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Talking to home owner the other day who spent a personal fortune on reinsulating an old house with blown-in cell, foam board on the outside and then wrapped the whole house in Tyvek. He replaced most walls and ceilings with new sheetrock and vapor barriers. He was complaining about the humidity levels and swore his house is colder now than before.
If you go into his basement, you could grow rice or raise carp. He did nothing to isolate the main floors from the basement – moisture and airflow wise — but did insulate and vapor barrier the attic floor. His basement walls are field stone and parged — a very handy sponge to transport exterior moisture indoors.
He lives a mile from a friend of mine who used to have water run into his uphill side basement floor after a few hours of rain. This guy was quoted 25 G’s to dig out the basement perimeter, seal the walls and wall/slab connection, install new drain tile and downspouts, then to back fill with all new gravel and sand. I was visiting him during a storm one day and the brown water started to run across the floor. He was — rightfully — complaining about the quote to fix the basement while madly rushing to lift papers and boxes off the floor.
I asked to borrow a shovel, went outside and dug a 10″ deep trench across the uphill side of the lawn about 8′ from the basement wall. It took about 45″ since the soil was so soft from saturation by the rain. I removed the downspouts from the holes leading to the drain tile and pointed them towards the trench. It was still raiing like heck but the water in the basement stopped flowing 30″‘s after I finished the trench and moved the downspouts. He hired a guy to finish the trench with perforated drain tile, bury the gutter drains and lead them to the trench, fill the trench with the removed (clay heavy) topsoil and lay back the sod. It cost less than $1,000. and he has not seen a drop of water in the basement since.
The lower Great Lakes, especially on the US side have so much clay in the soil that the fields are still draining from snow melt (middle of June). Even so, the practice remains to dig basements and backfill them with gravel and sand. Its like creating a dam and a well in one step. Surface melt and rain seek the air spaces of the back fill; the water lays there stagnating and humidifying the basement. Rain gutters are drained down to the weeping tile — a perfect little well for holding water. Every new house I have toured in this region has a wet basement; no matter what waterproofing treatments they use. They also have sump holes open to the ground under the foundation.
I can’t understand why the code and the convention is to use gravel when the surounding soil is clay and to weeping tile and downspouts to fill the well around the house. Even if expensive basement and slab watersealers are used, the houses still lies in a puddle all year round. If you keep the humidity out of the basement it travels up the side walls and bathes the whole house in a microclimate of water vapor – coming in the windows and the soffit vents throughout the warmer months.
Isn’t this stupidity obvious to the building inspectors and contractors. I have never seen an area where houses deteriorate so fast, are so expensive to run mechanically and are plagued with uncomfortable interior climates. And to top it off, everyone puts furnaces, water softeners, dehumidifyers and DHW tanks in this humid climate. My brothers-in-law makes their livings from replacing water tanks and furnaces in this area –they don’t last much more than a decade.
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Talking to home owner the other day who spent a personal fortune on reinsulating an old house with blown-in cell, foam board on the outside and then wrapped the whole house in Tyvek. He replaced most walls and ceilings with new sheetrock and vapor barriers. He was complaining about the humidity levels and swore his house is colder now than before.
If you go into his basement, you could grow rice or raise carp. He did nothing to isolate the main floors from the basement - moisture and airflow wise -- but did insulate and vapor barrier the attic floor. His basement walls are field stone and parged -- a very handy sponge to transport exterior moisture indoors.
He lives a mile from a friend of mine who used to have water run into his uphill side basement floor after a few hours of rain. This guy was quoted 25 G's to dig out the basement perimeter, seal the walls and wall/slab connection, install new drain tile and downspouts, then to back fill with all new gravel and sand. I was visiting him during a storm one day and the brown water started to run across the floor. He was -- rightfully -- complaining about the quote to fix the basement while madly rushing to lift papers and boxes off the floor.
I asked to borrow a shovel, went outside and dug a 10" deep trench across the uphill side of the lawn about 8' from the basement wall. It took about 45" since the soil was so soft from saturation by the rain. I removed the downspouts from the holes leading to the drain tile and pointed them towards the trench. It was still raiing like heck but the water in the basement stopped flowing 30"'s after I finished the trench and moved the downspouts. He hired a guy to finish the trench with perforated drain tile, bury the gutter drains and lead them to the trench, fill the trench with the removed (clay heavy) topsoil and lay back the sod. It cost less than $1,000. and he has not seen a drop of water in the basement since.
The lower Great Lakes, especially on the US side have so much clay in the soil that the fields are still draining from snow melt (middle of June). Even so, the practice remains to dig basements and backfill them with gravel and sand. Its like creating a dam and a well in one step. Surface melt and rain seek the air spaces of the back fill; the water lays there stagnating and humidifying the basement. Rain gutters are drained down to the weeping tile -- a perfect little well for holding water. Every new house I have toured in this region has a wet basement; no matter what waterproofing treatments they use. They also have sump holes open to the ground under the foundation.
I can't understand why the code and the convention is to use gravel when the surounding soil is clay and to weeping tile and downspouts to fill the well around the house. Even if expensive basement and slab watersealers are used, the houses still lies in a puddle all year round. If you keep the humidity out of the basement it travels up the side walls and bathes the whole house in a microclimate of water vapor - coming in the windows and the soffit vents throughout the warmer months.
Isn't this stupidity obvious to the building inspectors and contractors. I have never seen an area where houses deteriorate so fast, are so expensive to run mechanically and are plagued with uncomfortable interior climates. And to top it off, everyone puts furnaces, water softeners, dehumidifyers and DHW tanks in this humid climate. My brothers-in-law makes their livings from replacing water tanks and furnaces in this area --they don't last much more than a decade.