 for info on the tax credits. Doubt i will be able to get geothermal in by the end of the year but looking at them they extended the 30 percent tax break until 2019. Therefore I think I will stick to the solar hot water. That will save me a quite a money.

I'll post an update after I talked to the engineer.

Thank you

 

[wssix99]

Using the composite deck pan from vulcraft 3vli18 i can span the 13.5 feet i need without steel trusses.

That's great.

It would be tied into the wall just like the amdeck detail.

I don't think you can do that. The metal deck penetrating in to the core of the wall would be problematic and would weaken the wall. You'd have to keep the metal decking back and shore/support it at the edge, no matter what. (Come to think about it, you'd need some sort of support around the edge permanently, no matter what, if you aren't going to use trusses.)

To supply that missing support at the edges you'd be missing in a truss-les configuration, you can stagger the cores: (so you have a thicker wall on the lower floor than above)

or you can use brick ledge block. These will give you a concrete "lip" for the decking to rest on. (If you don't have this, the metal deck would want to "delamninate" from the concrete and peel off the bottom of the floor.

^ You will still have the mini-blow-out problem under the deck when you do the pour above. If you tie the concrete floor in to the wall, you'll have to find a way to keep the concrete from flowing in to the wall space and under the steel corrugations. (If you do the staggered core/transition block method, this may be a lot easier to do.)

We used both the transition block method and brick ledge to support 2/3 of our floor and roof trusses. (It's a lot less expensive than the special hardware/truss hangars to hang a LVL band beam around a flat ICF wall.) It makes construction easy, but in particular - the brick ledge detail is tough to finish inside. (I have ideas for that, though.) You need to get creative with the finishes for interior brick ledge block since the wall and ceiling don't meet at a 90 degree angle.

 

[readhead]

You can't **** weld the sheets together. Usually the deck will be a multispan. If not you may have to go with a thicker deck. Why are you ordering decking before the engineer has speced the material?

 

[wssix99]

Why are you ordering decking before the engineer has speced the material?

This is the thing with one-off engineered ICF construction. The owner/contractor has to do the value engineering first. (Paying an engineer to do this could end up costing more than the OP would save by going composite over the Amvic floor system...)

If the engineer comes back with substitutions or suggestions that lower the cost and effort - that's great. Even still, there will be a constant back-and-forth as construct-ability problems are found with these things in the field.

 

[Firebrick43]

No decking is ordered. I just quoted it. Need to see if other suppliers will sell 14' sheets as said above and according to the manual, welding is only to be done over a beam.

 

[rustyjames]

You should be able to get any size you want. I've handled sheets that were over 30'. Sheets are never **** welded, they are lapped over a support and puddle welded.

 

[sarmo3]

great

 

[Firebrick43]

The engineer is working on it. He was familiar with the Vulcraft 3vi. He is sizing the beam, the support columns for the beam and the shoring(not necessary but will do to prevent belly and safety). He prompted so good conversations on how to tie in the beam, deck, and footers/columns. Also he was pleased with the information including cad files. He didn't have to go looking for it saving him time and therefore me money.

I will need the pans to be the full width however as it helps with pan stiffness until the concrete sets.

Will report back when he is done

 

[wssix99]

The engineer is working on it. He was familiar with the Vulcraft 3vi. He is sizing the beam, the support columns for the beam and the shoring(not necessary but will do to prevent belly and safety). He prompted so good conversations on how to tie in the beam, deck, and footers/columns.

This is the easy, conventional/baby food stuff.

Also he was pleased with the information including cad files.

I see that Amvic has details for the non-truss methods I was talking about. Did you figure out how you are going to tie the the floors in to the ICF? It looks like there is just one straight forward way for the walls parallel to the pans, but you have lots of decisions for the walls perpendicular to them.

 

[Firebrick43]

Here is a detail of my deck.

Warning this drawing was done by me and no one should use it. You need an an engineer to calculate everything together.
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