“No Problems. Just Solutions.”

I first heard the phrase “no problems,  just solutions” from a former coworker. It has always resonated with me because I see it as a call to action – to find creative and efficient ways to solve those issues that inevitably arise. They can be one-time issues specific to a particular job or problems common across most jobs.

Tackling a Tricky ICF Build
There was one particular job we did with specific challenges related to the use of Insulated Concrete Forms for both the foundation and the main floor walls. Two things made it particularly tricky. We had to build a wooden floor within the ICF, then pour a gable wall over 20 feet tall – all in one go. When I first wrote this post, I typed out five long paragraphs discussing standard deviations from perfection in carpentry, the thermal mass of concrete sandwiched between Styrofoam and calculations of pressure at the bottom of a 20-foot concrete wall when pouring. That’s all important, but it’s also terribly complex.

Keeping Water Where It Belongs
Here’s something that might be a bit more relatable: water ingress into a house. No one wants it. Every homeowner fears it.

When you hire Delarge Construction, we take particular care around window openings. Windows are always going to be a weak point in your home’s water-resistant barrier. While we make every effort to ensure that things are flashed properly to prevent any water from getting in, we go one step further. When we frame the bottom sill (the horizontal part of the opening that the window sits on), we do two important things:

1. We use wide waterproof tape to completely cover the wood on the bottom sill.
   
2. We also slope the bottom sills slightly. This means that if water does get past the siding and the window, it lands on the waterproof bottom sill and then has an escape route out of the house.

Details That Make a Difference
We care about all of your construction pain points, including the literal ones. Take slivers. We build lots of decks, and they very often have wooden deck boards. If you’re like me, you likely look forward to summers on the deck barefoot. With this in mind, whenever we install wooden deck boards, we always router a slight chamfer onto the edges to make it a lot less likely your evening will end with a sliver.

Built with the Customer in Mind
At Delarge Construction, we always build with the customer in mind. These things take extra time, but when the goal is a product that you will love and we can both be proud of, it’s worth it.