Cracking walls & loud noises?

[cantwait]

We are currently living in a newly built two story gambrel house. During these cold nights there are very loud banging noises, enough to wake you from a deep sleep. We have noticed that the exterior walls, all of them, are developing cracks at every corner. Any room with an exterior wall has this. Also the one piece shower/tub unit has cracks on the walls it is connected/leaning/next to.

Does anyone know why the noises?
Why the cracks?

thanks

[Rich]

Well most newly built homes have a measure of settling that happens during the .. well actually during most of the life of the home. During the initial 6 months or so it can be pretty annoying.
But honestly if you are hearing louder than normal cracking and there are visible cracks on the exterior you may have more issues than just that. Don't be alarmed just yet. I would probably give it awhile longer before I raised too much of a stink with the builder, but would definately talk to them about it. Make sure there is a written record of exactly what happens during this time. Such as ...builder came out to our home today and called me a dirty sob so I flew the bird and flung my hammer at him. In all these situations - documentation will save your bacon.

[cantwait]

Actually, this house has been sitting for two years, the owner has allowed us to live here while we get ours built. We are not using any of the contractors used on this house.
The kitchen counters have seperated from the wall by about 1 inch at the top, the floor part is still flush, which leads me to wonder is the floor dropping or the wall moving out.
We have video taped and photographed every single thing due to the unstable behavior of the owner.
What concerns us is that we strongly feel he will try to blame the wall cracks on us.
The builder he had/has is, well how should I put it, less than desirable.
He put all, yes all, the windows on LAST, OVER the t1-11 siding, guess what they all leak.
The furnace chimney leaks like a sive, when it rains. And there is only one duct run from the furnace to behind the bathroom door. This is a two story house, brand new, and according to the owner, completed and paid for.
The bedroom upstairs never got above 52 that's with an electric heater running non-stop so we had to run 12/2 sjt to put a second heater there, our six month old was very cold.
Did I mention this was a new house?
Any way, we are very distrusting of the owner, they day we don't know what country living is like, ofcourse they are in Florida and we are way, wasy up north, freezing.
I felt that all this noise and cracking was structural and possibly due to, well how should I put this, another example of this builders shotty work.
Any other thoughts?

[Rich]

I would run away very fast. After you describe the rest of the house I could very easily see how you would think it was the shoddy quality of the builder... and honestly I would agree.
Windows over the siding? Is the contractor licensed?

[mreynolds]

I was just reading an article about truss uplift. Basically they said if you nail interior wall partitions to the bottom truss cord, the nature heating and cooling of your house will cause the bottom cords to bow up. Their suggestion was to install a sliding fastner and not to nail dry wall within 16 increase of the wall. Could this be the casue of the cracks described in this article?

[Rich]

I've never heard of that before - I suppose in the worst situation it could cause troubles. I guess my thought is that if the winds are high enough to cause that much uplift it should be designed into the truss itself and the support structure.
I personally have always attached interior walls to the bottom chords and never had any troubles.

[cantwait]

Actually, I have read, seen and heard of "truss uplift" which usually pertains to the ceiling rock being firmly connected to the wall rock and when temps get cold out the top cords change (shrink/expand) and pull on the bottom cord causing the ceiling to rise "tearing" away from the wall. Also because the bottom cord usually is "warm" covered in insulation from the attic space above. Experienced contractors usually are aware of this and use a molding only attached to the ceiling so that when movement happens you don't see a gap at the ceiling corner.

Funny thing is this builder built the second floor in truss fashion as one unit with open web floor directly attached to walls/roof parts (gambrel) 24oc. We did think about the "truss uplift" effect since so far it is only the entire first floor that is seperating.

Oh the entire first floor 24x24 is held up by 2-2x4's nailed into a tee, not the usuall steel "columns" used to hold up girders. We are truly expecting crap from the owner since in his own words,"...this builder built everything in his barn and builds above code standards...everything is better than code..." They think this guy is the god of construction.

We looked up from the basement through the WIDE opening under the tub plumbing and can see the exterior wall their, NO insulation. Also, the floors both have no insulation. Lots of wicking and leaking.

Needless to say, we "cantwait" to get out of here, unfortunately its been 20 below and worse for this whole month.

Hey, that article about the builders who built those houses with the driveways going up at about 60 degrees, my wife's aunt lives in a very expensive community in North Carolina where their homes are clones of the ones posted. We had a Jeep Grand Ch. and needed 4 low to creep up the drive, they on the other hand never used it or the garage. We'd like to know what stupid bank lent the money for those?

Thanks.

[Rich]

Interesting methods for Gods of Construction eh? I should have continued on with my explanation of the use of drywall clips. Although I've never used the sliding connection mentioned. I always try to specify the use of drywall clips which will take care of most of the problems.
I've seen more problems with this in Colorado than I saw in Montana. At first I didn't quite understand it but after living in CO for awhile I can tell you why it's more of a problem - it's drier than H*ll here. Typically the wood ends up with less than 19% MC after about 6 months.
My understanding of truss uplift is a little different than what you've described also. With an engineering background I consider truss uplift to be more of a problem with wind loads on one side of a structure that causes uplift in differing conditions across a truss. I call your situation expansion and contraction.. that's why my comment about the engineer accounting for it.