Post Frame Apartment Buildings I have thought about the possibilities of constructing apartments using post frame construction for years, however a recent query from reader DERRICK in CINCINNATI brought it to the forefront of my thoughts. Dave writes: “Can you build apartment buildings out of your products? Nothing fancy. Just affordable living in a rural […]

DEAR POLE BARN GURU: I have an upstairs (loft) exterior opening that is 50″ wide by 68″ tall. I want to build a door with the National Hardware tab-loc frame and cover it with r-panel siding. How much overhang on each side, and top and bottom do I need to make the door? What should […]

Help! My Pole Barn Has Frost Heave Reader DAVID in MINNESOTA writes: “I looked through many pages of your blog and found nothing yet that deals with my frost heave problem. Bought lake property 8 years ago that had a 24 X 24 pole shed that was 5 years old. It has concrete floor with […]

From reader Paul in Bismarck: “How do you deal with the requirement for a 4 foot frost wall on buildings that will have plumbing installed in them. Typically, the concrete footing on a stick built structures qualifies as the frost wall. How is this accomplished with a pole building that will be used as a […]

Reader KEN in FORT COLLINS writes: “HI MIKE! We just bought an acreage with an existing 36 x 48 post frame farm storage building. In talking to the prior owner, we have learned that the builder did not use cookies, footing pads or a cement bottom collar. So nothing to prevent settling (He did nail […]

Don’t Sink the Pole Barn Floor Reader Clay has contributed the beginnings of this article, with a concern his pole barn floor might sink. Thank you Clay. “I am about to construct a 24’x32′ building to be used as a woodworking shop. I am strongly considering a pole barn.  Now I do not want a […]

DEAR POLE BARN GURU: I am installing re-bar hairpins prepping for a pour in a Hansen pole barn. My question is about the inside poles. I have on rebar per outside pole. Do i put two rebar hairpins on the inside poles?   Thanks ALCUIN in LAVEEN DEAR ALCUIN: The purpose of the rebar hairpins […]

This is construction, things happen. The true mark of how any particular project goes is not everything going perfectly without a hitch, it is the ability to solve challenges when they arise. The scenario below is one which I have never had a DIY person do (shout out to all of you who are putting […]

DEAR POLE BARN GURU: I am looking for a bottom guide for a sliding barn door. I was hoping to get a guide with a roller vs. just a roller. I noticed some guides trap the roller in a channel on the bottom of the door. I would like to know if you have that […]

Placement of Sturdi-Wall Plus Brackets I am enjoying our client Dan who is in the process of getting started with his new Hansen Pole Buildings’ kit package. My educated guess is he is going to construct one truly beautiful building. Dan has a great question, which I will share: “So I went ahead and purchased […]

Grade is at… ANSI/ASABE S618 Post Frame Building System Nomenclature has the definition of grade as, “10.1 Grade line (grade level): The line of intersection between the building exterior and the finished ground surface and/or top of the pavement in contact with the building exterior”. On Hansen Pole Buildings’ Engineered Building Plans, grade is denoted […]

I’ve Hit a Boulder, What do I do? When I was building, the rock the size of a Volkswagon was generally parked in the last hole being dug on any given project. After digging all of the other holes – moving the building to avoid the rock just never felt like a viable option. I […]

Clients make for the best blog article subjects, here we have client Dan at a relative loss as to what to do about concrete backfill dilemma in and around his building columns. DEAR POLE BARN GURU: Hi there!  So I am about to receive everything for a 22x34x10 pole barn. The plan is to add […]

DEAR POLE BARN GURU: Is it possible to get a quote from you guys? Do you just deliver material or build too? I am looking to build a house pole barn in Belle Plain MN Do you have to have a 36″ frost wall to build on a concrete slab? JOSHUA in BELLE PLAIN   […]

DEAR POLE BARN GURU: We are planning to build a pole barn in the near future and, I need some advice on the footings. depth width etc. We are planning to use rough cut 6×6 pine for the posts and plan to use anchors. The soil here on the property is very sandy. I’ve set […]

