03-02-2008, 03:45 AM
My wife and I went to the Seattle Home Show last weekend and we stopped and chatted with a guy who specializes in preparing homes for earthquakes. He had all the standard stuff that you'd expect; strapping for the water heater and tall cabinets and such, but one that really caught my eye was a bracket for attaching a house to the foundation. I took his material and emailed him yesterday looking for these brackets. He said they're available in Home Depot or Lowe's, but I got a blank stare from the hardware people I asked in both of these stores.
Our house was built in 1958 and the sill is bolted to the concrete foundation in just enough places to ensure everything on top could be constructed. I want to install something to do what I can to keep the house from shifting off the foundation if\when we get a good jolt.
There isn't enough room between the sill and the floor to hold a hammer drill to drill through the sill and into the top of the foundation, so I can't use anchor bolts in the vertical direction. This bracket was interesting because it fits to the side of the foundation and the sill. It's installed by drilling two anchor bolts horizontally into the foundation and four lag bolts into the sill. I can't find these on the net, and I can't imagine what else to call them besides "earthquake brackets", or "foundation brackets".
Does anyone have a source for this type of hardware? Any other ideas for preparing my home for an earthquake are also welcome.
Mahalo nui loa,
Brian and Mary
Lynnwood, WA\Discovery Harbour
Our house was built in 1958 and the sill is bolted to the concrete foundation in just enough places to ensure everything on top could be constructed. I want to install something to do what I can to keep the house from shifting off the foundation if\when we get a good jolt.
There isn't enough room between the sill and the floor to hold a hammer drill to drill through the sill and into the top of the foundation, so I can't use anchor bolts in the vertical direction. This bracket was interesting because it fits to the side of the foundation and the sill. It's installed by drilling two anchor bolts horizontally into the foundation and four lag bolts into the sill. I can't find these on the net, and I can't imagine what else to call them besides "earthquake brackets", or "foundation brackets".
Does anyone have a source for this type of hardware? Any other ideas for preparing my home for an earthquake are also welcome.
Mahalo nui loa,
Brian and Mary
Lynnwood, WA\Discovery Harbour
Aloha pumehana,
Brian and Mary
Lynnwood, WA\Discovery Harbour
Brian and Mary
Lynnwood, WA\Discovery Harbour