I have a crack in my porch, about 2 1/2 feet long, not very wide, but when we get heavy rains at the right angle the water goes through the crack and into my garage running all over the joisting. Tearing out the entire porch is not high on my list of things to do, any ideas on how to best repair this to eliminate the water from my garage? (I live at the bottom of a hill so the house sits on top of the garage.)
Is there anything else I should be concerned about?
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Replies
"is there anything I should be concerned with?'...
You should be concerned as to what caused the crack. Is it an old crack? has it gotten bigger or just stayed the same? Is the crack near or close to a structural support member (porch column post...etc.)?
Any ideas on how best to repair this?
Go to your local automotive store and buy some 2 part expoxy kits. They cost about $7 per and it will take you 4 or more for a crack this size. Normally it looks like a double sized syringe...as you push the plunger, both resins and hardners come out in specific amounts...you mix the 2 together...wait a few minutes, then pour this expoxy into your cracks. Get expoxy that is rated for concrete repairs. If your cracks are fairly wide or deep, you should stuff a little bit of paper or fiberglass insul in the crack just to keep the epoxy from running out the other side. Once cured., it will help bond your concrete and it is waterproof throughout. Get the clear expoxy.
You can even mix in some fine grain masonry sand in with the epoxy to help give it some "body". This type of sand resembles table salt in size and appearance.
If you live near a Fastenall Store...you could tell them your problem and they could sell you large tubes of epoxy ( similar to large size caulking tube.) It will cost you a bit but works on same principle as the tiny syringes. Would use the big caulk type units only if the small kits weren't generating enough epoxy to fill the crack and be cost effective.
Davo
If I understand correctly, there is nothing between the elements and garage but a layer of planking? I would have thought that the garage area would have been protected by tarpaper at the least. There should be something else in there. Am I wrong is assuming that the garage area is enclosed? Sheet rock walls, electric, etc?
I would investigate further to determine how this is all constructed.
Epoxy filler is a good idea. Marine stores, like West Marine, sell a variety of products that are relatively inexpensive and hold up well to exposure. One product is very low viscosity and will seep into the smallest cracks. One is for rotted wood. Fillers, coloidal fibers for instance, are available to add strength and fill larger voids.
The house sits on top of the garage due to the hill side so the foundation walls in the garage are 7 feet high in someplace and 4 feet high in others. It is unfinished but completely enclosed. The porch is over one corner of the garage, so when you are outside you can walk up to the front door or down into the garage. The crack is right where the stairs meet the porch.
When you are standing in the garage and look up you can see the tar paper between the cracks in the wood. The crack is very fine, and it is apparent that the previous owner of the house repaired the crack at one time but over time it has opened up again.
Thank you both for your ideas on the epoxy, living in the SF Bay Area it should not be to hard to find a marine store.
Cheers.
Thanx for the detailed information on the porch/garage. Apparently what has happened is that tap paper was laid down over the garage roof before the deck was built. Obviously, tar paper is not enough. If you repair just the deck, you will continue to have problems down the road. There may be other leaks that you are not aware of yet.
The proper way to do this is to remove the deck. I know. Hate to do it, but . . . After ensuring all timbers are in good shape, lay down rubber sheet roofing material. Don't remember the trade name or manufacturer off the top of my head, but after this stuff goes down, you'll never have to worry about it again. It is incredibly robust and will even seal around nails.
Good luck, Dude.
I'm still totally confused what is cracked?
I am forced to make assumptions how this is constructed. is the deck ocer made of concrete, wood, rool roofing?What?
you speak of a "crack" in the decking / ceiling from below, and a "Crack" that is letting water in. Are these the same crack? or is the under crack simply the joint between boards in the roof sheathing and the leaking crack in the roofing material. What kind of roofing material is it? Gotta know what you have and go from there.
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Wish I could help, Piffin, but it is Nighraider with the problem. I am also trying to come up with a solution.
As I understand it, however, sheathing was laid on the garage ceiling joists then tar paper, then the deck was laid over that. Nightraider's last message indicated that he could see cracks in the tar paper by looking through the cracks in the deck.
Did I get that right, Nightraider?