DEAR POLE BARN GURU: Did I read on this web page that there is a installation product that is one inch thick with a R rating of R-50? DELLA in DALLAS DEAR DELLA: Unless I am mistaken, I believe your question is about insulation, rather than installation. Yes, there is such a product. Here is […]

DEAR POLE BARN GURU: Good morning. I have been reading the various blog entries for several days, regarding pole barn construction.  I have been in contact with your design professional, but I a question that I thought might be a question that could possibly benefit others with a similar situation. I am in the process […]

DEAR POLE BARN GURU: Is concrete included in price? TRACEY in SUMTER DEAR TRACEY: No, we do not include concrete in the price and here is why: Most familiar, as well as most available is the Sakrete® general purpose High Strength Concrete Mix. When mixed per the manufacturer’s instructions, this mix affords a compressive strength of […]

DEAR POLE BARN GURU: I am considering using pole barn construction to add on to an existing metal building I have I also already have a 24×34 foundation were I want to put the add on. This will be a residential building. Would you recommend using drill in slab brackets to connect the post to […]

Another great and well thought out question, which is best answered at length. Dear Pole Barn Guru: The construction manual states that concrete slab floors should be poured so there is 3-3/4” of skirt board left exposed above the slab. What do you do if you want or need to have a typical slab slope toward […]

There is Something Wrong with This Picture My disclaimer, this is NOT a Hansen Pole Building. It was advertised on Craigslist by a builder in Kentucky. There are some odd things about this pole building – one of them which is crucial and the building owner is going to hate probably forever. Maybe longer. The […]

Another great question from a loyal reader: DEAR POLE BARN GURU: How would you install a concrete floor in one of your pole buildings. RICK in TOLEDO DEAR RICK: Here is the chapter from the Hansen Pole Buildings Construction Manual: Chapter 18: Concrete Slabs While preference is to have building shell completed prior to pouring […]

What’s better: A poured foundation or block? How about – neither? Try post frame footing design! Even though my lovely bride and I are now living 98% of the time on the eastern border of South Dakota, I still read the online version of my formerly local newspaper – The Spokesman Review, from Spokane, Washington. […]

When I began writing these articles a few short years ago, I assumed I would run out of subject matter after about 100 or so. Silly me – as I’ve now produced in excess of 1100 of them and I keep realizing I have totally skipped over some obvious subject matter. One of those which […]

Do it Best® I get a lot of people asking some great questions of the Pole Barn Guru. Some of which take some lengthy answers, in order to adequately make the point. Here is one which involves the thought of doing business through a Do it Best® store would add a level of security. For […]

I’ve espoused previously on the joys of hydronic radiant floor heating (https://www.hansenpolebuildings.com/2012/08/radiant-floor-heating/) and would encourage anyone who is going to install a concrete slab on grade in their new (or existing) post frame (pole) building to consider at least making a provision for it in the future. As we all realize, once a concrete floor […]

How appropriate to have the following question asked after having just written recently about screeding concrete! DEAR POLE BARN GURU: Why does the concrete pad get poured at a level below the top of the bottom skirt board? If I bring the concrete level with the top, it is easier for to skreet level, plus […]

My long time readers will recall concrete flatwork is not my friend and I will avoid it whenever necessary. In the event one is forced into doing flatwork (apparently some folks actually enjoy it), concrete screeding is something to know about. Screeding is the process where a concrete finisher (a real live person, not a […]

One of the most surprising things about steel is that it has an expansion coefficient nearly equal to that of modern concrete. If this were not so, it would cause problems because of additional longitudinal and perpendicular stresses as the temperature changed following setting. Although rebar has ribs which bind it mechanically to the concrete, it […]

The Hole Enchilada Yesterday I began hacking away at my neighbor’s new pole building under construction. Today, I will dig even deeper (pun intended)! Leroy and his building crew arrived on Thursday to begin building. My bride and I had to take a detour most of the day to go to Fargo to visit grandchildren […]

Build to Match the Pole Building Plans Picture this, if you will….. A monitor style post frame (pole) building. The center portion is 24 feet wide by 48 feet long with a 24 foot eave height. On each side of the center is a 12 foot wide “wing”. The right wing is a roof only […]

