weird foundation issue -- my floor is leaking???

[Xylob the Destroyer]

There is no plumbing in the area, the foundation wall is concrete (cracks were repaired within the past 18 months or so by previous owner).
Water is seeping UP through the floor.....


I don't get it...
Where is this coming from?
the area in the photo is about 18 to 24 inches wide and that darker round area closer to the camera is standing water (shallow, but still 'standing').
The floor is about 7 and a half to 8 feet below ground level.
We are currently in the middle of a huge blizzard that has shut down most of the state (governor even declard a state of emergency!).
But there is no build up of snow on this side of the house, near the foundation or otherwise....

Anybody know what this is??

[stiltman]

The floor is about 7 and a half to 8 feet below ground level.

Think that says it all.

Did they install a french drain pipe around the basement? (pipe with small slits and then covered over with mesh, then with pea gravel, then soil)

Did they seal the outside of the wall and foundation? (spray-on or rubber sheeting)

If not, that's what you'll be doing. or you can put a hole in the foundation right there and install a sump pump

[Dr. DOS]

My basement suffers from water as well. Tends to be after large snow falls or rain. Cause is a high water table / hydrostatic pressure that pushes the water up thru the floor. Solution is to alleviate the pressure. As Stilt denotes that can be fixed with a french drain around the interior edge of floor.

Some day for me.

[ZAPPER]

Stiltman is about right. The grade of the surface should also shed water away from your home. I have never been a big fan of french drains or tile pipes or most of the standard building practices as far as waterproofing subgrade structures go. Without building your basement as tight as a battleship, all you are really doing is delaying the water from coming in.


My concern is that if you are currently in freezing weather, there shouldn't be a whole lot of liquid water to come in. It could be that somewhere in you drainage system there is a frozen spot or a clog. What about your rain gutters? Is the snow on your roof being melted and flowing into a frozen downspout and backing up near the foundation?

Try to confirm that the source is not from above grade before you start to do any excavations. What about the possibility of a supply line having frozen and leaking. (Not all supplies are burried as deep as they should be)

It could be one of several things and it will most likely be the last thing that you would expect.

Where does you existing foundation drain go to?


Serious waterproofing would consist of excavating around the entire perimeter of the house to a point well below your basement slab. Cleaning your exterior foundation walls and reapplying a suitable product (I question the existance of such a product, but hot tar, tar paper and more hot tar would be my choice if money was no problem) Reinstalling a new drainage system and back filling with perk stone all the way to just below the surface grade.



The only part worse than all of the money and work involved is that water is some tricky stuff. A soft vein in the soil running under all of your work and coming in contact with your basement slab or terminating inside of the defensive perimeter that you install, can make all of you work a waste of time and money.

I would venture to say that 98% of the time it is mismanaged surface water, 1% of the time leaking pipes and then there is the 1% of the time when it is just pure evil water trying to make you go broke or insane or both!


There are products designed to seal you walls from the interior, but think of it like this. Even if you did actually find one that almost worked, the water on the outside of your house would still be there just waiting and causing the system to fail. It is best that the water never have the chance to touch your foundation.

OK, enough of the negative thoughts. Good luck and keep us posted

[redstripes]

yea... definitely need a french drain pipe/ sub-pump

[Mr. Dweezel]

About 10 years ago we had the same problem at a house that
we owned at that time.

We had the problem corrected from the inside.

Here are the details...

They dug a small trench around the inside of the
perimeter of the basement, and drilled holes into the basement
wall near the floor.

Perforated drain pipe was laid in the trench, covered with gravel,
and cemented over.

The house had a sump, so the new drain was connected to it.

The job had a "finished" look, and the basement could have been
remodeled if we wanted.

The cost back then was $3500, but all of the other companies
wanted about $7000.

[Mr. Dweezel]

edit...

Sorry..... Double post.

[Xylob the Destroyer]

yeah, that would be prohibitively expensive, as the rest of the basement is finished....

[ZAPPER]

There is also a product that is like a surface gutter that is installed on top of the slab around the interior perimeter and channels the water to werever you direct it, but then again the water is actually inside your house. The best case is to keep your foundation walls dry from the outside. There are paint on products for interior application as well, but once again these are stop gap solutions and not he real fix.


I wish I took photos of my basement with a foot of water in it. I have a basement door that leads outside, it is about 2' below surface grade and has a couple of steps in the shallow well there. Mother nature decided to drop a pine branch on the gutter right above. The way it peeled the gutter over allowed for about half of my roof to drain basically straight into my basement. It killed my deep freezer and made a hell of a mess.

[gadgetguy]

This is what mine looked like after the sewer backed up last summer.

[Poppa_Meth]

Short term solution:
Pack it tight with a small layer of Hydraulic Cement. Dries even when the the surface is wet. They paint it with a couple coats of UGL Drylock, the Oil-based variety. I use to have bad leaks in my basement until we did this. It's lasted several years so far with no work done outside. It should tide you over with a minimum of expense. Have it corrected from outside though if you ever want to finish that part of your basement.

[zzyzzx]

About 10 years ago we had the same problem at a house that
we owned at that time.

We had the problem corrected from the inside.

Here are the details...

They dug a small trench around the inside of the
perimeter of the basement, and drilled holes into the basement
wall near the floor.

Perforated drain pipe was laid in the trench, covered with gravel,
and cemented over.

The house had a sump, so the new drain was connected to it.

