Brick Skirting

[Nancy McIntosh]

I am trying to found out how deep a footing should be for putting brick around a manufactured house already in place. We want to brick it up to the windows and each corner of the home. This would be a do it yourself project. We live in Oklahoma. I would appreciate any help you can offer. We have a brick layer for the bricking, we need to do the footing ourselves. Thankyou.

[Roy T. Bonney]

The depth of the footing is controled by local jurisdiction. Contact your county building official, to obtain this information. Please realize, that if you go to the windows, you are placing a substantial portion of your home behind the brick perimeter wall. If moisture is allowed to pentetrate thru the top course of the brick, you will have serious issues. This is not a do it yourself project. Also keep in mind the required ventilation requirements, and vapor barriers. My reccomendation would be to do a brick skirt, stopping at the rim joist, and being under the home, as opposed to outside the perimeter.

[David]

Would there still be a moisture problem if a manufactured home was bricked all the way up in front and left siding on the other 3 sides of the home.
I suppose bricking up to the frame on the other 3 sides would be a good idea.
Thanks David,

[Roy T. Bonney]

Vinyl siding is meant to be self ventilating, and exposed. When you cover it up, you are basically bringing it into the crawl space. If you have a higher relative humidity in the crawl space, it will infiltrate into that side wall, where the siding allows the free flow.

[David]

I assume a person would take the siding off and put the tabs to hold the brick to the existing wall. Yes I cant imagine bricking over the existing siding.

David