Waterproofing the basement!

[dlock13]

We've scraped off the mildew/moldy parts already, bleached the heck out of it, and we purchased some waterproofing paint. I don't remember the brand name right now.

Anyway, there's only a couple of parts of the basement that were pretty bad.

What do we do/need to know from here on out?

 

[slag]

Fix your leak, don't just bandage it. It appears the drainage area around your basement isn't adequate. Excavate near the basement wall and install plastic water barrier as well. Do it correctly.

 

[bignateyk]

Water sealing a basement with paint isn't going to stop a major water intrusion. Water sealing is only meant to keep humidity levels and small amounts of moisture out.

If you have a genuine leak or drainage problem with water accumulation, water sealing isn't going to do shit.

 

[dlock13]

Well, it's not that the basement is wet or items down there get moldy or anything of that sort. It's just that there is moisture in the walls.

There's no leak that actually has water seeping in and causing accumulation. It's just there is moisture down there which is why we believe the paint is our best course right now.

 

[slag]

Do you have a dehumidifier? They are pretty essential in many basements due to condensation and general humidity in the summer.

 

[dlock13]

Do you have a dehumidifier? They are pretty essential in many basements due to condensation and general humidity in the summer.

Yes, we do have one that we use down there.

 

[Vic Vega]

Have the same issue in my basement and the previous owner did the waterproofing paint. Seems to do OK but I still run a dehumidifier basically 24/7.

 

[Juddog]

Fix your leak, don't just bandage it. It appears the drainage area around your basement isn't adequate. Excavate near the basement wall and install plastic water barrier as well. Do it correctly.

Doing this is great but it's also expensive as hell.

 

[Juddog]

We've scraped off the mildew/moldy parts already, bleached the heck out of it, and we purchased some waterproofing paint. I don't remember the brand name right now.

Anyway, there's only a couple of parts of the basement that were pretty bad.

What do we do/need to know from here on out?

It all boils down to how much money you want to put into it, and how much time / manpower you have available.

If you have a crew of friends, amongst who is someone who can operate a backhoe, the best solution is to approach it from the outside. That involves digging a trench that has a bottom slightly lower than the subfloor of the basement. In the bottom you put a pipe that has perforations, and use one of those garden fabric cloths around the pipe to keep out particles from getting in there. Run the pipe to the storm drain / sewer at the curb. Fix any cracks / holes on the outside of the basement wall using a quick dry cement, if the cracks are deep, then use an epoxy. Once that's done, line the exterior wall with a several layers consisting of plastic / rubber, made especially for that purpose.

Doing all this will run you about $10k for a small house.

Bleaching the walls and putting mildew resistant paint is more of a stop gap measure; it will slow down the water but chances are it will just push somewhere else into the basement, as the hydrostatic pressure has no release. If you have drain tile, hire a plumber / basement specialized to come in and blast it out to make sure it's not obstructed in it's path to your sump pump area. If you don't have drain tile (e.g. house built before the 1960's), you can always have it put in, but it's pricey.

If you want to go as cheap as possible, put some mildew paint on there and run a dehumidifier 24/7 that drains to your sump pump.

 

[Scotteq]

If you're having enough of a water problem that mold/mildew are growing of their own accord, then know you are a candidate for a french drain and/or a weeping tile system.

 

[olds]

Put a LARGE drain in the floor. With an industrial garbage disposal in it. It really helps with clean up.

 

[Juddog]

If you're having enough of a water problem that mold/mildew are growing of their own accord, then know you are a candidate for a french drain and/or a weeping tile system.

True, there are many ways to do what the OP is looking to do.

Ultimately the question is really how much money is he willing to dump into the project?

 

[Jeff7]

Doing this is great but it's also expensive as hell.

My parents had a french drain system put in at their house. $5k is the cost that comes to mind, but that might be way off; I might be thinking of something else. Whether or not that qualifies as "expensive as hell" is of course subjective.

The landscaping that was done when the house was built so brilliantly had the ground sloping toward the house on three out of four sides. Every time it would rain for several days, the basement would fill with about 1.5" of water, at which point it was high enough to flow out the back door, though that was also on a side of the house where the ground sloped down toward it. Luckily it never got bad enough that it would come in through there.
There was a sump pump. That would run almost continuously during flood situations, but that only helped out on that end of the house. Water would come in elsewhere, either through any small cracks in the floor, or through the concrete walls.

