Born in Carson City, Nevada, and raised in the Southern California mountains, Richard S. Imus went to high school in Lake Arrowhead, CA. At the age of 13 in 1976, he received what he considers the greatest gift of his life—a relationship with Jesus and the Holy Spirit. In 1979, his family relocated to Sandpoint, Idaho, where he finished high school. While there, he and two fellow students attempted to start a Christian club on campus, but it was shut down by the principal, Mr. Richard Sodorff. (More on this in a future blog post.) After high school, Richard studied at the College of Idaho and San Bernardino Community College. As his father was a contractor, he worked as a carpenter during school breaks and vacations. Post-college, he served as a lead carpenter, superintendent, and project engineer. Richard became a master carpenter, concrete specialist, and Terrazzo mechanic. His expertise includes building custom homes for high-end clients and designing and constructing concrete formwork for various projects, with budgets ranging from $5,000 to several million dollars. His Terrazzo work is displayed at Mid-Columbia Hospital in The Dalles, Oregon, and at the Centralia Community College performing arts center in Centralia, Washington. He attributes all his talents, visions, dreams, and daily insights to God. In 1990, Richard joined the manufactured home industry, bringing his skills and creativity to the field. It was during a challenging workday that he received a vision for a concrete skirting product, thanking God for the inspiration. This vision later expanded to high-production precast panels that would become the industry standard. Despite setbacks in 2023, he recalled a message from the Holy Spirit: "Industry Standard." Reflecting on his journey, Richard acknowledges the many challenges faced and anticipates more in the future. Yet, he finds solace in the words of his savior: "Take heart, for I have overcome the world.”
2020 is just around the corner and the new modern is keeping things plain and simple. For instance, when it comes to modern deck skirting the plain smooth concrete wall is desired. Basically, millennial’s are more concerned about showing off their gadgets.
Likewise, millennial’s want quality low-maintenance products so they can go about their lives with less concerns. When it comes to home products it’s no difference. Products need to be subtle, plain and long-lasting especially when it comes to deck skirting.
So, What Does Modern Deck Skirting Look Like?
Here is an example of the smooth concrete look accomplished by DURASKIRT™.
As you know, modern structures are built using materials such as concrete, glass and metal. Likewise, if you desire to build a modern deck it will need skirting to keep varmints out. So, the best modern deck skirting is using a concrete product.
Furthermore, let’s explore the ways you can accomplish building a modern looking deck skirting. As you know, there are hundreds of ways to skin a cat. Nevertheless, there is always the best way for everything until you find something better.
How To Mold A Smooth Look Concrete
Given that concrete is a moldable material it forms to whatever surface you form. For instance, to get a smooth look, like we’re trying to accomplish here, you must mold it with a smooth material. Of course, smooth plastic, sleek steel, MDO plywood, or glass can be used to get a smooth concrete look. But not all of these are cost efficient.
Subsequently, if I am pouring concrete in place, I like using plastic coated MDO plywood to get the modern look. Conversely, I prefer a mobile home skirting productcalled DURASKIRT™ that is molded using steel forms. This product looks better than a pored-in-place wall and is engineered for ground burial so no worries.
Finally, now that the cat is out of the bag, namely DURASKIRT™ is great for all your modern deck skirting needs. Likewise, use this concrete board for both residential and commercial deck skirting. To order yours call MH SERIVICE & Supply at 360-419-9909.
Schaeffer’s Oil Is Great Trust Me – So Where Do You Get It?
I remember the first time I heard about Schaeffer’s oil. It’s been almost a decade ago. In fact, a Schaeffer’s representative stopped in and asked us if we had time for an oil and grease demonstration. Of course, my brother and I looked at each other and agreed.
Today we’re so glad we agreed. Schaeffer’s grease and oil have saved us thousands to date. For instance, we were using an old mixer and the main bearing was regularly being replaced. The cost of replacement including the production shut-down exceeded thousands. Using Schaeffer’s we’re happy to say the bearing lasted until we replaced the mixer with a much larger one, about six years.
Not only does Schaeffer make grease and oil we love their metal cutting lubricants too. The Synkool 311 products literally saves us thousands too. Moreover, our blades cut better and stay sharper longer. This saves in down time and regular maintenance costs. But Schaeffer’s doesn’t stop at lubrication they make the best cleaner degreaser product.
