I agree.
I would want to somehow not build it to fail either.
We do get winds, 120 mile per hr.
We do get earthquakes.......? WHEN

But I do not want to over build.
Pressure Treated posts with screw anchors would be fine.
I am thinking of simple, sturdy alternatives....
without the scar of footers and such....
John

"Mike Marlow" wrote in message
...

jloomis wrote:
Yes, I will probably use sono tubes...
Trouble is the roots of the trees are nightmarish.
We will see how that goes.
No problem with frost here either.

Why bother with sonotubes and piers then? It's a tree house, right? What
kind of loads and weights is it going to be subject to? It can easily be
ground mounted on a frame base, or even a frame base that is anchored into
the ground with screw type anchors. Eliminates all of the issues with
roots, customer not wanting a footer, etc. And - is there even a need for a
slab? Sometimes we can over-engineer simple things.


Yes, I think a slab would not go well.
I thought about using "modular anchors" the type that screw into the
ground, and putting one of those in each sono tube.

Yup - that's what I was talking about above, except I don't understand why
you feel you need the piers with the sono tubes.


--

-Mike-