Abilene, Texas · Taylor County
A steel building goes up fast, but only if the slab under it is square, level and has every anchor bolt exactly where the building supplier's drawing says. Miss a bolt by an inch and the erection crew is drilling and epoxying on day one. Abilene Concrete Builders pours slabs for metal shops, barndominiums, equipment barns and detached garages in Abilene and out in the county.
Most shops carry trucks, lifts, welders and a lot of weight in a small area. We thicken the slab where a car lift will bolt down and slope the floor toward the overhead doors so wash water and rain blowing in under the door run out, not toward the back wall.
A barndominium is a house under a steel roof, so its slab carries plumbing, a vapor retarder and interior walls like any home foundation. The City lists secondary dwellings and residential additions among the projects that commonly need a building permit, and we pour barndominium slabs to stamped plans.
Barns that store a tractor or hay equipment need thick edges at the doors and room for heavy tires to turn. We'll ask what's going inside before we price the steel.
Abilene's amendments to the 2021 International Building Code require construction documents prepared by a registered design professional under the Texas Engineering Practice Act or the architects' licensing law. They add that any building with a clear span over 24 feet needs its foundation and structural members designed by a professional engineer. A 30-foot-wide shop with no interior columns, for example, is past that line, so we pour buildings like that to sealed drawings.
For a structure that doesn't need an engineer and isn't over 2 stories, the City's amendment points to its own minimum footing detail, Figure 18-1.E. The City's stated reason is that it gives smaller structures, such as accessory buildings, a design best suited for the soils inside Abilene's city limits.
The City's permit handout lists accessory buildings of 200 square feet or larger as needing a permit, and a smaller building also needs one if it has electrical, plumbing or HVAC. A typical 30-by-40 shop is 1,200 square feet, so plan on a permit.
Outside the floodplain, the City's amendment sets the finished floor at 18 inches above the highest point of the street gutter, measured perpendicular to the building. On a lot that sits low to the street, that can mean more fill and taller forms than you'd guess, so we shoot grades before we price the job.
The City's amendment adds an investigation fee equal to the permit fee for work started without a permit, and a ten-times fee for work started within 12 months of an earlier violation. Waiting a week for the permit is the cheaper path.
We start with the supplier's anchor bolt plan and the reactions sheet, then form the perimeter, thicken the edges and any column pads, and set bolts in plywood templates so they can't drift during the pour. The slab is sized to the building, not the other way around. If the engineer calls for post-tensioning on expansive clay, see our post-tension slab page.
Send the building size, the supplier's anchor bolt plan if you have it, and the address. Call (325) 728-4111 anytime, or use the quote form and choose "Shop / Metal Building Slab."
Prefer to talk? Call (325) 728-4111 anytime.
See every service we offer at Abilene Concrete Builders.
