Slab Piers Stabilize Settled Ranch Homes and Slab Additions Permanently

Including bracket, core drilling or excavation, and patching. If foam injection is paired with the piers to fill voids, that adds separately. The Customized Repair Estimate after on-site inspection reflects your slab's actual scope. Fixed price, not a range.

Epp Foundation Repair issues a 10-year warranty against further settlement on the installed slab pier. No lifting warranty is provided. The warranty transfers to the next homeowner if the property sells. If a warrantied pier fails to stabilize during the warranty period, Epp re-installs at no charge. Settlement in a section of the slab not previously piered is a separate inspection.

Slab piers are smaller-diameter helicals (2-3/8 inch or 2-7/8 inch shaft) engineered for slab-on-grade loads. Ranch homes, slab additions, garage slabs, and light commercial slabs. They install faster and cost less per pier than full-size helicals because the loads are lower. Full-size helical piers (3-inch shaft and up) carry heavier full-basement homes. Founder Dave Epp specifies slab piers when the structure is slab-on-grade and full-size helicals when the structure is basement or crawl space. The choice is made on the inspection visit and written into the contract.

Slabs are more rigid in plan than basement foundations, so lift recovery is typically lower than what a basement home can achieve. The piers stop further settlement first; how much of the lost elevation can safely come back depends on slab thickness, age, soil conditions, and how brittle the existing finishes have become, and Dave Epp states the realistic expectation for your slab on the inspection visit. Stabilization is guaranteed on every install; no lifting warranty is provided. Forcing too much lift in a rigid slab can crack the slab elsewhere or damage tile and trim that have adapted to the settled position.

Yes, and slab settlement usually accelerates. Loess hydroconsolidation in eastern Nebraska and western Iowa continues every time the soil cycles between wet and dry, and a slab that has dropped a half-inch in three years can drop another half-inch in the next two. Expansive clay in Kansas and Missouri averages 50-plus freeze-thaw and wet-dry cycles per year, each one adding cumulative differential movement. Cracks that started cosmetic frequently progress to slab separation from the structure, displaced exterior brick, and sticking doors. The cosmetic damage Epp finds on a delayed install becomes the homeowner's separate finish work after piers stabilize the slab.

Often, yes. When a slab is lifted with piers, the lift opens a void between the slab and the soil below. The soil settled, that is why the slab dropped, and lifting the slab puts a hollow space underneath. Polyurethane foam injection fills that void with continuous bearing support, preventing the slab from deflecting between piers under live load over the years. Most ranch home and slab addition scopes Epp writes include both. Piers stop further settlement, and foam fills the gap that the settled soil left below. The two are priced separately on the contract so the homeowner sees the full scope.