After the french drain system was put in, effectively putting up a shield around the house, no more flooded basements. It went down pretty deep, at least 10 feet in some places, I believe to the base of the foundation, or perhaps even lower.
I don't think the sump pump has even gotten any action since that work was done.

 

[Imp]

Doing all this will run you about $10k for a small house.

Funny. We're looking at doing the "proper" sealing job for our basement and the random estimate we got was also about $10k. When it rains hard in the summer, water seeps into the basement. Not a really bad flood, but enough to wet half of the basement floor.

It's a completely shit house that hasn't been properly maintained for 30 years, so I've been suggesting that we just bury a plastic sheet or pave over the front lawn for about a grand -- won't solve it, but should help.

Then I remembered that our neighbor has an open lawn, and since we don't know where the water table is, we don't know how high it gets when it starts raining really hard. I'm skeptical about the water table being an issue though.

 

[Juddog]

My parents had a french drain system put in at their house. $5k is the cost that comes to mind, but that might be way off; I might be thinking of something else. Whether or not that qualifies as "expensive as hell" is of course subjective.

The landscaping that was done when the house was built so brilliantly had the ground sloping toward the house on three out of four sides. Every time it would rain for several days, the basement would fill with about 1.5" of water, at which point it was high enough to flow out the back door, though that was also on a side of the house where the ground sloped down toward it. Luckily it never got bad enough that it would come in through there.
There was a sump pump. That would run almost continuously during flood situations, but that only helped out on that end of the house. Water would come in elsewhere, either through any small cracks in the floor, or through the concrete walls.

After the french drain system was put in, effectively putting up a shield around the house, no more flooded basements. It went down pretty deep, at least 10 feet in some places, I believe to the base of the foundation, or perhaps even lower.
I don't think the sump pump has even gotten any action since that work was done.

$10k is an estimate for a fair sized house and assumes waterproofing the basement walls with the appropriate materials in addition to installing the french drain. I know someone that did it for about $800 in materials, but they knew a bunch of people that basically worked for free to help them out, and had access to construction equipment to dig it out.

Other methods include digging a trench and pouring in roofing tar, mentioned in the other waterproofing thread by a forum member, which forms a humongous rubber seal. It all depends on who you know, what kind of equipment you have access to, etc..

 

[Juddog]

Funny. We're looking at doing the "proper" sealing job for our basement and the random estimate we got was also about $10k. When it rains hard in the summer, water seeps into the basement. Not a really bad flood, but enough to wet half of the basement floor.

It's a completely shit house that hasn't been properly maintained for 30 years, so I've been suggesting that we just bury a plastic sheet or pave over the front lawn for about a grand -- won't solve it, but should help.

Then I remembered that our neighbor has an open lawn, and since we don't know where the water table is, we don't know how high it gets when it starts raining really hard. I'm skeptical about the water table being an issue though.

Yeah I had the same issues; I had a big crack that I just had sealed for about $750. I would love to do the proper treatment, but just don't have enough money. Right now my main focus is on getting the gutters redone so that the water is dumped far away from the house. The previous owner had the gutters linked into the storm drain system, so the front lawn is always dry; the back of the house has gutters that dump water near the base of the house, so I plan on getting some super long extensions and dumping the water farther back.

My buddy's dad owns a backhoe that he rents out at $60 / hr., so I'm pondering trying to use that to do the a trench system. The problem is that it's rained like crazy this year so I really haven't had a good weekend to get the gutters redone in the back yet. During a heavy rain, the entire neighborhood around my house looks like a pond. It rained real bad a few weeks ago and I had several inches of water in my backyard for about 4 days. My neighbor's yard gets so bad that it looks glass-smooth after a heavy rain, which means that the water depth is over the tops of the blades of grass - it literally looks like a pond.

 

[bockie]

First of all, kudos to you for making me come out of "Lurker" status.

I just had my unfinished basement waterproofed by professionals. We have a sump pump but were still getting water in via the previous owners french drains / foundation wall cracks (1950's house) / window wells.

They dug around the exterior and put tar / plastic below grade. Tile was also placed around the exterior and connected to the interior system. Interior was jack hammered and they replaced the foundation tile and added a second sump pump pit (and battery backup). Interior wall cracks were injected with a sealant.

This was for our particular area. High clay soil. Basically the house sits in a bowl where water collected. After we had it done we learned from some people a creek ran through our neighborhood at one point. Another neighbor didn't have any success until they did both the exterior and the interior like was done in our house.

