Building advice for the Ultimate Boat House.

[gsganzer]

Eddie,
Why do you need piers at all? I've seen some boat houses on Possum Kingdom and very few of them have piers. The entire boat house floats (same as you intend), but the boat house is kept out from the shore by the walkway and two trusses. The walkway is in the center and the trusses (20 feet long or so) attach to each corner of the boat house and anchor back to the shore. The trusses usually angle from the shore to the boathouse (sort of triangulate) to keep the boathouse from drifting left to right. This allows the boathouse to rise and fall with the lake level. The only change is the angle of the walkway to the boathouse as the lake level rises and falls. The trusses and walkway are all hinged at the boathouse and the shore to allow up/down movement.

I don't know if all that makes sense, but I can draw a sketch if you want.

Weld all the components up and then send them to a galvanizer. I have some galvanizers near Dallas if you need names. One note: If you have the parts galvanized, drill all the tube and/or pipe members (minimum 5/8" holes) so you get galvanized inside and outside.

 

[mjarrels]

Cut limestone... been used for years to hold up railroad and road bridges. Looks better with age.

mark

 

[gordon21]

What about the precast tapered square concrete poles similar to utility poles? They would be installed virtually the same as PT poles. No matter what you do, make sure to install sacrificial anodes for him. It is better to eat away cheap replaceable anodes instead of the boats lower units. A professionally run marina will have them. Corrosion happens in fresh water too; just not as fast as salt water.

 

[EddieWalker]

This may interest you Home

Those are probably what he was talking about. He didn't give me a website, or company name on the, just that he was looking at fiberglass poles. Thanks for the link, they look allot nicer then I expected them to.

gsganzer,

Hi Gordon. Not sure why he doesn't want a floating boat house. It is a fairly exclusive country club with allot of restrictions, but I have no idea if that's one of them or not. I'll mention it to him, but since I have zero experience building on floats, it might be an issue. I've never built a boat house either, but he likes my work and what I've done for him before.

Thanks for the offer to help with a place to get metal galvanized. Any chance you know the lifespan of galvanized pipe set in fresh water?

Mark,

Limestone isn't an option in this area. Down around Austin, it's everywhere, but here, we just have clay and sand. Rock of any kind is very rare.

Gordon,

I like the precast concrete pole idea. I mentioned to him that concrete piles would be perfect, to which he responded, where do we get them, and how do we install them?

Neither of us have actually spoke to the guys who install the poles, so we're just fishing for ideas right now without any idea of what is possible.

I have a few months until I'm even able to start, if then, so we have plenty of time.

Thanks,
Eddie

 

[gordon21]

A quick search found this Texas supplier plus many others. These are pre-stressed. Ask your local utility companies where they source their poles that cross lakes, estuaries, etc. A typical installation can be done two ways. On small poles, a hole is drilled or pounded only a few inches larger than the post to be set. (similar to a wooden fence post). This works fine if you are drilling into a solid rock base. Drill hole and set concrete post. Tie all the tops together with forms and concrete the whole thing into one unified web. You can also cantilever out over the lake up to 8'-10' which would give your doctor a cantilevered or floating deck. That idea could make you an extra $50,000. Now that would be impressive.

Option two is where you have no solid rock under the lake bottom to work with. In that case, a large pier is needed to hold the concrete pole. A 10"x10" pole would be set into a round or square footing probably 5' square. In this case, you are relying on sheer weight and bulk to anchor the pole on a non bedrock base. Same procedure at the top. tie all pole tops together into one concrete grid.

Your barge installers can easily handle this if pushed. I'm sure they would prefer to work with wood. Wood is more forgiving, far cheaper and can be trimmed with a chainsaw. Concrete poles will require far more skill and heavier equipment on their part.

Make sure to use the proper wet environment rebar above the water line. You can't just use any old rebar from the hardware store.

http://www.lonestarprestress.com/pdf/Utility Pole Catalog.pdf

 

[gsganzer]

Eddie,
I'm confused and new to the whole boathouse idea. If the boathouse doesn't float, then how do you accomodate changing lake levels? Is the level of Lake ********* pretty static? I can see 1-3 feet not being a problem, but some lakes can raise and lower 6 feet or more.

 

[Tom_Stewart]

The best dock/pier setup I have ever seen was this:

12" pvc (with UV protection) driven into the mud, pumped out the water, drilled for stainless bolts to attach the stringers to and then filled with concrete....stringered and decked with treated wood...

Now you could do all of the decking with the composite decking and it would last even longer.....

ts

 

[RobS]

Eddie, sounds like you need to be talking to bridge builders, not dock builders for this guy. I don't know the design/construction details but most bridges have stone/concrete abutments that last forever. Once you've got those in place, you can deck over it with whatever you see fit. Someone else mentioned granite, that or limestone would look very nice and indeed last forever. The key is likely the footing structure below grade.

Sounds like an interesting project.

 

[gsganzer]

Eddie,
Can you use stainless steel pipe for the piers? You could use 304SS SCH40 in 2",3",4",6". It's probably cheaper then having concrete piers poured and not as expensive as you think. It starts to get expensive when you get over 6". I have the name for some stainless suppliers in the Dallas area, but you can probably find the same in/near Tyler.

 

[EddieWalker]

Nope, haven't thought of stainless steel. It's worth pricing and compairing to the other options. I really like concrete, but don't want to deal with it if I can come up with a metal solutiong that will last just as long. Those fiberglass piers look real interesting too, but I wonder if they are cheaper or more expensive then steel. The size of them will probably make them too dificult to install for the guys who do wood piers all the time. Metal should be a simple enough option I'd think. Of course, it's all just theory right now.

Thanks,
Eddie