Yeah, I kind of got that but don't know how he could know if it is just a single layer of tarpaper of a full BUR or modified roof by looking from below.
Odds are, you are right and it is time to tear up the deck and re-roof the garage which is why I asked about age of house.
Sorry about wrong adressing above. So much confusing info in this thread.
Like the epoxy recommendation made me think maybe there is a concrete deck?
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No problem on the mis-ident. Always a challange figuring out who's doing what to whom.
Piffin,
I thought he was talking about a concrete deck porch...which is why I recommended the epoxy. When I hear the word "crack" and "porch" concrete comes to mind. Now if I hear the word "split" and "porch", wood comes to mind.
Davo
So do you still think the epoxy is the best option? Or do you think tearing up the deck is what will need to happen? You can imagine my excitement at tearing out the porch, there isn't any.
NR, I'm still semi confused about the layout of the stairs. If there's a crack (gap) where one surface meets another, you could probably stop water infiltration with Urethane caulk. If the gap is bigger than a 1/4" wide, stuff in backer rod first to below the surface, top off with urethane caulk.
If I misunderstood the placement of the stair and deck, sorry.Remodeling Contractor just outside the Glass City.
Quittin' Time
See the above, I meant to post to you. It is inconceiveable to me that someone would have buildt over nothing but tarpaper. How old is this house and hjow long has the leak existed?
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Actually, the best thing to do would be to fix the slope of the porch so water runs away from the crack. You can buy concrete patch compound that can be "feathered" out to a fine edge, allowing you to apply a thin layer and still change the slope.
I want to thank all of you for giving this thought, sorry I have been on vacation the last two weeks and had no access to a computer, and believe it or not it was fantastic.
OK here is the situation, my apologies if I was not specific enough. The house sits on top of the garage, as the garage was cut into the hillside. The porch takes up a small corner of the garage foot print, so if you are standing in the garage you of course will see all of the joisting. Where the porch is the joisting is reinforced with bigger wood to take the weight of the porch that it supports.
So the deck is made of concrete. The under crack is simply cracks that you can see when you look up at the planks that were laid down on top of the joisting, some of the planks have cracks in them, due to time I assume but maybe not. Through these small cracks one can see the tar paper for the moisture barrier, with the concrete of the porch poured on top of that. So if you are standing in front of the front door and drilled a hole straight down you would be in the garage.
The front steps and porch were pored back in 1941 with the porch as one giant slab of concrete. There are 7 steps leading to the porch. Where the steps and the porch actually meet there is a hairline crack running the width of the stairs about three feet. The hairline crack is letting the water in which is then flowing into the garage on to the joisting.
How long this problem has been going on I am not sure, I have only lived in the house for 18 months. But last winter and this winter we have experienced this problem. This mess was a small disclosure failure by the previous owners, which they have paid dearly for.
So it sounds like the only problem you might have is to seal the "crack" against water intrusion. I would try the urethene caulk first, making sure things are clean and dry in the crack, then keep an eye on it in rainy weather for a a few months.
But you may eventually end up having to remove the concrete and replace the roofing membrane if you don't get it fixed and can't figure out what kind of roof membrane it is.
Concrete is not waterproof but it might shed most of the water that falls on it if sealed well. There are concrete sealers available. You don't want Thompson's which is just thinned down wax. You should look for a silicone based or acrylic modified concrete sealer. The wax would need to be renewed every four to six months. others can go for two or three years
I don't
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I'm curious why the previous owners shopuld have paid dearly for a defect that they may have not known was there. Was there some way you were able to prove that it has existed for a long tiome and that they knew about it and refused to tell you?
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When the first rains came last year we had a small river flowing through our garage, which they did not disclose very well. The neighbors confirmed that water was always coming through the garage. We went to a Mediator showed them a video, showed them some pictures of algae growing on my drive way, told them about the neighbors confirmation and gave them water tables for the last 15 years which showed some very heavy storms arguing that they must have known and that pretty much sealed the deal. They offered us money to fix the problem and go away.
Since then I have been putting in a drainage system around the house which has worked fairly well this year and has allowed me to identify other problem area that were not as obvious just due to the volume of water that was coming through.