Citrol 266 cleaner degreaser is the best and smells like oranges. We use this for cleaning and degreasing things in our maintenance shop. Not sure what we’d do without it. But Schaeffer doesn’t only make great oil and cleaning products we use their additives too.
Schaeffer diesel additives are good too. All our diesel engines enjoy the benefits of Schaeffer diesel additives. One of the benefits is better fuel economy and extra lubrication. Injectors that stay clean and well lubricated last much longer. More still, the upper combustion chambers stay clean and lubricated greatly reducing wear.
Additionally, Schaeffer oil saves our compressor motors by running significantly cooler. Our compressor room is much cooler now with Schaeffer. For engines too we love Schaeffer’s oil.
So, where do I get my Schaeffer products?
I recommend buying Schaeffer products from a family store called Buy1oils. You can find them here at stores.buy1oils.com
If you are wanting to pit set your manufactured home you need an exterior house skirting product like DURASKIRT™. Besides, being an exterior product make certain they can be back-filled. Additionally, this makes the product more valuable especially if you plan to pit set your home.
DURASKIRT™ concrete skirting panels for mobile homes is a wonderful product. Great for pit set homes.
So, what is pit setting a mobile home or trailer house?
Pit setting is when you excavate the soils burying the blocking height into the ground. Likewise, this method is preferred so that decks or walkways to enter your home have an easier access. Too, as we grow older less steps or ramps are more desirable.
Therefore, finding an exterior house skirting with the ability to pit set it is vital. This takes some reading of the fine print, so I recommend taking your time. Moreover, when you do find a skirting product for back-filling it’s time for planning.
Planning Pit Setting Your Manufactured Home Using Exterior House Skirting?
Now that you understand what pit setting is, you need to understand the components. Also, the functions of each component of your manufactured homes’ foundation. More still, there are four major components that make for a very secure manufactured home.
Components for Preventing Earthquake or Heavy Wind Damage
The Floor Fame: Your manufactured home comes with a flooring system that is secured to a steel structure. This structure is engineered to support the home and occupants and receive
Solid Blocking: Cement or concrete blocks are the best support for manufactured homes. They provide great support when following the manufacturers specifications.
Individual Concrete Panel Skirting: The best exterior house skirting for resisting damages from earthquakes is a concrete panel skirting system. This allows for maximum movement without damaging the home or skirting. More so, the flexibility of having individual panels and a system like PSC’s is the best.
For this reason, I recommend DURASKIRT™ concrete panel skirting. In addition, this system also works for pit setting your home. Finally, it is a great exterior house skirting.
Definition of Earthquake Tie-Downs for Mobile Homes
Worrying about living in a manufactured home or mobile home in high-wind or seismic events is common. But securing them for these destructive forces by tying them down properly relieves concerns. Especially, when you educate yourself on how earthquake tie-downs for mobile homes work.
As you may know, the stability of its foundation against harsh winds and destructive seismic activity is imperative. Furthermore, as a mobile homeowner, enjoying its light weightiness and portability is advantageous. Consequently, these homes are defenseless against natural calamities in the absence of a proper tie-down and anchorage system with the ground.
Comparing them to site-built homes, manufactured homes are built entirely in a factory. Likewise, they are an attractive economic alternative due to lower construction costs. In fact, the factory-built structure of mobile homes is resilient against shaking or severe forces.
Obviously, because they are subjected to these during transportation from factory to site. However, the seismic performance of manufactured homes largely depends on the anchoring. In particular, the connection, tying of the home with the foundation and ultimately to the ground.
Ultimately, you will need a tie-down or seismic bracing system contractor to do the work. Moreover, the contractor will provide you with engineering for the foundation certification.” Need To Talk To An Earthquake Tie-Down Expert? Call Now! 360-419-9909″ “We Sell & Install Earthquake Bracing Systems for Manufactured Homes” style=”outline” color=”sky” We have been installing earthquake bracing systems on manufactured homes for more than 30 years. We sell and install earthquake bracing for manufactured homes, mobile homes, trailers, RV’s, park models, tiny houses, and more!
We have been releveling mobile homes in Washington State for many years. The things we find, from what I hear, are typically found under mobile homes all around the country. Moreover, it does surprise us when a home looks as if it was set up just yesterday, but this is not the norm. Mobile home re-leveling in Washington state is typical.
Hire These Selected Services– mobile home re-leveling experts in Washington state!
Many times, we open the crawl hatch and find dead animals, stashed needles, rodent droppings, and sometimes live animals. Cats either climb out or we find their carcasses.
