DIY Concrete Footings for a Backyard Pergola

what's going on guys today i'm going to be pouring some concrete footings for a pergola that i plan to build in my backyard and i thought i'd document the process the first thing i had to do was measure out and place stakes where the footings needed to be this required knowing the dimensions of the structure that i'm going to place here and required a little bit of planning once the footings are in place it'd be nearly impossible to move them if something ended up not quite right [Music] my backyard has these brick edgers all around the perimeter since i know that i eventually want to cover this area with a ground level deck or pavers i went ahead and started removing them from the build area for now fortunately you guys don't have to watch me dig all three of these holes i'm still learning how to use this camera which also means learning how long the battery lasts my local building code requires footings to be a minimum of 16 inches deep to help me achieve this and ensure consistency i'm using sonotubes which can be found in your local building supply store cutting this four foot long tube into thirds worked out perfectly giving me the 16 inches that i needed [Music] be sure to check with your city for how deep yours might need to be if your area gets lots of freezing weather be prepared to dig much deeper than i had to also don't be afraid to give your local code compliance office a call they're generally there to help and can be a great source of information [Music] next i placed all three sonotubes into their holes and spent some time making sure the centers of each tube were where i wanted them to be in relation to one another this process took a bit of time but again once the concrete goes in these things aren't going anywhere [Music] [Music] once i had them where i wanted i filled the space around the outsides with some dirt to keep them from shifting around during the concrete pour next i used a level to make sure the tube wasn't off kilter and made some small adjustments once they were all level themselves i ran a string between each tube and made sure they were level with each other the concrete i used for these is quikrete fast setting mix in the red bag this stuff is a great choice for footings and the bag advertises that you can just pour the dry stuff straight into the hole and pour water on top of it mix it and you're done but i really wanted to make sure i got it thoroughly mixed so i chose to mix it up in a wheelbarrow before pouring [Music] the pros can just mix this stuff by eye using a garden hose but since i don't work with it that often i added the water a little bit at a time you absolutely want to avoid adding too much water as the concrete won't cure properly and will lose its strength you also want to make sure you don't have any pockets of dry mix remaining either [Music] [Music] do [Music] this is about what the consistency will look like when it's ready to go [Music] [Music] i wasn't sure how many bags each hole would need so i did one bag first just to get an idea i worked quickly to mix up the rest as this stuff sets up very quickly [Music] so [Music] [Music] i ran a 2x4 across the top in a sawing motion to level out the top of the footing in a process known as screeding my goal is to create a nice flat surface for the post of my perla to sit on as well as avoid collecting any standing water from the rain or in my case irrigation because we don't really get any rain here for my anchor point i've chosen to use an anchor bolt which is an l shaped rod with a threaded end that will eventually attach to a base plate a lot of times you'll see people put their post into the hole and pour concrete around it for me this is fine for fences but i prefer the use of anchor points for decks and pergolas that way you can see what's going on at the base of your structure and makes future repairs much easier [Music] i probably spent way too much time trying to make the top of the footings look nice but at this point i still wasn't sure what was going to be under the pergola if these were going to be exposed at least they wouldn't be an eyesore [Music] [Music] so now that we had one down we just repeated the process two more times we're gonna let these guys dry for a few days and by then we should be ready to build

Channel: Household How To

Views: 121,387

Rating: 4.6072931 out of 5

Keywords: concrete, footing, post hole, pergola, anchor, building

Id: Jqv7irKDwjg

Length: 9min 40sec (580 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 18 2021