Engineered Screw Piles in Edmonton and Area

Fence Tech offers screw pile installation in Edmonton and surrounding area. Our high quality engineered helical screw piles are manufactured in a CWB Certified facility near Edmonton, Alberta that houses state of the art equipment, providing one of the highest quality screw pile products on the market. Our piles and caps can be custom built to accommodate any application and ground condition. Our screw piles are built to last as a solid and permanent foundation method for many residential and commercial construction applications. Helical piling, also known as screw piling, is a long-standing, established foundation method, which has been used in projects for over 150 years. Screw pile foundations first appeared in the 1800’s as pile foundations for lighthouses and were extensively used for piers in harbours. The speed, non-invasive ease of install and superior foundation elements of screw piles were soon recognized by international construction authorities, including our provincial and federal building codes (Alberta Building Code A-4.2.7.1. and National Building Code A-4.2.7.1.).

Screw Pile Installation How To Steps:

1. Call or submit an Alberta One Call ticket online they will mark underground utility lines free of charge Utility Safety Partners

• Alberta One Call will only mark public utilities.
• If you have private utilities such as a gas or power line going to a detached garage in close vicinity to the work area or you need to locate your sewer or water lines for pile installations, you may need to call a private locatorclick here for a list of private locators in Alberta or contact Tierra Geomatics

2. Determine if a permit is required

• For Decks under 2ft most municipalities will not require a permit however, over 2ft a permit will be required. As long as the deck is not over 6ft you should only need our engineered drawing of our pile and torque report for your inspector.
• For Decks over 6ft, shops, cabins, mobile homes and house foundations, you will likely be required to provide an engineered foundation drawing. This can be prepared by many engineering companies such as  BIE Engineering Corp.

3. Layout Piles – If you have an extensive pile layout on your engineered foundation drawing and you are not comfortable with marking your pile locations companies such as Pals Geomatics should be able to assist you with this.
4. Mark Screw Pile Locations – Prior to install, pile locations must be marked by customer with a painted ‘x’ or nail and flagging.
5. Confirm Equipment Access – Minimum width clearance for our large track machine is 6′ 8″ (for install of all our available pile sizes).
6. Mark Pile Height – If you will be using our laser levelling service, we would require a pile height marked on a stake or foundation. This will be used as a reference point for our laser level.

 Engineering and Screw Pile Torque

Our screw piles are engineered and meet code for any deck where permits are required. Screw pile torque has a direct correlation with the load capacity of helical screw piles. On installation as the screw pile enters good bearing soil the install torque increases along with load capacity of the screw pile.  

We use top of the line PENGO/DIGGA screw pile drives and in-line relief pressure monitoring system which enables us to monitor the pressure at the drive head  and the back pressure returning to our tanks. Using these readings, we can determine based on our engineered allowable loads charts, that we are indeed into good load bearing soil and the exact load capacity of each pile we install, leaving you with a solid reliable foundation every time. If your deck requires a permit, we can provide an engineered stamped torque report. Please let us know before the piles are installed if you require this for your permit.

Frost Line

We install our screw piles as deep as necessary to achieve the desired torque which will ensure the pile can handle it’s maximum potential load.  We also want to make certain the helix area of the pile is anchored well below the frost line. For fences and other structures that can float (move up and down with frost heave) getting below the frost line is not required, as they will move up with the frost and back down when the frost is out of the ground. However, if  you attach something that can float (like a deck on piles above the frost line) to something that is fixed and stationary i.e. a house, this is where you run into problems.  If for example, your deck is attached to your home’s ledger board and the deck heaves because the piles are not below the frost line, this will cause the deck to raise while the house stays in the same position. This potentially could break the ledger board and loosen the joist hangers resulting in possible disconnection from the house.  This would create an unsafe deck that could in fact fall to the ground.

Although our national standard is to install 7 ft helical screw piles to get below a 6 ft frost line, Geotechnical engineers have found the frost line as low as 7.5 ft in some soil types around the Greater Edmonton Area.  This means you need a screw pile which is longer than 7 ft. This is why Fence Tech Inc. standard stocked piles are 8 and 10 ft ensuring the helix (bottom screw type plate which holds most of the bearing weight) is below the frost line and that there is enough pile above grade for the soil to move up and down around it. Every project has unique soil conditions and you can have completely different soil conditions from one pile to other only a few feet away. This is why our extendable pile system is a huge advantage over most of our competitors.

