lostNtranslation

So after having the chimney torn down by my friends over at Keystone Basement Systems I needed to fill the left over hole in my foundation.

One of the reasons the chimney had to come down

After consulting several close friends it was determined that the best course of action was to fill with

Right before they took the chimney down

cement.   I’ve never dealt with cement/concrete before, but after doing some quick online research I found nothing to indicate it was past my abilities.  So off to busy beaver I went.  I found that I needed approximately 4 cubic feet of cement to fill the hole.  So I purchased 8 bags of premium quickcrete and a tub for mixing.

Mixing cement by hand is pretty tough work, but I managed to get through with a basic small black tub.  I mixed one batch at a time a slowly filled the hole.  I had to go slowly because on the inside of the house the only thing holding the cement back was a piece of flashing stuck to the wall with duct tape(super secure).  After about three bags I started really working the mix into the holes of the house to make sure those we’re filled properly.   All the time I’m running back and forth from the back of the house into the basement to check and make sure everything is holding tight.

Here you can see the massive hole left by the chimney

Luckily everything held without trouble.  I ended up using 6 of the 8 bags I purchased.  The other two will come in

Here's the finished job from outside

handy soon enough.  Part of the reason for this project is to complete a garden on the back of the house where the chimney once stood..  So one additional thing I did was to put two posts into the cement as small footers for a lattice structure we want to use to cover the vent pipe that now replaces the chimney.