Foundation Wall Missed The Footers

That some shitty looking work there. You should fire your builder. It will only get worse moving forward.

As I have recently discovered, builders and remodelers will hide/cover/lie about all sorts of stuff and you won’t find out it is messed up until many years later when they are long gone. Get them to do it right now.

a couple things

it appears you are building a block chain wall foundation. So they earth formed the grade beam which is perfectly fine. It looks like shite at the edges but it will all get covered up, there was no need to edge form it.

look at your structural drawings…look and see where the engineer wanted the block to fall on the grade beam. If it’s on the edge then you are fine(ish). Obviously if it’s in the middle then you aren’t fine. But just because it’s not aesthetically pleasing at this point in construction doesn’t mean there’s an issue.

If there is an issue with the block/grade beam connection (again, look at your drawings) then you’ll need to address with your builder so he can consult with the engineer for a solution (and there’s always a solution)

Good luck

Stop saying FOOTER!

quote:

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look and see where the engineer wanted the block to fall on the grade beam. If it’s on the edge then you are fine(ish)

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I looked at the drawings. Oddly, there's a pier detail that calls for a minimum 5" set back from each edge (block centered). However, the foundation wall detail has no minimum. The drawing does show the block centered on the footer but there's no detail stating a required setback.

Interestingly there's a detail showing foundation with brick veneer which also doesn't indicate a minimum set back but shows the block centered on the footer with the brick veneer on the footer edge. The wall in question isn't getting a brick veneer. In my non-engineering line of thinking, if the brick ledge can be on the edge of the footer then the block should be able to be on the edge as well?

I also talked to my builder. He (obviously) said it wasn't a problem and code only requires 70% of the block to be on the footer. He did agree that it was my house and my call and he'd would do whatever I wanted to be satisfied. He said he could either cut it out and re-pour it, or dig out beside the footer and extend the footer to be under the block. Both instances would have rebar drilled into the footer to "bond" them together.

Based on your string line 70% of the block will be on fluff of the concrete on the side. I'm going to go with the other poster and tell you you need to find a different contractor. It's not the right way to do it. I'm a contractor and really dislike the shoddy ones. Any variance in the foundation transfers to the top. Deviations only increase in construction.

is it brick veneer? or ....?

the point to consider is that it would not have been any additional effort to locate the grade beam correctly. He made a mistake and it’s a pretty obvious one. There were multiple opportunities to confirm whether it was correct or not just by using the batter boards

SE here. I am 100% having them fix this to provide full block bearing on the footing. The last thing you want is a foundation failure because someone did bad work and the GC talked you into accepting it.

Of equal concern to me would be the lack of vertical dowels connecting the footing to the CMU wall.

That is a must.

Hell man have something done OP just so this subcontractor and contractor do a better job of doing it right next time for someone else. That's a big damn miss IMO, some very lazy measuring it seems like to me.

Another reason to have it fixed to some degree is so that your general contractor doesn't think you are just a pushover and going to allow some other work to slide. Its one thing to be a PITA high maintenance customer and home owner but there's nothing wrong to just expect normal work.