Screw Pile Applications

Fence Tech Inc. offers residential and commercial helical screw piling installations in the Edmonton, Alberta Area. Screw piles are a great choice for residential and commercial applications as they cause minimal ground disturbance, are quickly installed, have superior foundation elements and can be built on immediately after installation. Our engineered helical screw piles are built from quality steel and modern robotic equipment creating a seamless finished product which will last longer than the lifetime of any structure. We offer our basic residential/light commercial  2 7/8 ” x 10′  or 12′ with 3/8″ x 12″ helix. For heavier applications, we offer a 3 1/2″ x 10′ or 12′ with a 3/8″ x 14″ helix and 4 1/2″ x 10′ or 12′ with 1/2″ x 16″ helix. We also offer a 2 3/8″ x 10′ with 10′ helix which is a more affordable option for standard uncovered decks. We stock various caps including 8″ flat with 1″ offset or 6″ saddle with 1″ offset for seating your beams, posts, concrete, etc. If required for certain rare ground conditions, our extensions can take the piles down to greater depths depending on the job or engineering required.

Advantages of using our screw piles for your next project:

No mess – Because screw piles are screwed into place using the integral helix system, no auguring is required, leaving no cleanup.  A concrete 12′ x 12″ pile which is required for most deck permits would leave approximately 4 wheel barrows of clay per pile. The clay removal itself is a huge labour and cost.

Engineering & Building permits – Our screw piles can be used for permits where concrete piles are called for. These are typically the 12″ x 12′ concrete piles. We offer engineered stamped drawings of our piles, torque to load graphs and complete foundation plans for provided project drawings which can be given to our customers when required for permit processing.

Pile caps – We offer our standard flat 8″ slotted offset or 6″ saddle caps, these two cap styles work for the majority of our projects however, if you require a specific cap, we can custom build it.

Custom Engineered piles – We can build our custom engineered piles to most pile and helix configurations.

Piece of mind  – Know that your newly installed screw piles will not move. We install our screw piles as deep as necessary to achieve the desired torque which will ensure the pile can handle it’s maximum potential load. We also make certain the helix area of the pile is anchored well below the frost line. Although our national standard is to install 7 ft helical screw piles to get below a 6 ft frost line, Geotechnical engineers have found the frost line as low as 7.5 ft in some soil types around the Greater Edmonton Area.  This means you require a screw pile which is longer than 7 ft. This is why Fence Tech Inc. uses a minimum 10’ pile ensuring the helix (bottom screw type plate which holds most of the bearing weight) is well below the frost line.

Recycling – If years down the road you decide to change the layout of your deck, move your mobile home or change a sign location, your screw piles can be moved or re-positioned by simply unscrewing  and re-installing in the new location.

Quick installation – Installation is quick. In most cases it takes less than 5 min/pile and with no downtime waiting for concrete to set, construction on your project can start the same day.

Laser levelling option – With our optional laser levelling, we can level and cut all piles to the same height so you can either place your beam directly on our 8″ offset pile caps, or cut all posts that make up the difference to the beam at the same height. This will save you hours of labour and help in the process of building a professional built look.  

 Below are just a few residential and commercial screw pile applications for which we offer for installation:

Residential Applications:

• Cabins
• Concrete slab base foundations
• Decks
• Garage pads
• Grade beams
• Hot tub base support
• Manufactured/mobile homes
• Patios
• Retaining walls
• Sidewalks
• Signs
• Solar array foundations
• Streetlight bases
• Sunrooms
• Verandas
• Wheelchair access ramps and boardwalks

Commercial Applications:

• Bollards
• Concrete slabs
• Lighting foundations
• Retaining walls
• School portables
• Sign supports
• Solar array foundations
• Tent structures

Don’t forget to checkout our Screw Pile Installation Checklist to make sure you have all the information needed to be ready for your engineered screw pile installation.

We offer our screw pile installation services in:

Edmonton Alberta, Beaumont, Camrose, Devon, Leduc, Leduc County, Sherwood Park, Fort Saskatchewan, Spruce Grove, Millet and other locations around the Edmonton Area.