Hi All posters,

This is a fascinating topic.

I have often toyed with the idea of what it would take to design an all wood foundation and the posts received to date seem to provide both encouraging and cautionary advice.

Most old timber buildings here in the UK have long lost their timber sills with many buildings showing evidence of being righted and underbuilt with more durable materials like brick and stone.

Much earlier, building techniques did employ timber in direct contact with the ground. For example in Scotland and Ireland we have crannog buildings which were built on piled foundations in shallow loch waters with a linking causeway to shore. Below water line some of the timber piles (alder) can still be seen today several thousand years after driving same into the mud.

We have examples of early post (wind) mills where the trestle cross trees and quarterbars (oak)were buried and backfilled to help provide greater stability to the mill. The Saxons were great believers in using earthfast posts and remnants of post circles are frequently encountered

Venice is built on (larch) timber piles.

I accept that the ground / air interface is the problem to be overcome but could we not employ easily replaceable or sacrificial pieces that spanned this vulnerable area made from highly durable timber like cedar, locust, oak, etc.

There also remains the question of treatment and in times gone by charring was employed to good effect as was the application of pine pitch.

I would be keen to get rid of the necessity for the embodyment of high energy concrete foundations.

Any ideas ?

Regards

Ken Hume