Our Solutions
Underpinning Brisbane
We don’t underpin your Brisbane home using traditional methods. Instead, we offer you an affordable, modern underpinning solution that doesn’t disrupt the structure of your home at all.
What is underpinning?
Underpinning is a process that strengthens the foundations underneath homes to allow for additional loads. More importantly, underpinning corrects subsidence to stop Brisbane homes from sinking and enduring further costly damage.
Underpinning can be a massive undertaking and commitment for Brisbane homeowners and the builders and engineers carrying out repairs. For this reason, it’s important for Brisbane homeowners to understand why their home is subsiding.
It’s also important for Brisbane homeowners to understand the various underpinning methods available as well as the advantages and disadvantages that come with each.
Why is underpinning essential to a sinking Brisbane home?
Underpinning is a process that strengthens the foundations underneath homes to allow for additional loads. More importantly, underpinning corrects subsidence to stop Brisbane homes from sinking and enduring further costly damage.
Underpinning can be a massive undertaking and commitment for Brisbane homeowners and the builders and engineers carrying out repairs. For this reason, it’s important for Brisbane homeowners to understand why their home is subsiding.
It’s also important for Brisbane homeowners to understand the various underpinning methods available as well as the advantages and disadvantages that come with each.
The common ways Brisbane homes are built and some of their challenges
Conventional Concrete Slabs
Conventional concrete slabs are typically made from a mixture of Portland cement, aggregate, water, and reinforcement. The reinforcement is typically provided in the form of a steel rebar or wire mesh. The concrete is then poured into place and allowed to cure. Conventional concrete slabs are typically between 150mm and 300mm thick.
Once cured, concrete slabs provide a strong and durable foundation for Brisbane homes. However, the downside is that concrete slabs weigh an incredible amount and can sink if the ground is weak, aerated or overly damp. This will cause homes to sink too.
Waffle Slab
Within any waffle slab are formed voids, generally polystyrene blocks, placed on top of the soil. These blocks have no structural properties, and are there to form trenches above ground so beams can be poured and also for the slab floor to set on top of. Waffle slabs usually have a floor thickness of only 85mm.
Waffle slabs can be cheaper to build but aren’t suitable for all applications, especially areas throughout Brisbane that are subject to high loads or heavy traffic.
Strip Footings
More often than not, strip footings were made of clay pressed brick or stone block, bonded with lime mortar. In many cases, footing depths were only 450mm. Due to their close proximity to the surface, strip footings are susceptible to the effects of reactive clays and soil erosion caused by leaking pipes and poor storm water drainage. These environmental effects can cause strip footings to sink and in turn, entire Brisbane homes.
If subsidence isn’t stopped, foundational and structural issues can multiply to quickly escalate repair costs. Underpinning is essential to stopping your Brisbane home from sinking further and enduring more damage.
Most importantly, underpinning will save you money and make your home safer to live in.
What are the different types of underpinning traditionally used in Brisbane?
Mass concrete underpinning
While it may be the most well known method throughout Brisbane, that doesn’t mean it’s the best. Mass concrete underpinning is expensive, disruptive, and can cause long-term damage to your Brisbane home’s foundation.
Steel pile underpinning
Steel pile underpinning is an option for Brisbane homes built on reclaimed land, flood-prone areas or land that used to be a bog. Steel piles are driven deep into the ground by specially adapted, tracked excavators. Much like mass concrete underpinning, this method can be expensive, and isn’t always effective for a Brisbane home. In some cases, the steel piles can make structural problems worse by causing weak soil to shift even further.
Cement grout underpinning
Cement grout underpinning is a form of preventative maintenance for subsiding Brisbane buildings and structures. Underpinning can be achieved by pumping a concrete mix or a non-shrink cement grout under structures to fill in large holes and voids. This underpinning method works well if the gaps below a Brisbane building or structure are large and easy to find. However, this method can be very costly and time-consuming, and may not always be effective in stopping subsidence.
Our Underpinning solution – GeoPoly™
Buildfix offers Brisbane’s homeowners Geopoly™, an affordable, efficient and completely modern way to stop homes from sinking.
If you’re a Brisbane homeowner who’s endured subsidence and fed up with your house getting damaged, Geopoly™ is the answer you’ve been looking for. Geopoly™ is our very own proprietary geopolymer soil stabilisation solution. It’s by far the most advanced option available to underpin your Brisbane home.
Using the latest geopolymer technology, it compacts weak ground and raises house foundations to close up wall cracks and re-level floors. With Geopoly™, you can avoid the lengthy process of Brisbane’s more traditional underpinning methods and the high price tag that can come with them.
If you’re looking for a quick, efficient and affordable alternative guaranteed to last, Geopoly™ is what you want.
GeoPoly™ -
Underpin your Brisbane home quickly and effectively at an affordable price
The advantages of Geopoly™ are available to Brisbane homeowners needing their homes underpinned
Non-disruptive
Job complete in 1-2 days
Guaranteed Success
Buildfix, Brisbane’s best underpinners
And we’re succeeding. We’ve completed over 10000 repair projects to see tens of thousands of customers smile.
What makes us the perfect solution provider for you is our unique understanding of the ground on which Brisbane’s homes have been built.
Do you reside in the City of Brisbane, the Gold Coast, the Sunshine Coast, City of Ipswich, Logan City, the Moreton Bay Region or elsewhere? You can be sure we’ll lift and stabilise your home for good.
Our underpinning solution promises
FREE structural assessment
Our team will come to your home to see if it’s subsiding at no cost. Our quotes are free as well. Save money from the get-go.
Transparent quotes
After we’ve completed your quote, we don’t change it. We don’t add extra costs at the last minute. With us, there are no tricks, no games and zero surprises.
Permanent repair of subsidence
Using our techniques and proprietary technology GeoPoly™️, we can underpin and lift homes permanently. What we fix stays fixed. Everything comes with a 10-year warranty.
Minimal disruptions to your life and home
With our innovative, industry leading technology, repairing your home’s subsidence shouldn’t take more than a day, or two. We don’t excavate or pull anything apart.
Lower prices
With our leading techniques and technology, we work more accurately and more efficiently than anyone else. Underpinning should only cost between $4K to $16K*.
*Based on averages, subject to inspection.
An inspection of your Brisbane home – free!