The job had a "finished" look, and the basement could have been
remodeled if we wanted.

The cost back then was $3500, but all of the other companies
wanted about $7000.

Problem with using that methid is that your not keeping the water out. I prefer to keep the water from getting in in the first place. when I bought my house I had water coming in from two places. When it was raining really hard, I watched where the water went and I was able to fix one of them since it was a simple roof drainage issue (soaking the ground near the house instead of draining away from it). In the other case I'm still working on it. But anything involving the use of a interior drainage or sump pump system is just plain silly. I prefer to cure the problem instead of treating the sympton. And in my case it also appears to be high ground water (even though I am on a hill, seems odd).

[Xylob the Destroyer]

yeh, I think the water table is quite high here.
however, since I have no magic wand or elemental powers, I'm not sure how to 'fix' nature...
whatever the solution, I'm sure it will involve a shit-load of money.

[ranchhand]

I have a 103 yr. old Victorian, and have fixed several local leaks with Hydraulic Cement same as Poppameth. For localized leaks, chistle out a square/rectangle length of the leak and 1" further on each side. Make it a reverse "V" slightly if you can (wider at the rear than at the front". Smooth in hydraulic cement. If that is the only place in your basement giving you problems that will probably take care of it.

[Mylan23]

Why don't you call someone to fix it?

[Xylob the Destroyer]

because I haven't learned how to shit $$$$$

[ZAPPER]

because I haven't learned how to shit $$$$$

Yep. If poop was money, we would have been born without butholes!
(edited for content)


OK, you say that you are on a hill? It would be unlikely that ground water is the problem (It could be, but unlikely) Is there still a wet spot and is the weather still freezing outside. Do you have a dog, cat or other animal Do you know where the drainage system from the foundation lets out yet? Leaky gutters? plumbing or irrigation lines? HVAC condensate lines?


Bust out a hole big enough for a sump pump and see if the hole fills with water to gauge the volume. Is that a saw joint in the slab on the right of the pic? Is the heatea basement melting the outside snow.

Unfortunatly you are the one on the spot, you will have to do the best detective work that you can, but you could call for some FREE ESTIMATES on getting it fixed just to see if anyone has a fair answer as to what the source is. Not all tradesmen are rip offs, their bosses may be, but...

[Xylob the Destroyer]

not on a hill, but on a slope -- the spot is in the higher side of the house
the small amount of standing water dried up within less than 2 hours after I took the picture, but the 'stain' remains.
it's been alternately warm and freezing since i took the picture, and we've been getting record amounts of snow. there is still three feet of standing snow in our yard -- mostly from that first storm. about a foot of it melted, then another 2 feet got dumped on us again. about 2 feet of that melted and then we got another foot..... (we're suppose to get at least another foot this Friday --damn you El Nino!)
no animals
no clue about the foundation drainage system, don't even know if there actually is one.
gutters ain't leaking -- that was the first thing I checked!
no plumbing or irrigation in the area
no A/C (gets hot as hell in the summer!)

I was thinking sump pump too
and yup, that's a say joint in the slab.
the house is 40 years old, but the basement floor is less than 2 years old....
we bought the house from a guy who 'flipped' it.

[ZAPPER]

You may have to wait for the spring thaw to see if it gets worse. In the mean time start looking around for some waterproofing contractors and consider those free estimates, somebody may put you on to the root cause. A new basement slab? Almost unheard of unless there was something (Or someone to cover up) I have seen the drain tile/perforated PVC to an interior sump done on the inside of a basement before. It is cheaper than excavating the perimeter of the house below the foundation, piping, stoning and waterproofing the walls and backfilling. But I still agree that it is not the true fix. (although considering the fact that the basement is finished to some degree it may be cheaper to do it right and keep the work and water outside.

If it were me? I would wait and see what the worse it gets is in say like a year. (Barring any damage to the interior finish, and you may want to make a few exploratory access panels in the finished areas to make sure that there is no hidden water damage) Ehh, me? I am lazy. I know better but a couple of damp spots ain't goina ruin my day or bank account (got a wife for that) Keep the damp prone areas clean and use a fungacide or bleach every once and awhile to clean the area. Mold is all the rage these days, and while it probally wont hurt most folks it can be a serious problem for others.

Check into your realestate documents and the disclosures, let everyone involved know that you have a problem, there may be money in it (well atleast for the lawyers anyways) Better PM Adam too!


Ain't no shame in a damp basement, it ain't like you built it.


You know I am gonna laugh my ass off when you come back and tell us that you found out that someone spilled a drink or something

[zzyzzx]

I am wondering if shoveling the snow that's near the house away from the house help.

[Xylob the Destroyer]

have been doing so since the first flakes started falling.
there's no snow within 6 feet of the foundation...

[LadyLiete]

Maybe there is water under your house.

[zzyzzx]

I have a 103 yr. old Victorian, and have fixed several local leaks with Hydraulic Cement same as Poppameth. For localized leaks, chistle out a square/rectangle length of the leak and 1" further on each side. Make it a reverse "V" slightly if you can (wider at the rear than at the front". Smooth in hydraulic cement. If that is the only place in your basement giving you problems that will probably take care of it.

OK, so your solution is a chisel and a big bag of hydraulic cement?

[coldheadaches]

So my friend has this issue in her house and the old paint that was originally on the floor was red so when ever it leaks through the tiles it looks like someone was killed or something. It's like a giant red pool of something. LOL.