Do you know why your basement is wet? This could be the reason...

Welcome to this week All Things Basmenty Q&A 

This week's question is:  What is the most common cause of wet basements?

The main reason we see for wet basements is an external drain clog. When your house is build  they will lay down an external drain tile  and they will either run it to sump pump of drain depending on what year your home was built. There are different types of drain tile but the same problem remains with all of them, and that is that they will clog with dirt and settlement as water will bring it to the external drain system as it is trying to get through there. When that happens the water will just sit outside of the home and then it finds its way into the home, because that is what water is good at. 

If my drain tile clogs, how will I go about fixing that?

There is a couple of different ways of fixing that. One way that people look into a lot is just replacing it, and that doesn't make a whole lot of sense in our eyes.  You will have to excavate around the house, pull out the old tile, and replace it with new drain tile in order to fix that on the outside of the home. It doesn't make sense financially as well as logically, because if you do the thing that caused the problem in the first place again, you will probably end up with that same problem. So what we use is an internal drain system.

What are some of the benefits of an internal drain system?

All internal drain systems are a little bit different, they vary in how they are applied. Our benefits are that we keep it up out of the dirt and the mud so that way it is not filling up and clogging like that external drain system has. We can also cover up cracks and places that water can be getting in else wehre with different methods on top of that water proofing system that we are putting in. 

How long would it take to get internal drain system installed?

We can install most of our internal drain systems in three to four days. It doesn't take very long at all.

Is that much shorter than installing an external drain system?

Oh absolutely, and external drain system you will be looking at several weeks of work there.

If I were to get an internal drain system, what are some requirements of a good one?

You will want a couple of different things.  One, you will want to get the internal drain system up out of the dirt, away from the footing and away from the mud zone. You also want a pump that can handle the amount of water you are going to be pushing to it. If you are in a high water table you are going to want a really powerful pump. Lastly, you will want to make sure that that is running to a low point in your house, wherever you put that sump pump. You will want the sump pump at the lowest part of your basement otherwise you will be running water up hill, and that doesn't usually work out that well. 

Be on the lookout for more answers to your upcoming basement questions.