Ours is warranted for as long as we own our house plus it can be transferred. They started with a crew of 4 on a Monday, crew of 6 on Tue - Thurs, and finished on Friday with a crew of 10. Ours was a lot more labor intensive than they anticipated. Plus due to footage they had to add a second sump pump pit. I was told 1 pit can service 170' of wall. Ours was 174'.

Our basement walls were painted with that stuff but it is peeling off in several places. Yeah it was expensive but if we ever have issues again it won't cost us a dime.

 

[Juddog]

First of all, kudos to you for making me come out of "Lurker" status.

I just had my unfinished basement waterproofed by professionals. We have a sump pump but were still getting water in via the previous owners french drains / foundation wall cracks (1950's house) / window wells.

They dug around the exterior and put tar / plastic below grade. Tile was also placed around the exterior and connected to the interior system. Interior was jack hammered and they replaced the foundation tile and added a second sump pump pit (and battery backup). Interior wall cracks were injected with a sealant.

This was for our particular area. High clay soil. Basically the house sits in a bowl where water collected. After we had it done we learned from some people a creek ran through our neighborhood at one point. Another neighbor didn't have any success until they did both the exterior and the interior like was done in our house.

Ours is warranted for as long as we own our house plus it can be transferred. They started with a crew of 4 on a Monday, crew of 6 on Tue - Thurs, and finished on Friday with a crew of 10. Ours was a lot more labor intensive than they anticipated. Plus due to footage they had to add a second sump pump pit. I was told 1 pit can service 170' of wall. Ours was 174'.

Our basement walls were painted with that stuff but it is peeling off in several places. Yeah it was expensive but if we ever have issues again it won't cost us a dime.

Jesus Christ that must have cost a lot... I'm guessing around $15k for all that?

I don't understand the reasoning behind connecting the exterior to the interior system though.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Fix your leak, don't just bandage it. It appears the drainage area around your basement isn't adequate. Excavate near the basement wall and install plastic water barrier as well. Do it correctly.

Yep, it does not hurt to do some sealing from inside but the right way is to do it from outside, and it's a HUGE job, I'm a DIYer and it's something I contracted it out when it had to be done. The equipment required, logistics etc just make it not DIY worthwhile as it will end up costing you a lot anyway due to having to rent equipment etc...

I got it done last year as I had a few places that leaked when we had a torrential downpour in middle of winter when ground was still frozen. It had never leaked before that so had no idea the seal was bad till then.

Lots of pics here of the progress: http://gal.redsquirrel.me/?level=album&id=34

Project costed around 17 grand or so if I recall. I ended up pulling equity from my house to pay off for it as I did not want to be stuck with such a huge debt, which I'd still be paying now. Also needed a new car that year so I had like 20 grand of debt at one point. Scary stuff.

 

[Juddog]

Yep, it does not hurt to do some sealing from inside but the right way is to do it from outside, and it's a HUGE job, I'm a DIYer and it's something I contracted it out when it had to be done. The equipment required, logistics etc just make it not DIY worthwhile as it will end up costing you a lot anyway due to having to rent equipment etc...

I got it done last year as I had a few places that leaked when we had a torrential downpour in middle of winter when ground was still frozen. It had never leaked before that so had no idea the seal was bad till then.

Lots of pics here of the progress: http://gal.redsquirrel.me/?level=album&id=34

Project costed around 17 grand or so if I recall. I ended up pulling equity from my house to pay off for it as I did not want to be stuck with such a huge debt, which I'd still be paying now. Also needed a new car that year so I had like 20 grand of debt at one point. Scary stuff.

$17k - ouch! Looks like they did a pretty nice job though, and the pictures show the plastic layers they put on the outside that I had mentioned earlier in the thread.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Yeah it's a pretty high end product called Rub-R-Wall. It's better than Blue Skin, which is also a good product. The plastic sheets are mostly to protect the actual product from the soil so it does not wear it out, but if water gets behind the plastic it's fine as it's not there as part of the waterproofing.

The danger with products that rely strictly on a plastic type membrane and not a spray on product is if water gets behind the plastic then it can still get in. The stuff they used is sprayed on and forms a very tight seal. They also replaced the old clay weeping tiles with the newer plastic perforated pipe style with the sock.

 

[Eug]

Yeah, for my place half the house was properly waterproofed, but the other half wasn't. (I have a big house, and it was built in stages.)