One time we were re-leveling the mobile home and repairing the insulation when an opossum jumped on one of the guy’s chests and started hissing. From that day on it was called the Dracula house.
Aside from animals though, we often find leaky pipes, torn insulation, missing vapor barrier, and inadequate blocking. Occasionally there are missing or broken mobile home tie-downs too. The biggest cause we find for a mobile home becoming un-level is poor soil preparation.
Inadequate Soil Preparation Causes
Quite often we slink under a mobile home and find poorly prepared soils. Buried tree stumps are a huge culprit creating voids where support blocking falls away. Although, contractors who determined not to use a compactor or adequately remove organic debris are causes too.
Best Soil Preparation Practices
The right way to prepare the soil for holding the weight of a home is to remove the top layer of dirt. This layer has tree roots, plant mulch, and sometimes buried stumps. Removing the organics or materials that break down will assure a good foundation.
Soils preparation.
After removal of the topsoil layer, it is necessary to compact the stirred-up dirt. Subsequently, adding a gravel layer to the needed depth of no less than four inches. Now it’s time to compact everything once again.
Compacting the soils has another benefit as well. It seals the earth from absorbing moisture preventing a muddy work site.
Mobile Home Re-leveling in Washington – Prevention
To summarize what we’ve learned about mobile home re-leveling in Washington state is that we find many of the same causes. Soil preparation is key to preventing settling. Homes needing re-leveling probably were not properly prepared. For more tips and mobile home, upgrades stay tuned to DURASKIRT.com/blog/.
Steel Jack Stands or Otherwise Known As “Metal Pier Supports” A Big Mistake
In the Manufactured Home Industry Metal Piers or Steel Jack Stands are becoming notorious. Moreover, they’re a costly mistake to mobile homeowners. Consequently, homes placed with these installed from the 1970s through 2015 are ticking time bombs poised for collapse. Indeed, it’s a wonder we haven’t had much press coverage over these lately.
Before we get started let’s get this straight. We’re talking about stands to hold mobile homes up, right? So, it’s a good idea to inspect under a manufactured home fitted with metal piers. Specifically, looking for the beginnings of rust and corrosion. Not to mention after finding rust going forward another ten years and some will already be disintegrating.
Are “Metal Piers” A Standard That Needs To Go Away?
What was once a standard support component is now under scrutiny in our industry as dealerships, contractors, and municipalities. Hence, they’re distancing themselves from admitting they ever thought they were a good idea. Likewise, contractors and installers retrofitting homes are at risk of installing new manufactured home skirtingor Earthquake Resistant Bracing Systems (E.R.B.S.) are crawling under existing homes.
However, finding life safety issues like rusted mobile home jack stands are helping homeowners. Is this an accident waiting to take place? Just imagining, a small earth tremor has the potential to have hundreds if not thousands of homes collapsing.
How To Know If Your Home Has Steel Jack Stands
Every home is required to have a crawl space opening for the purpose to have access to the underside of your home. Finding the access opening on your home take a flashlight and carefully look under the home without placing your body under the home. Obviously, this is an important safety precaution. Certainly, you can see from the photos these kinds of homes can collapse at any moment.
Now have a look. What do you see? Many homes were blocked with 8″ x 8″ x 16″ concrete blocks and wood wedges which is good. If all you see is metal piers then you will need to replace them at some point, although if steel jack stands appear to have any scaling rust then they will need replacing as their engineered ability to support is already below the original specifications.
How Do You Go About Replacing Steel Jack Stands?
Carefully, very carefully. For YOUR NAME HERE, we begin at the crawl space shoring up the beams on either side. Then we work both
After an earthquake in California jack stands like these could be found poking up through the floors.
ways along the first and second beams. With one person on the outside at all times, we begin loading one of our low-profileDURASKIRT™ Retrofit Cartswith blocks to pull under the home.
This process can take up to two days depending upon the conditions of the stands and crawl area accessibility. Because of the danger factor and hard conditions, it is difficult to find qualified companies like ours that can be trusted and will do this work both correctly and cost-effectively.
How Much Can I Expect To Pay To Replace The Metal Piers for Manufactured Homes Under My Home?
You can expect to pay anywhere from $3500.00 to $7500.00 depending on the conditions and size of the home. But this is money is well spent when considering the considerably higher costs of life and limb. Supposing you decide to add an Earthquake Resistant Bracing System (E.R.B.S.) for additional peace of mind, you can expect to pay an extra $3000.00 to $5500.00.
