Dug up the foundation on one side of the house to waterproof and exposed the old storm drain pipe that the down spout feed into. It was assembled in 3′ pieces that are made out of a glazed brick type material. Each piece has a male and female end and they just seemed to be laying into each other without any kind of fastening or sealing at the joints. It goes straight down next to the foundation, makes a 90 degree turn at an opening in the footing to go under the basement slab. The horizontal piece that goes under the slab has about half its female part broken off. How do I reassemble this thing? Can I transition to PVC with a rubber connector if I break off the rest of the female end of the horizontal piece?
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First off, the pipe you are looking at is made of terracotta. Second you should check with your town to make sure it goes into the storm drain and not the sewer drain. In the old days they used to hook up the houses downspouts to the sewer line to help flush it during rainstorms. Now we have just the opposite problem. Many towns have gone around to old houses and have them disconnected so they don't overwhelm the sewage treatment plants when its raining.
You should also check to make sure that the pipe that runs under the slab is intact and clean. There are drain cleaning companies that can send a small camera thru the drain to check it out but its gona run you $200-$300.
Rich:
In my city these type of drains are not legal anymore but they do not make you alter the existing drains. I have seven of these at my house and oftentimes a section will break and cause a seepage problem in the basement if you have a stone foundation like mine. I remove the broken sections and insert a 3" schedule 40 pvc pipe in the terra cotta as far as it will go and pour concrete around the transition. I place a 4" x 3" pvc coupling on top of the 3" pipe to hold the downspout.
Stan
Thanks for the advice Stan, I'm going to try your fix.
Yeah, check with your city. If the things are illegal anymore you should probably plug the pipe and abandon it. It's the right thing to do and it may save you a flooded basement down the line.
I'm in Chicago, they are not illegal. The city asks homeowners to voluntarily disconnect them if possible. I have one down spout that emptys into the back yard, but this one is on the side of the house and as is the case with many houses here, I'm so close to my neighbor that it is not practical to dump the water on the ground.
its been happening in GreenBay alot. people have storm hooked to sewage, the storm overwelms the city sewer lateral, then the backwatervalve closes to stop the water coming back in (hopefully) and causes HO to handle the water locally in a holding tank(basement) untill the rain subsides and the sewer catches up.
they found this out when engineers looked at several houses on the same lateral. some were effected and some were not. most that were had storm going into sewer. some had fualty backwatervalves. in either case the city was not responsible. there were millions in dammage. the city did allow expansion on sewers that had not been a problem in past rains.
if it ever happens to you divert the downspout at least for the duration of the rain, and hope you have a backwatervalve that is functional.
they make a "fernco" to adapt pvc to terracota but terracotta is so brittle. man its hard to get them on. ive even collapsed the pipe tightening the clamp. you could put a backwatervalve in line on the horizontal under the slab elevation. then your downspout would just overflow if your citysewer were overrun?
Edited 3/31/2005 12:16 pm ET by Brian