In the non-waterproofed side, I had moisture and mold issues. I had to run a dehumidifier most of the day during the summer to remove moisture in the basement, or else it'd sometimes start to smell a bit like mold.

So, when I did my basement interior reno, we cracked the slab and dug down to put 6 inches of crushed stone for drainage, with 6 inches of cement on top of that. Before it was 2-4" of slab on top of soil, so my moisture issues were actually coming from there, not leakage from the walls.

However, I did note also that the wall was moist in a couple of spots near downspouts from the eavestroughs, but got no flooding ever from these non-waterproofed walls. I've since redirected the downspouts with success. Nonetheless I still wondered about the cost for getting the place properly waterproofed exteriorly. The quotes came in at $12000 - $15000 CAD IIRC, which is only slightly less in US $.

However, a third guy (from the biggest company of the three) came in and suggested I do NOT get it exterior waterproofed since the slab redo and downspout redirect solved my problems and I haven't had any moisture issues since, even after heavy rainfalls. I took his advice and didn't bother, and it's been fine. I don't have to use a dehumidifier in the basement anymore, and there are no longer any mold issues either. After the foundation fix, it's as dry as the rest of the house (according to humidistats).

Oh yeah, we had some moisture retardant paint we used on the interior cinderblock, but I'm convinced it's near useless. However, it can't hurt, so I said to the basement contractor to go ahead with it.

Oh and I have a backflow valve on my main sewer line, since the rain runoff in my city flows into the sewers, which causes a lot of problems with sewer backups in the city. It looks like this, but it's not clear:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMBznnNV-ss

 

[bockie]

Jesus Christ that must have cost a lot... I'm guessing around $15k for all that?

I don't understand the reasoning behind connecting the exterior to the interior system though.

It was a little more than that. I was actually expecting to pay 50% more than I did based on people I had talked to.

The exterior system was 4ft+ deep in places due to my basement window wells. Since they were 4 feet deep the only way to discharge the water is via a pump in that instance.

Also, should a sump pump fail (which I've had happen before) all I do is call their maintenance department and it is replaced at no charge to me. Also, if I contact my city and check to see if I can run to their storm drains they will come out and do the run at no charge as well. I probably could have personally done it cheaper, but for the time, effort, and warranty service I'm happy with what I paid.

 

[Juddog]

Yeah it's a pretty high end product called Rub-R-Wall. It's better than Blue Skin, which is also a good product. The plastic sheets are mostly to protect the actual product from the soil so it does not wear it out, but if water gets behind the plastic it's fine as it's not there as part of the waterproofing.

The danger with products that rely strictly on a plastic type membrane and not a spray on product is if water gets behind the plastic then it can still get in. The stuff they used is sprayed on and forms a very tight seal. They also replaced the old clay weeping tiles with the newer plastic perforated pipe style with the sock.

Good info; the video I watched of a local waterproofing agency used 3 different techniques for the outside wall. After fixing any cracks, etc., they painted on a layer of black tar looking stuff, then they put on a big layer of blue stuff (blue skin?), similar to what you have in your pictures. After the blue layer was on, which had a peel-off layer on the outside which made it stick to the wall, they unrolled a big layer of black rubbery looking substance, which looked like it was nail-gunned onto the outside. By painting on the black tar stuff first, it supposedly filled any tiny openings, plus formed a seal with the blue layer. The black rubbery outer layer seemed to be the protector of the blue layer stuff (again I have no idea what this stuff was, but there was another thread in the past few weeks about members redoing their basement, and one of the members had put down a layer of this black rubbery sheet stuff that looked exactly what they showed in the video).

 

[Juddog]

It was a little more than that. I was actually expecting to pay 50% more than I did based on people I had talked to.

The exterior system was 4ft+ deep in places due to my basement window wells. Since they were 4 feet deep the only way to discharge the water is via a pump in that instance.

Also, should a sump pump fail (which I've had happen before) all I do is call their maintenance department and it is replaced at no charge to me. Also, if I contact my city and check to see if I can run to their storm drains they will come out and do the run at no charge as well. I probably could have personally done it cheaper, but for the time, effort, and warranty service I'm happy with what I paid.

Ah ok - so basically the clay soil stops the water from migrating away from the house, so the pump is to get that drained out, from the sounds of it. What you mention about warranty is one of the main advantages of going with a company that specializes in basement waterproofing; a DIY is great, but if something gets messed up, you're paying for everything again, versus a warranty which is close to no hassle.

I'd like to go that route eventually when I save up enough cash.