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Flooded basement

mak2

Active member
THis weekend has sucked, figuratively and literally. In the last 5 years my basement has flooded 3 times, once during a 100 year rain and twice in the last 2 weeks. When we bought the place the inspector specifically noted the basement does not appear to have been wet. It seems to be seeping up through the slab, I have fixed the gutters which did not work when I bought the place, I have fixed the drainage around the garage so it does not flood into the house it now runs down the hill etc. I cannot figure out what the problem is. I know I am tired of dehumidifiers, fans and shop vacs.
 

DaveNay

Klaatu barada nikto
SUPER Site Supporter
Do you have a sump pit & pump? How long ago did you buy when it appeared to be dry? What new construction has happened since then?
 

mak2

Active member
Sump pump functions normally, we have been here about 5 years now. It cycles on and off more when it rains. Could it be in the wrong place, it never fills up. We are about 20 ft up the side of a hill, but the hill crests about 2 foot above my first floor level, during the big rain it ran into my garage becasue it completely overwhelmed my draining system, course it did everyones and I had diverted a lot of water down the hill right into my neighbors house. You got me thinking, could there be 2 sump pumps and one just not work?
 

muleman

Gone But Not Forgotten
GOLD Site Supporter
Do your spouts all discharge at least 10ft. away from the house walls? You may have winter springs under the place that are hydraulicing the water up through the slab. Getting spout water as far away as possible is one of the first things to try. Is their any ground water from higher elevations coming toward your place?
 

mak2

Active member
I think they do, I had the gutters fixed and connected to the black tubes that run down the hill, but they might be filled with tree debris, I will check that. The top of the hill is about 2 ft higher than my garage and under normal circumstances the 4 inch or so pipes in the driveway eaisly discharge it down the side of the hill. Could be clogged, I will check that too. Thanks.
 

mak2

Active member
This weekend severely sucks, I mean in perspective it aint that bad, but still. I just got an email from our travel agent saying the resort we plan to go to is closing at the end of April, or 2 weeks before we get there. My air tickets are nonrufundable. Grumble, grumble.
 

tommu56

Bronze Member
GOLD Site Supporter
We had a similar problem at the fire house had like 10 downspouts going in to 1 4" pipe and the pipe couldn't take the flow.
I dug it up and ended with max 2 down spouts in 1 4" pipe and up sized the pipe down stream (ran some in parallel when I had to) and used sdr35 pipe with gaskets to keep it from leaking the largest pipe was 10".

I did all the bull labor had a contractor help with the digging and back filling and compacting we haven't been wet in the 15 years since I did it.

tom
 

mak2

Active member
Thanks man, I think my vacation went to hell and I just got a new spring project. Great.
 

BigAl

Gone But Not Forgotten
SUPER Site Supporter
Hell . I have a swimming pool under the old ranch house . We have a spring under there . They use to just have a drain pipe to the biggest area of water . I installed a sump pump and pit and it helps a lot . This summer I plan to dig a ditch 7" down on the back of the old place and try to find where the spring is coming from .I will install another pump in the ditch .
 

REDDOGTWO

Unemployed Veg. Peddler
SUPER Site Supporter
I used to have a wet basement, had a guy look at it and he drilled a hole in the cement and then he asked me if I had a cork, I knew then that we had a problem.

There was a leak in the connection between the city and house connection right under the foundation. It was a real mess to fix.

Good luck on the fix.
 

bczoom

Super Moderator
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
Something that's very important is the drains for your gutters/downspouts need to be separate from any floor drains or foundation french drains.

If they're connected and the discharge pipe either can't handle the volume or is blocked, it backs up. Well, since the foundation and floor drains are obviously lower then the gutters, it backs up in those pipes and then causes basement issues. If you're not sure that they are separate, a simple dye test will answer it. Pour some food coloring in the sump pump and see what pipe the dye comes out (or if the dye ends up in your basement...). After the dye has cleared, repeat the process but put the dye in a downspout and see if the same discharge pipe is used. If it is, that's bad...
 

mak2

Active member
Something that's very important is the drains for your gutters/downspouts need to be separate from any floor drains or foundation french drains.

