demoing house

[Dirtman2007]

We looked at a house that the renovator want to partially demolish. It's a two story house 1 story above ground and the bottom is below ground in the front, but has a walk out basement in the bottom. He wants to remove the roof, first foor and gut the bottom leaving nothing but the 4 outside walls on the bottom. 2 of the bottom walls are concrete block so I felt that they could be left pretty easy, but the back and the other side is all wood and just don't know how much of that would be able to survive the demo(will be using and 25 ton excavator). The renovator understands this, And I feel that it want be much of and issue to leave the block walls, but the wooden ones might have to go. Then I figured using the skid steer with the grapple to drive in and bring the debris out where it can be loaded. House Is around 3500 sq feet. This project will be done at and hourly rate so I feel pretty good about doing it.

Anyone else ever done anything like this or have any advise?

[Tom Spivak]

Make sure you have whatever agreement you make, in writing.
These sort of things can go horribly wrong, I can attest to that.

[Dirtman2007]

we have done work for him before and has been good about paying and understanding issues that may arise that may add to the cost. Still good to get something in writting though...

[Wolf]

Keeping the wood walls intact seems kinda risky, especially with a machine that big. then again, you are good at tricks and fine detail with the bucket and grapple, so you might be OK. why not just demo the whole house and start over. is there really anything worth saving there?

[nedly05]

we did a job like this a couple years ago. The builders cut all around the house with a chain saw, I would just boom up, they would hook up they chain and then I would wing the panels into the dumpster. I would never have been able to tear it apart with the bucket and thumb, it would have ruined the whole place. It went quickly though, I would reccomend trying it this way.It is neat and tidy on the site, and the panels stack nicely in the can so you can get a lot in there.

[Dozerboy]

It should be easy enough to demo everything on the floor(sub floor) on the 1st floor with just the hoe. After that is where it will get hard getting up the sub floor and floor joices without ripping down the stick framed part of the basement, but a little work with a chainsaw and a sawsall should do it.

[dirthog28]

I agree with dozer boy, I did this on a tornoda house that we had to save the foundation, the JD120 didn't have enough reach into the center of the house, so we used our bobcat to get up on the subfloor and pushed it over to the 120, wouldn't recommend on yours with a basement underneath though. But we did just like Dozerboy said, use sawsaws, chains and take your time to get the panels(subfloor) off. Should work most important patience!