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What Causes Walls to Bow?

Bowing walls within a home or commercial building are a foundational issue. Foundations can be stressed when expansive soils or horizontal earth movement puts pressure on the outside of the foundation. This pressure can cause the walls inside your home to bow or crack from being pushed beyond their flexible capacity. Talking with a Charleston or Lexington area basement wall repair and retaining wall stabilization company before any issues get worse can be greatly beneficial to the future of your home. 

What Are Retaining Walls?

Retaining walls are rigid walls designed for the lateral support of soil and to hold soil in a slope that it would not naturally keep. Therefore, your basement walls are a type of retaining wall. The International Building Code requires retaining walls to be designed ensuring stability against excessive foundation pressure and water uplift. 

Common Retaining Wall Issues

Because retaining walls are supposed to be designed to relieve foundation pressure, the retaining walls in your basement serve as an important structure in the overall support of your home. If your retaining walls are not supportive to the weight of your house, it could lead to other serious issues. The structural integrity of your basement walls can be compromised by the lateral or horizontal movement in the ground’s soil. Certain outdoor factors like extreme weather conditions or too much moisture in the ground can cause the soils in the ground to expand and contract. Over time, this constant expansion and contraction causes the soils to move underground and can put pressure on your basement retaining walls.

Signs for Bowed Basement Wall Repair

Like any other problems that might arise in your home, it’s important to spot the signs of retaining wall issues early so it can be quickly repaired. Most of the weight of your home relies on your basement walls, so they play a key role in your home’s overall structural integrity. Common signs of basement retaining wall failure include:

  • Cracked or crumbling walls
  • Retaining walls separating from connecting walls
  • Slanting or tilting walls

If you notice any of these signs with your retaining walls, it’s important to address the issue quickly with Charleston, Lexington, and West Virginia basement wall repair and retaining wall stabilization experts before it becomes worse and leads to other structural issues with your home.

Bowed Basement Wall Repair Solutions

Luckily, most of these issues can be fixed without a complete wall replacement. Maybe you need a retaining wall anchor or maybe a tieback. At United Structural Systems, Ltd., Inc. in Charleston, Lexington, and West Virginia, we offer a number of basement wall repair and retaining wall stabilization services because not every issue is a one-size-fits-all solution. The most common solutions to realign walls include:

  • Helical Tiebacks
  • I-Beams
  • Carbon Fiber
  • Composite Rock Retaining Wall Anchor
  • Wall Slushing

Depending on your home’s situation, one or more of these solutions can permanently stabilize your walls and give your home structural stability that you can count on for the long run. Our team of Charleston area basement wall repair and retaining wall stabilization experts at United Structural Systems, Ltd., Inc. has experience in all these areas and can give you a free, accurate assessment of your basement retaining walls. We have service areas in Cincinnati, Lexington, Lancaster and Cross Lanes!

structural repair service
  1. Helical Tieback
  2. I-Beams Carbon
  3. Fiber Composite
  4. Rock Anchor & Wall
  5. Slushing Wall Slushing