Welcome to Ask the Pole Barn Guru – where you can ask questions about building topics, with answers posted on Mondays.  With many questions to answer, please be patient to watch for yours to come up on a future Monday segment.  If you want a quick answer, please be sure to answer with a “reply-able” […]

About a year ago the Technical Department of Hansen Pole Buildings was contacted by the manufacturer of the Toci Ground Anchor: “We manufacture the Toci Ground Anchor, an anchoring device that you may find useful in your line of business. The Toci Ground Anchor safely secures any outdoor structure or building to the ground without […]

From Hansen Pole Buildings’ Designer Rachel: “A nice lady from Pennsylvania called and said she was looking to get some advice.  Her husband died five months ago and she is having a pole building put up.  It sounds as though they have the poles up, skirtboard on and the concrete poured although there is a […]

In an article last year I included a reference to “floating poles”: https://www.hansenpolebuildings.com/blog/2014/05/one-pour-reinforcement-cage/ But how would one go about actually floating poles? Once all of the column holes have been dug, distribute the poles about the perimeter of the building, laying them perpendicular to the hole they are to be placed in, with one end […]

Part of being able to determine a budget for a new pole building is the cost of the premix concrete needed to backfill the holes with. At Hansen Pole Buildings, our engineers calculate the minimum amount of post hole concrete required to prevent your new building from settling (due to the dead weight of the […]

We recently received a request from a client who had a building burn to the ground. The client proposed to reuse their existing concrete – which to me has always resonated as a bad choice. But is it actually a bad choice? Concrete can be some amazing stuff. In June of 1987, I was privileged […]

We Don’t Always Do Things Perfectly, But We Do Listen Last summer Hansen Pole Buildings Supplied a pole building kit package to a client who experienced a few challenges and I took the time to address each one of them. This is Part I of a four part response. First – here is my initial […]

How to Attach Interior Wood Stud Walls to Pole Building Concrete Floors As a child I grew up living in the last house in the neighborhood – the road went from asphalt paved to dirt at the end of our lot. My father was a framing contractor, and true to the adage – a builder’s […]

This is a story which is heard all too frequently. And it always revolves around clients having just poured the concrete slabs in their new buildings. Even more so when the building has a low perm rated vapor retarder under the concrete. Vapor retarders do exactly as their name implies, they retard the movement of […]

Welcome to Ask the Pole Barn Guru – where you can ask questions about building topics, with answers posted on Mondays.  With many questions to answer, please be patient to watch for yours to come up on a future Monday or Saturday segment.  If you want a quick answer, please be sure to answer with […]

Welcome to Ask the Pole Barn Guru – where you can ask questions about building topics, with answers posted on Mondays. With many questions to answer, please be patient to watch for yours to come up on a future Monday or Saturday segment. If you want a quick answer, please be sure to answer with […]

The original Hansen Pole Buildings column encasement design, had the pressure preservative columns placed to the base of an augured hole. Pre-mix concrete was then poured around the lower 16-18 inches of the column to form a bottom collar. The bond strength between concrete and wood was sufficient to enable the assembly to resist both […]

Having spent two decades directly involved in the prefabricated metal connector plated roof truss industry (with titles running from just above the janitor, to owner of two plants) steel truss plates have always fascinated me. From Pro-Footer® comes the UP-Lift plate, which is an ingenious adaptation of truss plate technology. They are designed to help […]

I have a serious case of “like” for The Home Depot®. When my children were little, every time we got near one, they would start to chant (in unison), “Home Depot…..Home Depot”. Yesterday morning I was in The Home Depot® at Grand Junction, Colorado. It was a special moment, when a gentleman came up to […]

New!  The Pole Barn Guru’s mailbox is overflowing with questions.  Due to high demand, he is answering questions on Saturdays as well as Mondays. Welcome to Ask the Pole Barn Guru – where you can ask questions about building topics, with answers posted on Mondays.  With many questions to answer, please be patient to watch […]

The phones ring at Hansen Pole Buildings every day from dawn-to-dusk, and sometimes both before and after. Some calls are a little more interesting than others. Bright and early, first thing this morning Eric (one of the owners of Hansen Pole Buildings) gets a phone call from Lowe’s®. It seems Lowe’s® has a pole building […]

