Pylex Screw Pile - Impact Gun Adapter

[vtcnc]

Background:
Been paying $80/month for 10'x12' storage unit for two years. Enough! Decided to build a shed. Had my son design it and come up with the materials list. He is a second year civil engineering student at Norwich so we figure this will be a good experience for him. Although he was helping me build my shop 7 years ago, running the air nailer for the second story. Anyhoo, I digress... I'm building a shed...and gawd! I don't want to dig and pour concrete sonotube footings! In desperation, I read about these Pylex screw pilings and there appears to be two choices: heavy duty sizes for about $350 each installed, or DIY version for about $50/each. Before anyone tries to dissuade me, I'm committed and going to make it work!

Each piling is rated for static load bearing of 5,000#. I don't like how the pilings can potentially sway, and in the Northeast, I have to go below the frost line. The base units are 50" long and you can purchase a 24" extension to get real deep if need be.

Installation is pretty straight forward, according to their website and Youtube, an 8' 2x4 can be used to wind these into the ground. After having purchased 8 pilings (for a 10' x 14' shed) I was having second thoughts about how easy these are going to be to screw into our gnarly Vermont backyard with lots of roots and rocks.

So, I decided to go the power route. I have a Porter Cable corded impact hammer for changing tires. Pylex does sell an adapter, but nobody had one available - not that it matters - I'm a hobby machinist!

Build & Photos
A 1/2" drive 3/8" socket, 1-1/4" round, 1" square bar. Drilled the round through up to 1/2". Bored one side 3/4" diameter about 1" deep. Bored the remaining 1/2" end to accept the 3/8" socket side of the socket later for welding. Then I turned a 3/4" stub on the square rod, about 1" long. This was then used in a square collet block on the mill to quickly mill the 1" square down to the inner diameter of the Pylex tubes, which are swaged square with .840" inner square dimensions. Then I welded everything up and then turned the square corners down to the point where they square drive fits inside the tubes clean. See photos below.


Finished.
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Welded socket. Hope it holds!
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Square end. This was milled on a square collet block, corners turned (interrupted cuts) and imperfections filed out to make sure I had clearance.
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Drops right into the swaged top of the piling.
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And installed on the impact driver.

Was a good day to do this project, it has been raining off and on all day, so we will start the pilings tomorrow. Wish me luck!

 

[Eddyde]

Are you using these pilings in lieu of a concrete slab?

 

[woodchucker]

good luck. I would have just bought or rented a powered post hole digger if you had a lot of sono tubes. They have the type with the remote power too to provide some torque limiting assistance, so you are not spinning yourself around .

They are tried and true, and in my opinion a great choice. I like a little free pour at the bottom to keep it well anchored and like an elephants foot.

 

[vtcnc]

Are you using these pilings in lieu of a concrete slab?

Yes. It’s a stick frame shed, 10x14’. We live in a hill section so slab is ‘impossible’ without major excavating which I’m not willing to do. Grade on our hill is probably 1’ per 20 ft.

Sonotubes would have been the conventional choice here. I just don’t have it in me to dig holes and pour concrete.

It SHOULD be fine. I’ll show you guys some pics once the rain lets up and we can get some piles screwed into the ground.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[vtcnc]

good luck. I would have just bought or rented a powered post hole digger if you had a lot of sono tubes. They have the type with the remote power too to provide some torque limiting assistance, so you are not spinning yourself around .

They are tried and true, and in my opinion a great choice. I like a little free pour at the bottom to keep it well anchored and like an elephants foot.

Yes, it would probably be about the same cost to use concrete, rent a post hole digger, etc. We will see how this gamble works out!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[WobblyHand]

Don't know if it is better up in Saint Albans, but here, if I dig a hole, oh, I get to maybe 3-4" before hitting some mighty big rocks. The kind that are a foot long or so. Makes fences, holes of any sort difficult, even big tomato stakes in a garden. Good luck.

On the other hand my topsoil is pretty deep at 18-24", since when my house was built, (1851) they didn't have bulldozers and the like, nothing to strip the soil (and sell it to someone else) leaving you with only 4" of good dirt. Below the topsoil, its more clay like, but still loads of rocks! Every year I fish out rocks out of the garden. Been doing it for 35 years, and they still come up in the spring, like a fountain...

 

[Eddyde]

Yes. It’s a stick frame shed, 10x14’. We live in a hill section so slab is ‘impossible’ without major excavating which I’m not willing to do. Grade on our hill is probably 1’ per 20 ft.

Sonotubes would have been the conventional choice here. I just don’t have it in me to dig holes and pour concrete.

It SHOULD be fine. I’ll show you guys some pics once the rain lets up and we can get some piles screwed into the ground.

Those pilings should be more than adequate for a shed, Yeah, getting them into rocky soil might be a chore, hope it goes easy for you.

 

[Jake M]

I read about these Pylex screw pilings and there appears to be two choices: heavy duty sizes for about $350 each installed, or DIY version for about $50/each. Before anyone tries to dissuade me, I'm committed and going to make it work!

Each piling is rated for static load bearing of 5,000#. I don't like how the pilings can potentially sway, and in the Northeast, I have to go below the frost line. The base units are 50" long and you can purchase a 24" extension to get real deep if need be.

Those chitty spindly little things can't hold up a shoe box, let alone a shed... But somehow they do. And not only do they hold sheds, if you take the effort to level the "auger" part without (or without excessive) use of the adjuster nut, they're more rigid than you'd expect. I'm not saying they're as strong as putting in footers and frost walls, they're not, but they're pretty darned good. For static storage, you'll more than likely never notice the difference.

Here in the Addison clay (which is VERY dense and VERY bony), once they're started in ten or fifteen inches, me and a buddy and a 2X4 for a symetrical torque application (no tipping), you can push stones and small rocks right out of the way. Which is kinda unbelievable. I dunno what your soil is like, but if you've got to drive every one of those three times to get all the way down, you'll still be way ahead of the game over making a proper foundation, or hand digging at just the four corners.

I'm betting you WILL have frustrations, and you're going to cuss at those things more than once, but it's only because it's just some screws... By the time you're done and looking back, it's going to be more like "wow, am I really done already?". I think you'll be pleased. And the buddy for symetrical twisting of the two by four when it gets deep, that really does go a long ways. At least here in the clay. You might have better luck. These will cut "reasonable" tree roots.

 

[mmcmdl]

Let us know how that works out Bryan . I took a short cut up in the camp . I drove 4ft long 1" steel rods into the ground and then drilled holes into the centers of the 6 x 6s . Lifted them up and dropped them on . The poles have never moved for over 10 years or so but the canopy tears to shreds every year .

I have to follow along here . The neighbors up north finally removed my 32 ft camper from my property and I need to have some kind of sleeping structure . It's either a build vs buy decision at this point .

 

[Eddyde]

I believe these "Screw Pilings" are a derivative of underpinning, a technique used to stabilize building foundations, sometimes even massive, high-rise buildings, bridges, etc.
You can do a "Poor mans" version by driving pieces of rebar into the ground, at slight angles, using a power hammer, with a ground rod driving attachment. I have done this for simple concrete slab construction, where no additional footings or pilings were practical. For sheds, etc. one can also use a floating slab, poured on a bed of compacted gravel. But that way isn't good for a pitched grade.