Seismic Retrofit - Phase I

[chidorho]

For a building to perform well in an earthquake, it needs to provide continuous load paths from the roof down to the foundation. There's a science to this, especially to construction of adequate shear walls. But I'm just doing a retrofit, and there's not an easy way to upgrade walls. Fortunately, the greatest loads are at the base of the house, and

Comments

[chikuru]

Fascinating stuff, but I have two questions: 1) What is a mud sill? 2) How did you get Dustin Hoffman to help you with your house?

[chidorho]

The mud sill is the part of the wood framing that rests directly on the foundation. Ours is a 2x6; I think that's typical. The rim joist (another 2x6, tho' really it's 5 1/2 by 1 1/2) rests entirely on the mud sill and follows the perimeter of the house. The floor joists connect to the rim joist at the ends.

Dustin Hoffman? Now we just call him "Dusty."

[grieve]

I actually thought the nail was stuck to your hand by some sort of glue. Interesting to know that it uses magnets.

[chidorho]

I tho't it was kind of goofy, but chose the gloves for other reasons. Then I decided it was a handy feature. Tends to pick up more than one nail at a time, tho'.

RSS feed?

[anonymous]

So where do I find the RSS feed info for your blog? - Sowmya

Re: RSS feed?

[chidorho]

chidorho.livejournal.com/data/rss

In Google Reader, there's a link next to the title of each entry that makes it easy to respond.

[anonymous]

That's california. Out of work actors will do any thing for pocket change. I have Helen Hunt cleaning my house twice a month. - Sowmya

Cute couple

[anonymous]

I was showing a co-worker the picture of the mummified rat and she saw this photo of you and Mike and said "Look how cute they are!"

Oh and it's been almost 2 months since your last post.

- Sowmya