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This maybe a silly question. But how can water be prevented from entering the basement over the foundation walls? Here’s what’s happening… any time we get a hard driving rain, water will start pouring down the inside of the basement walls. The water is coming in under the foam sill seal on top of the foundation (basement) walls and then trickling on down. The exterior is brick. The house has Tyvek and on the brick ledge the black plastic flashing. The house is all of two months old. We first thought the wind was pushing water through the weep holes in the brick. The builder had the weep holes filled, this reduced the amount of water coming in by about 30 to 40 percent. We have located some small cracks in some places in the brick mortar but it seems unlikely that those few cracks in those few places are allowing that much rain to be driven in behind the brick. All the windows and doors have been re caulked and we have ruled out any infiltration through the roof of the house. So, any thoughts on where the water is coming from (it can’t just flow through mortar)? And if the cracks here and there are the culprit (the winds around here do whip like a mother) what is best to fill them with? more mortar? Or are we barking up the wrong tree?
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This maybe a silly question. But how can water be prevented from entering the basement over the foundation walls? Here's what's happening... any time we get a hard driving rain, water will start pouring down the inside of the basement walls. The water is coming in under the foam sill seal on top of the foundation (basement) walls and then trickling on down. The exterior is brick. The house has Tyvek and on the brick ledge the black plastic flashing. The house is all of two months old. We first thought the wind was pushing water through the weep holes in the brick. The builder had the weep holes filled, this reduced the amount of water coming in by about 30 to 40 percent. We have located some small cracks in some places in the brick mortar but it seems unlikely that those few cracks in those few places are allowing that much rain to be driven in behind the brick. All the windows and doors have been re caulked and we have ruled out any infiltration through the roof of the house. So, any thoughts on where the water is coming from (it can't just flow through mortar)? And if the cracks here and there are the culprit (the winds around here do whip like a mother) what is best to fill them with? more mortar? Or are we barking up the wrong tree?