I really, really enjoy interactive clients. The ones who pay attention to what is going on (chances are, if you are reading this, you are one too). They help keep me on my toes, as well. I’ve been enjoying interacting with John. Over the weekend he came up with this for me: “I looked at […]

Welcome to Ask the Pole Barn Guru – where you can ask questions about building topics, with answers posted on Mondays.  With many questions to answer, please be patient to watch for yours to come up on a future Monday segment.  If you want a quick answer, please be sure to answer with a “reply-able” […]

Client calls into my office at the end of the day Friday and says his Building Official will only accept his new pole building construction with holes 48 inches deep, with six inch thick concrete cookies in the bottom of the hole, and no concrete backfill around the columns. Here is some background…. The building […]

This is just wrong – in so many ways…. As my loyal readers know, I try to read every posting I can on the ‘net regarding pole buildings. Sadly, more than a few of them are downright scary. These are excerpts from a recent chat room posting: “I built this barn last year. I did 80% […]

In typical pole building construction, holes are augured into the earth, columns are placed in the hole so concrete can be placed below the column to act as a footing for vertical support, as well as to encase the lower portion of the column. Above this “bottom collar” compacted soil backfill is used to fill […]

In yesterday’s posting, I quoted Harris Hyman, an engineer from Portland, Oregon, who appears to know his stuff when it comes to preventing frost heave. In a July 1994 article, in the Journal of Light Construction he listed some methods which don’t work to prevent frost heave: “Another method for dealing with frost involves wrapping […]

Coulomb Theory As I have probably mentioned a few times, I learn new stuff every day. Sometimes, what I learn causes me to rethink my prior positions on subjects. I’d like to believe this is a good thing, as it keeps me from being so rigid. I’ve always had a bad attitude toward the use […]

My home outside of Spokane, Washington is located in an area which is subjected to a variety of weathering patterns which can prove to be stressful to concrete flatwork. Being on a lake, subjects concrete to high humidity, due to the amount of moisture in the area. Added to this, my home is in an […]

Dear Pole Barn Guru is normally my Monday Feature, but lately I’ve gotten backed up on questions – so in honor of Friday the 13th, am hosting an additional segment.  This is why I encourage those with questions to provide email addresses, which are used for nothing other than answering your questions. We don’t SPAM […]

Concrete – when cured it normally looks gray and is hard. Not much more to know about it… right? Wrong. All concrete is not created equal. Modern concrete mixtures often contain many additives, some of them used to decrease the selling price of the pre-mix, others for strength or curing characteristics. Back in the “olden […]

Welcome to Ask the Pole Barn Guru – where you can ask questions about building topics, with answers posted on Mondays.  With many questions to answer, please be patient to watch for yours to come up on a future Monday segment.  If you want a quick answer, please be sure to answer with a “reply-able” […]

According to TKProduct.com: “Drying shrinkage is an inherent, unavoidable property of concrete. Shrinkage of plain concrete drying is .72 inches per 100 feet from its plastic state to a dried state with 50% relative humidity, this shrinkage will take place when the moisture leaves the concrete.” Now this research, on my part, was triggered by […]

DEAR POLE BARN GURU:  Can these pole barn kits be placed on a basement foundation? MOTIVATED IN MEXICO MISSOURI DEAR MOTIVATED: I happen to live on a lake, which is nestled into a mountain valley. For the most part, the parcels of land around the lake tend to be very narrow and very steep (only […]

In Robert J. Hoyle, Jr. and Frank Woeste’s 1989 textbook “Wood Technology in the Design of Structures”, in Chapter 21 (Post-Frame Building Design) on Page 336 is the following: “Concrete encasement of the post in the ground contact area enlarges the friction surface and can generally be credit with a wood-to-concrete bond strength of 30 […]

Truss Plates for Column Uplift The uplift of column in post frame (pole buildings) is a factor which is seemingly all too often overlooked in building design. Several methods for resisting uplift forces are utilized.  However the most popular option which historically has been used seems to be to pretend uplift doesn’t exist! Sadly, the […]