However, we do recommend these systems as they proved their worth in 1989 when California’s magnitude 6.9 earthquake known as the San Francisco World Series, and Loma Prieta Earthquake happened. As a result, all the homes with E.R.B.S. were left intact while 67% of the homes with metal piers for manufactured homes collapsed.
Moreover, the homes with concrete blocks without E.R.B.S. fared better than homes with metal piers having a 40% collapse rate. All of the homeowners having earthquake insurance were paying deductibles considerably higher than simply adding Earthquake Resistant Bracing Systems. Therefore, replacing jack stands with concrete blocks is a good idea. In fact, all of this is on record at the California Housing And Community Development – The Factory-Built Housing Program.
Is An Earthquake Resistant Bracing System A Good Idea and Why?
As we’re alluding to above, E.R.B.S. is an excellent idea. Surely, because they’re such a good idea and many consumers are retrofitting their existing homes today. Similarly, adding them to the new home setups. Because of their popularity at this time, it is difficult to find qualified contractors that are schooled in all the systems.
Knowledge and understanding of these systems take years to compile and that is why you need to hire a company like ours for peace of mind. But if we cannot serve you look for a qualified manufactured home installer/contractor who understands the importance of re-leveling manufactured homes and knows what to look for in these systems and their benefits for your home. Then install an E.R.B.S. and be safe.
(State of California Sent This Notice Out To Property Owners After The Earthquake)
“If you live in a mobile home…
Mobile homes can easily slide off their foundations if not properly secured to resist side to side motion. Look under your home – if you see a metal or wood “skirt” on the outside with concrete blocks or steel tripods/jacks supporting your home, you need to have an “earthquake-resistant bracing system” (ERBS) installed.
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Call or use the contact form below if you would like to learn more about these systems and their benefits. Or for more information regarding mobile home skirtingplease visit theDURASKIRT™home page.
DURASKIRT, LLC – PO BOX, Mount Vernon, WA 98273 – phone: 360-419-9909.
DURASKIRT™ Solves The Problem for Log Cabin Skirting
Log cabin skirting can also be used for all raised structures. Homes such as mobile homes, manufactured homes, log cabins, post, and pier homes, deck surrounds, and more. Why is skirting necessary? Certainly, there are many reasons to make sure that you have the proper skirting around your home.
First, it is important to keep the wind from blowing under your home. Without skirting, the cold weather can cause your pipes to freeze. Moreover, your house will be much colder than if you have skirting. Especially, skirting for log cabins will help with your heating and cooling bill, and who doesn’t need help with that?
DURASKIRT™ looks great on this log cabin. The best choices for skirting are concrete products.
Second, the skirting will help to keep out animals and other varmints. Many times animals will seek out the comfort under your home; they want shade in the summer and warmth in the winter. Oftentimes they will destroy things by chewing; this is especially relevant to the rodents. The log cabin skirting will help to keep them out of your home.
Third, the concrete skirting will help to keep your home stable. The concrete is strong and will prevent your home from becoming unstable due to wind.
What About Venting Skirting for Log Cabins?
Does your log cabin skirt need to be ventilated? The answer is yes! Why? The ventilation helps to keep things dry under your home, preventing your sub-flooring from rot. You may not realize it, but your home can put off poisonous gases. Moreover, these gases can come from plumbing, Radon, Carbon Monoxide, heating, and cooking gases all of these can become trapped under your home and cause a potential hazard.
If you are a do-it-yourself kind of person the skirting from DURASKIRT™ is for you. This company provides a great product that is easy to use and high quality. Duraskirting comes in several different styles; they have something to match your home, pole building, hot tub, deck, garage, or whatever you need to put the log cabin skirting on. Moreover, raised house skirting kits are sold for many home sizes.
Don’t go another year without putting skirting around your home, you will not regret it. It will not take you long to see a decrease in your electric bill and everyone will notice how great your house looks. DURASKIRT™ is so easy to install, your neighbors will think you are a professional! Your home is your castle, treat it that way and protect it from the elements, animals, and rodents today!
Finally, What Locations Have DURASKIRT™ Been Used For Log Cabins?
Whether your log cabin is in Alaska, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, or California we are installing DURASKIRT™ everywhere. Look for the DURASKIRT™ brand in all states and if you don’t find it ask.
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