Can't stop the water in the basement...detailed

[watsonr4]

Here's my problem. My basement has always gotten water coming through the back wall as long as I've lived here (6 years). We tried to fix it by sealing the back wall with sealent paint before putting up dry wall and finishing most of the basement (big mistake). Of course water came in again and forced us to roll back the carpet and rip out the drywall.

We originally thought the problem was the concrete porch in the backyard since it settled years ago and ended up sloped toward the house, thus all water that got on it went straight to the house and down the crack between the porch and the house.

So this summer we rented a backhoe, ripped out the porch, and dug up along most of the back wall down to the foundation. What we found was that the house had shifted forward on the foundation leaving a 1-1 1/2 inch lip sticking out that we figured was catching the water. We sprayed a hose on the lip and, sure enough, water flowed into the basement.

We power washed the outer wall, sealed the cracks with crack sealent, hired a guy to spray a rubber sealent on the wall, and ran 6mil plastic sheet from the top to just below the footer. A french drain was already in the ground slightly below the footer. We watched it during a couple of hard rains and it never appeared to be backing up.

We then filled in gravel and dirt (gravel against the wall, dirt on the outside of the gravel).

After all this, a hard rain STILL causes water to come in. It is better, but there is still an unacceptable amount of water coming in.

The only thing we can think is that we could not dig along the entire length of the back because of the neighbors yard and the air conditioner. The length we couldn't get to is maybe 7 feet before getting to the corner.

I can't see any possible way the water is coming in through the barriers I put in, so I assume its traveling through the block. We tried drilling a drain hole inside in the block directly under the area we couldn't get to, but very little is coming out, so I assume most of the water is traveling through the block before getting to the bottom block.

I'm really at a lose as to how to tell where all the water is coming from. Its hard to believe that this much water is coming from one small corner of the house.

The ground outside has settled and we have not been able to add more fill dirt yet to slope it away from the house, so a lot of water probably is sitting next to the house, but again, I can't believe its getting through all those barriers.

I hate to have to do the french drain thing inside and I'm considering building a porch the entire length of the back of the house just to keep the water far away from the house.

Does anyone have any ideas????

thanks,
ron

[watsonr4]

Anyone???

[Troy]

Barriers are a good idea, but keep in mind that if there is a way for water to get in, then the water will find it. The best way to prevent water seeping through the walls is to prevent it from ever getting there. Best results seem to occur through the use of french drains well before the water meets the walls. Route water away from your house early. It is too hard to fight once it gets there.

Can you install french drains away from your house to prevent the water from reaching the basement walls? Also take a look at your gutter drains to make sure that water is routed away from your home.

Generally I have found there is a saturation point, at which water starts to enter the home. The idea is to prevent water from entering the area, thus lengthening the saturation time of the dirt around the home. If you can lengthen the saturation time to a length longer than it takes to dry, then the water will evaporate before it enters your home. I don't think you will ever be able to build a barrier that will prevent water from seeping.

"There is no such thing as a dry basement!"

Hope that helps! Any questions? Welcome to the forum!

[mrcaptainbob]

Dang! That's a nasty situation! I had similar in the first two homes I owned. The one was fixed (as you did) by digging to the drain tile, patching the crack, slather the wall with a good tar mastic and covering it with sheet plastic. Also added a four foot extension at each downspout. No more problems. Interesting point about the downspouts: the leaks were all located pretty close to where they were. The second home had (has) a problem when the one downspout extension loses it's connection. THe water will flow out a 3/8" hole at the bottom of a mortar joint near the floor within ten minutes of a rain! Keep that extension in place...no problems there. This, our third home, is on the side of a hill and there's plenty of sand all around. A permanent fix!