When I was a teenager, I worked summers for my Dad and Uncles, who were the largest framing contractors in the Spokane, WA area. One of their frequent clients was a developer named Terry Lettic. I remember Terry and my Dad discussing the pros and cons of apartments built with concrete slabs versus over crawl […]

DEAR POLE BARN GURU: I have read much debate about setting the poles in concrete with no “footing” beneath them vs. setting the poles on a concrete footing and back filling with gravel and earth. Seems to be an issue of rot.  What do you recommend? MYSTIFIED IN MAGNOIA DEAR MYSTIFIED: It seems you and […]

Under Slab Plumbing In most pole buildings, any water and waste plumbing lines are placed beneath the poured concrete slab on grade. In some cases (especially post frame houses), elevated wood floors are used to create an under floor crawl space, making these lines accessible in the future, without the need for costly jackhammer or […]

DEAR POLE BARN GURU:  I have a full size tennis court, we want to put a pole barn on the tennis court (we don’t play tennis) The barn would be 30 x 60 obviously leaving an asphalt perimeter larger than the barn around the barn – how would you seal the edges where the barn […]

A Hansen Pole Buildings client in California has just today approved the plans for his new post frame building and poses the question: “We are in a no frost area with no snow load, so why are the concrete piers so large and deep??” In response: “The column embedment (depth and diameter of the holes) […]

Greetings…and WELCOME to my new blog Feature – Dear Pole Barn Guru! Starting today….each Monday I will post questions submitted to me about pole buildings and pole barn construction, products for use in pole buildings, along with my answers.  Scroll to the bottom if you have a burning question for the Pole Barn Guru, and […]

This is a true story, about the construction of an all-steel building; however the events could spell the doom of any building project – regardless of the structural framework. Shifting Piers Geo-technical engineers were called out to a jobsite to investigate why it was the concrete piers supporting an under construction all-steel building were unstable. […]

Alan was a post frame building contractor for years, prior to becoming a Building Designer for Hansen Pole Buildings. If I had to estimate, I’d venture Alan constructed well over 200 of our buildings. Recently, Alan had a client question the thickness of the concrete footings, beneath the columns, used to support the pressure preservative […]

When Judy, the principal owner of Hansen Buildings, purchased the 20 plus year old 10,000 square foot pole building used as a shipping warehouse for Hansen Pole Buildings, little did she know it came along with a hidden “gift”. The previous owner had let his dogs run loose in the building, and the dogs did […]

Rachel, one of the Hansen Pole Buildings Designers recently took a call from a client who was disappointed because we did not provide the concrete for their new pole building kit package. Most people are familiar with Sakcrete® readi-mix concrete. There is probably not a lumberyard in America which does not have it available for […]

Ever feel like things tend to happen in threes? This past week, my three times event has been Hansen Pole Buildings Designers and their clients asking about “Alaska Slabs”. Concrete foundations, for buildings other than pole buildings, traditionally consist of three parts.  Footings are wide areas of concrete at the base of foundation walls. Usually […]

Perma-columns are manufactured by the same company who produces the Sturdi-Wall brackets. Paraphrased from the company’s information: Perma-Columns are five foot precast concrete columns which are designed to keep wood out of the ground, ensuring a post frame building’s foundation will never rot. They are the first product to combine the economy of post frame construction with […]

I was talking with one of our clients yesterday. His builder was concerned because constructing the new pole building first, then pouring the concrete slab seemed backwards to him. Here is the information I shared with the client: While the preference is to have the building shell completed prior to pouring concrete slabs, at the […]

I know none of us has ever experienced this condition, but we all know of someone who has had the hurling issue, often after a period of personal discussion with some of the friends of George Thorogood. In this instance, I’m not thinking either of the example above, or the tasty oatmeal raisin cookies my […]

We were at a vendor event for the DirectBuy in Beaverton, Oregon when a member approached us looking for advice on how to seal an existing concrete floor in her pole barn. It seems the floor is always damp. I’ve always recommended placing an insulated vapor barrier beneath any new interior concrete floor. I’ve had […]