Helical piers are a good repair method. We install them ourselves, and where the soil is right they are quick, clean, and permanent. The trouble starts when a pier system is selected before anyone has looked hard at what is actually under the house.
On the Colorado Front Range, soil conditions for helical piers vary block to block. A pier that performs for a lifetime in one neighborhood can be the wrong call two lots over. Below we explain how we install helical piers, which Front Range soil conditions make them a poor fit, what it looks like when a repair is not holding, and what we do instead when the ground will not allow it.
How a Helical Pier Is Supposed to Work
A helical pier is a steel shaft with a helix plate near the leading end. We advance it into the ground with a high-torque hydraulic motor, monitoring three things as it goes down: depth, the rate at which it advances into deeper soil, and the torque required to keep turning it.
Torque is how we read soil strength. Denser soil resists more, the same way a screw takes more effort in oak than in pine. We keep advancing until the helix is embedded in soil dense enough to carry the structure, then bracket the pier to the foundation and transfer the building's weight onto that deeper material.
That is the whole logic of how helical piers work. It depends on two conditions being true: the helix can physically reach competent soil, and the soil it lands in will not change behavior with the seasons. When either condition fails, the pier is doing exactly what it was designed to do and the house still moves.
That is a methodology problem, not a product defect. It is also the reason we start every project with diagnosis rather than a product decision.
The Front Range Conditions Where Helical Piers Are the Wrong Call
Four site conditions account for most of the helical pier installation problems we are called in to look at.
Rock
Helical piers are excellent at screwing through soil. Rock stops them. On rocky sites, it can be impossible to advance the helix far enough to reach the material that should be carrying the load. The pier stops where the rock is, not where the bearing is.
Dense Expansive Claystone Near the Surface
Large parts of the Front Range have soil that is dense and expansive at the same time. Expansive means the soil holds clay minerals with a strong attraction to water. It swells when wet and returns toward its original volume when it dries, and it does that with real force. Soil expansion of this kind is the single most common condition we work around.
Shallow claystone can be too dense to advance a helix through, even with the most powerful installation equipment available. If the helix cannot get past that layer, the pier is seated above the problem rather than below it.
This is different from saying expansive clay rules out helical piers. It does not. It means the depth question has to be answered before the method is chosen. Readers wanting the fuller picture can start with expansive soil in Boulder and our explainer on expansive soils in Denver.
Steeply Dipping Bedrock Near the Foothills
Closer to the mountains we deal with a separate hazard. The expansive beds there dip steeply, and because some beds swell far more than the ones beside them, they heave unevenly. That is a different mechanism from the broad swelling of flat-lying soil, and it changes what a correct repair looks like.
A pier that would perform well in typical expansive soil can be the wrong call in a steeply dipping heaving-bedrock zone, because the rock can carry the pier with it. Depth alone does not solve this one. The design has to account for how those beds move.
A Helix Seated in Soil That Changes With the Season
If the helix ends up too shallow, or lands in soil whose moisture content swings through the year, the pier moves with that soil. The foundation moves with the pier. This is the condition that produces repairs which look fine in October and open back up the following spring.
Water is behind most of it. We almost never see a Front Range home with a foundation problem and good grading at the same time, which is why why expansive soil matters is not an academic question on these properties.
Signs a Helical Pier Repair May Not Be Holding
These are indicators worth taking seriously, not diagnoses. Any one of them can have a cause unrelated to the piers.
- Cracks that continue to widen, or new cracks appearing, after the repair was completed
- Movement that follows a season, worsening in spring or fall as soil moisture changes
- Doors and windows that stick again after being adjusted
- Gaps reopening at wall and floor joints or along trim lines
- Pier brackets that appear to have shifted relative to the foundation
- Settlement or heave that started after the installation was finished
When several of these show up together, particularly on a seasonal pattern, the bearing conditions below the piers are worth investigating. Our page on signs of vertical movement covers the symptom side in more detail.
When We Switch to Limited-Access Micropiles
Where helical piers cannot reach competent bearing, we use limited-access micropiles instead. We drill a narrow hole down into bedrock, place a continuous steel bar, and grout it in place. The pile is then bracketed to the foundation the same way a helical pier is.
The advantage is that drilling is not stopped by rock or by dense claystone. We reach confirmed bearing regardless of what the profile looks like on the way down, which is why micropiles are the gold standard for structural repair and why we have never had a callback from a moving pile or pier.
