Structural/soils/wateproofing engineer question
- Thread starter R Q
- Start date
- Joined
- Mar 17, 2005
- Location
- N. N. Raleigh, NC
I had a similer but smaller situation when i bought my house. The drain pipe on the side of the house had been laid with a 3" dip where water would leach back into the ground and not pass on well. This drained into my crawl space making it damp and moldy.
I replaced that section with some solid perf pipe with a sleive on it. Definitly regrading will help, but id still do the pipe.
I wouldnt worry so much about water proofing the foundation unless there was a basement/cellar type deal..
Oh ya add plastic under the house, I learned that a normal sized crawlspace in normal conditions will evaporate 10gals of water back into the air under the house.. Ive noticed a huge difference with the plastic on the ground..
I replaced that section with some solid perf pipe with a sleive on it. Definitly regrading will help, but id still do the pipe.
I wouldnt worry so much about water proofing the foundation unless there was a basement/cellar type deal..
Oh ya add plastic under the house, I learned that a normal sized crawlspace in normal conditions will evaporate 10gals of water back into the air under the house.. Ive noticed a huge difference with the plastic on the ground..
- Joined
- Mar 13, 2005
- Location
- Raleigh, NC
Without actually seeing the situation firsthand, I would probably agree with you.
Get the roof drain piped to daylight. That's the first thing to tackle. Figure that 1/2" of rain (a brief shower, basically) on a ~1000SF roof generates about 300 gallons of water. If you've got a normal pitched roof with a gutter on front and a gutter out back, you can get 150 gallons of water out of the front yard just by putting in a roof drain extension.
Cut a swale in the yard so that surface water runs away from the house, and you've probably solved the problem. I'm not exactly sure how the concrete figures in... if the driveway is sloped toward the house, etc... so that may need to be addressed. However, you may find that moving the roof drain and fixing the yard slope keeps the subgrade from getting saturated to the point where the basement wall weeps.
Hope that helps.
Get the roof drain piped to daylight. That's the first thing to tackle. Figure that 1/2" of rain (a brief shower, basically) on a ~1000SF roof generates about 300 gallons of water. If you've got a normal pitched roof with a gutter on front and a gutter out back, you can get 150 gallons of water out of the front yard just by putting in a roof drain extension.
Cut a swale in the yard so that surface water runs away from the house, and you've probably solved the problem. I'm not exactly sure how the concrete figures in... if the driveway is sloped toward the house, etc... so that may need to be addressed. However, you may find that moving the roof drain and fixing the yard slope keeps the subgrade from getting saturated to the point where the basement wall weeps.
Hope that helps.
- Joined
- Mar 13, 2005
- Location
- Raleigh, NC
Just as a point of clarification: use perf pipe with a sleeve where you're trying to collect water from the soil around the pipe... like at the base of a foundation. Use solid pipe with sealed joints any place that you're trying to move water... like on a roof drain, yard drain, or on a foundation drain after it runs away from the house.
- Joined
- Mar 17, 2005
- Location
- N. N. Raleigh, NC
Sorry by solid I meant that it was Schedule 20 pipe that was perfereated, and NOT the normal black flex pipe..
Thanks for the replies. When I was writing the original question, a friend engineer called me back and gave me the poop on what I could and could not get away with. Sorry most did not see my original post.
I'm going to do it like I wanted too WITH my engineers blessing.
RQ
I'm going to do it like I wanted too WITH my engineers blessing.
RQ