If they're connected and the discharge pipe either can't handle the volume or is blocked, it backs up. Well, since the foundation and floor drains are obviously lower then the gutters, it backs up in those pipes and then causes basement issues. If you're not sure that they are separate, a simple dye test will answer it. Pour some food coloring in the sump pump and see what pipe the dye comes out (or if the dye ends up in your basement...). After the dye has cleared, repeat the process but put the dye in a downspout and see if the same discharge pipe is used. If it is, that's bad...

Thanks, it does kinda bother me the problems started after I fixed the gutters. The one I can tell for sure where it goes definately runs down the hill but that one was added in the mid 80's and the guy that did all the work then was great, always fixed everything correctly. I will try the dye thing.
 

bczoom

Super Moderator
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
A faster method for the dye test. Use 2 different colors. Let's say you do yellow in the sump pump and blue in the gutters. If it comes out the discharge pipe green, you have an issue. BTW, use a light color in the sump pump. If it does leach back into your basement, you don't want a dark color staining anything.
 

Dargo

Like a bad penny...
GOLD Site Supporter
Interesting thread. My rent house was build in 1926 and it was built by their parents (elderly) and it has a finished the basement and said it never flooded. The first year I owned it, no issues either.

Fast forward to last fall and the stupid and cranky woman (a Mormon - they don't go for divorces - but her husband still left her and her kids went with him) did a lot of construction work to her home via various contractors with NO permits. Trying to be a good neighbor, I didn't turn her in (should have!). They turned two downspouts that were previously buried (but would have to have been moved due to her new septic system she had put in - again, without permit) directly at my rent house which is about 10' away from her house.

Now I've had the basement flood 3 times. She got bitchy the first two times and told me to piss off and it was my problem. I took pictures this last rain and turned in the damage to State Farm along with the pictures of water blasting off the side of my house from her downspouts.

It's costing me my freaking $500 deductible, but State Farm is going to sue her to recover their losses due to her causing them. I suppose we'll see who is right. Oh, I don't miss having any neighbors close to where I live! Why do some people have to be such asses?
 

mak2

Active member
I rode my bike through this yard when I was about 6 or 7 I guess back to the creek. There has been no significant construction close since back then. Upstream they have built a bunch of houses which I do think causes the creek to flood more often costing me my 20+ year old chain link fence, but that is at least 15 foot down the hill.
 

muleman

Gone But Not Forgotten
GOLD Site Supporter
Seen more than one news story about flooding in Indy over the weekend so it could just be mother nature kicking your butt. I went overkill on my drain system when I built this place and it was money well spent.
 

mak2

Active member
I will bump this thread this spring when I start working on it. It could be just a lot of rain, I guess we got 2 inches in a few hours then slower constant rain for hours. Thanks again everybody.
 

mak2

Active member
Well, I finally figured it out. I was about to call the professionals and I know they always tell you you need drains around the complete perimiter and it will only cost 20k. Anyway it had been dry for quite a while and I happened to be standing in my room saying to my wife at lest the carpet was dry, even with all this rain. Then I put my foot over by the wall. Soaked. Soon the entire floor was soaked. but this time I knew exactly where the water came in. I went outside and the downspouts appeared to be working fine, and the sump pump was t'd into the gutter on the highside. I was just looking behind the low gutter to see if it was leaking. O my goodness, there was a stream of water running under it, but not going out onto the sidewalk. So I picked up a shovel and started digging. It was mud and very hard to get off the shovel. anyway I dug up the leak, it was running under the black tubing supposedly running it out to the yard. anyway I dug it clear up to where the sump pump tee'd into the gutter drain. Some of it, very little actually went down the black tubing, but enough to make me think it was. In reality almost all of it was going under the tubing down the hill to my bedroom and appears to run right in my room.

I rerouted all the gutters and the sump pump into individual tubing and ran them into the back yard. Bingo dry room. I just have to landscape it back in when it dries out a bit. Happy day, I thought it was gonna cost thousands, in reality it was a 4 dollar snap in fitting and lots of tubing.

Thanks everyone for the help.
 
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