We are equally clear about the trade-off. Micropiles are slower, messier, and more involved than helical piers, and they require careful engineering and real knowledge of the soil. We do not recommend them on sites where helical piers will do the job properly. Choosing the bigger method when the smaller one is correct is its own kind of mismatch.
What we do not install, on any site here, is push piers. They rely on friction between the pipe and the surrounding soil, and they will not advance through rock or stiff shallow expansive soil. They work well over soft, non-expansive soil sitting on hard, non-expansive material. That is not what we have on the Front Range.
What We Evaluate Before Any Pier Goes in the Ground
Selecting between methods is an evidence question. Here is what we weigh, and where each condition usually points.
| Site condition | What it tells us | Where it usually points |
|---|---|---|
| Competent bearing soil within reach of a helix | Torque readings will correlate reliably with capacity | Helical piers, with engineering review |
| Rock in the advancement path | The helix cannot be advanced to bearing | Limited-access micropiles |
| Dense expansive claystone near the surface | The helix may not penetrate to depth | Engineering review, micropiles commonly indicated |
| Steeply dipping beds near the foothills | Movement is differential heave, not uniform swell | Engineered design for that specific bedding |
| Bearing zone with seasonal moisture swings | Capacity will not stay constant through the year | Deeper bearing, plus drainage correction |
| Water consistently moving toward the structure | Movement has an active source that piers do not address | Drainage and grading correction alongside structural repair |
Treat this as the shape of the conversation, not a specification. The method for your property comes from a site-specific evaluation and, on any significant repair, from an independent structural engineer.
Alongside the soil itself, we look at drainage patterns, the moisture history of the site, and the grading. If grading is sound and the structure is still moving, that tells us something important about what is happening deeper. If grading is poor, it is almost certainly contributing, and correcting the pier without correcting the water leaves half the problem in place.
Why We Want an Independent Engineer Involved
On any repair involving meaningful structural movement or uncertain soil, we would rather the homeowner engage an independent, third-party structural engineer before hiring a contractor. The engineer assesses the site, reviews available geotechnical data, and issues stamped drawings defining the scope for that specific property.
There is a practical reason for the order. The engineering cost is unavoidable either way, and hiring the engineer directly means one set of drawings that every bidder prices against, rather than a different set from every contractor. It is far easier to compare like with like.
When a project arrives with stamped drawings, the soil analysis has been done by a qualified professional and we execute the plan without substitution. That combination of a sound design and a contractor who respects it is what removes the guesswork.
What to Do If You Think a Repair Is Not Holding
These steps are useful whoever you end up hiring.
- Document what you are seeing. Note crack locations, when they appeared or widened, whether the movement tracks the seasons, and which doors and windows are affected.
- Pull the records from the previous repair. Find out what was installed, at what depth, and what the original diagnosis was. Locate the contract and warranty.
- Engage an independent structural engineer before the next contractor.
- Ask any contractor what soil evaluation they perform and how they confirm the pier has reached competent bearing. The answer tells you most of what you need to know.
If you would like a second read on a previous repair, or you are planning a first one and want to know what your soil will support, we are glad to come out. Schedule a complimentary on-site assessment and we will tell you what we find.
Frequently Asked Questions
What This Comes Down To
Helical pier soil capacity is not a number you can look up by soil type. It depends on what the helix is actually bearing in at the installed depth, whether it could physically reach that depth, and whether the material will behave the same way in April as it did in September.
Van Matre Construction was founded in 2001 as a general builder and remodeler and has focused on structural and drainage work since 2013. Our field estimators, Tim and Lance, have each been with us more than twenty years. That background is why we read a site before we pick a method, and why we would rather lose a job than install a system we do not believe will hold.
Our structural work carries a lifetime warranty. We do not require a deposit to hold a place in our schedule. We would rather you understood the reasoning than took our word for it.
Permanent Solutions. Guaranteed.
If you are on the Front Range and want a straight answer about your soil and your foundation, see our foundation repair services or get in touch.
Van Matre Construction
Lafayette: 214 N 120th St, Lafayette, CO 80026
Boulder: 7530 Baseline Rd, Boulder, CO 80303
Denver: 2644 Columbine St, Denver, CO 80205
(303) 668-2222
