Some of the Steps Followed in Building Homes

Have you ever wondered how a house is built? What holds up the ceilings and the walls? What keeps the rain out? What parts go into making a house? How many different people are involved when a house goes up? If you would like to know the answers to questions like these, or if you have simply been curious to know all the steps that go into making a new home, then rea­d on.

So let's start at the beginning. What is a house? An online dictionary describes a house as a “A structure serving as a dwelling for one or more persons, especially for a family." You probably have a very specific mental image of the "typical house." It is a structure on its own piece of land, generally with a lawn and plants outside. It has a pitched roof, walls covered in brick or siding, windows and doors. Inside there are rooms like the kitchen, the living room, bedrooms and bathrooms. This is the basic structure stated by most Adelaide home builders.

One of the amazing things about homes is that the huge majority of them are built using completely standardized building practices. One reason for this consistency is a set of uniform building codes that apply across the country. Another reason is cost -- the techniques used to build homes produce reliable housing quickly at a low cost (relatively speaking). If you ever watch any house being built, you will find that it goes through the some of the following steps:

Independent crews known as subcontractors perform many of the functions. For example, one subcontractor specializing in framing, while a completely different subcontractor specializing in roofing does the roofing generally does the framing. Each subcontractor is an independent business. All of the subcontractors are coordinated by a contractor who oversees the job and is responsible for completing the house on time and on budget.

The first crew on the site handles site preparation. Often, this crew and the foundation crew are the same people, but sometimes not (especially if there are many trees on the lot). Houses are generally built on a foundation that is a basement, a crawl space or a slab. The site-preparation crew typically arrives on the site with a backhoe and/or bulldozer. The crew's job is to clear the site of any trees, rocks and debris, level the site if necessary and dig as necessary for the foundation being built.

The example house shown here is built on a crawl space. For a crawl space, the site preparation crew digs a set of trenches and holes. Concrete is poured into these trenches and holes and will act as the interface between the foundation wall and the ground. Concrete takes approximately four weeks to cure to full strength (depending on the weather), so once the concrete is poured nothing will happen for some period while the initial curing takes place.

Slabs, basements and crawl spaces are the three main foundation systems used on houses. In wet and coastal areas, it is sometimes common to put houses up on posts as well. The framing crew is the next group of people on the site. They start by building the floor (unless the house uses a slab foundation, in which case the slab is the floor). The framing crew next begins with the walls. Walls are assembled on the floor and then raised into place. This house uses trusses for the roof framing. Trusses are pre-fabricated, triangulated wooden structures used to support the roof. The alternative is to build up the roof's frame with 2x8s and 2x10s. Trusses are quite common these days. When plumbers follow all the rules, they are able to create extremely reliable and safe plumbing systems. Over time, new rules get added as people realize funny little quirks and nuances. These new rules prevent problems in the future, and each one makes the code a little improved.

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