If you are planning on building a new home, there are many considerations with respect to home drainage, that you will likely not be made aware of through the local planning department, your architect, your home contractor builder, or even your close friends, many of whom have built a home as well. I will tell you some of the most misunderstood concepts in the world of home drainage with respect to new home construction.
When you are building a new home, you must discuss home drainage with your architect first, before submission to city and county approval officials. Specify that you want a foundation that contains more above soil grade concrete than the average proposed concrete foundation usually winds up with, to allow the creation of a soil grade enhancement at the foundation, when planning and having blueprints drawn.
The compacted sloping hard grade next to your foundation, approximately 18″ from the foundation, is called a splash block. It is essential not to garden and dig up your foundation area, and expect any kind of home drainage success, no matter what home drainage system you install. You must also keep a functional rain drain discharge system that vents the roof water through your gutter system, and on to a dry well or a day lighted vent, in most cases.
Pour the foundation about 1 ft. higher than the originally proposed finished backfilled soil grade, so a compacted and raised dirt and clay splash block can be installed around the home, for hard falling rainwater run off, to the inside of a 12″ wide, exposed river rock hand excavated french drain, located about 18″ from the foundation wall at the base of the splash block.
This will probably raise a few eyebrows from the experts you will be forced to deal with. Hold your ground. Specify this condition as necessary and gladly pay for the extra concrete, because it will save you thousands of dollars in the long run, by not costing you mega bucks in repairs to solve home drainage groundwater problems and damaged foundation and post beam infrastructure.
Use exposed 3/4″-1 1/2″ clean washed river rock for maximum groundwater collection around your new home. A compact soil grade slope, away from your foundation wall, will allow you to install a hand excavated french drain at the base of the compacted splash block, and beat the saturation of groundwater along the foundation wall.
Homeowners that are building a new home, contact me to weigh in, concerning their home design from a drainage perspective. They ask me to offer suggestions or alterations to the home drainage plan, if there even is one. Sometimes I just am asked to write them a proposal for work. Todays home buyers wants to make their new home a “green” place to live. Not just a future profit picture alone.
I show homeowners how to use hand excavated french drains to prevent structural problems to their new home, by using groundwater removal systems that work to prevent groundwater damage, before groundwater enters the crawl space or basement.
City planning departments and architects seldom counsel homebuilders to do as I have suggested above, so as a result, the finished soil grade at the foundation is often finished flat or the ground slopes towards the foundation, after the foundation area is backfilled. Everyone just forgets about grade.
Building codes require that the soil level, or other cellulose debris, be at least 6″ below the bottom of the siding. Most building codes mandate a 6″ slope away from the foundation walls, for minimum home drainage success. This is seldom followed in practice however, by the builder. Flat or negative grade at the foundation is a smoking gun for a home drainage problem and should be a tip off to look for evidence of home drainage problems.
Ranch homes are many times built with foundation vents poured too low in the foundation stem wall. As a result, rain just fills those foundation vent areas and the water runs below grade into the crawl space easily.
Many of these homeowners become frustrated and foul tempered homeowners, in the face of home drainage tension, a contractors who opt to install a sump pump in the crawl space, once the groundwater problem becomes intolerable, rather than install the more comprehensive, and usually slightly more expensive, hand excavated french drain system, to actually solve the groundwater problem from the outside.
Sump pumps do not prevent groundwater from entering the crawlspace, and are therefore not a home drainage solution. Sump pumps are just a bandaid marketed with a “guarantee”, that is not worth a cent. I just completed another hand excavated french drain system for homeowners who are in that very position. They spent over $5,000. on failed home drainage sump pumps, before finding my company.
Homeowners forget, or ignore, the fact that if they do not collect the groundwater on the outside of the foundation first, reducing the groundwater saturation and hydrostatic pressure caused by hard rains, the sump pump will always be pumping, just like the sump pump installer said it always would. He has likely told you the b.s. story of underground rivers and springs under your home, and how you are always destined to suffer from groundwater entry into your crawl space. Get it? This is home drainage catch 22 kind of.
A self fulfilling prediction that makes that sump pump guy look good, until you realize his “guarantee”, is worthless, and his method does not prevent the groundwater from flooding your crawl space, and still leaving you with a home drainage problem to solve. Maybe not until the homeowners sell the home, however. That is most typical. Wrong decision.
Sump pump guys love the word “guarantee.” They actually are giving homeowners a bait and switch type of deal. Read the language, or lack of it, within the sump pump guarantee.The pump will work alright, until the electricity goes out in a storm, or the sump pump clogs or burns out. Back to square one for the homeowners.
Beware of companies offering home drainage guarantees that sump pumps will work. They mean just that. If the old one burns out, they will put in a new one.
Big deal. Nero fiddles, as Rome burns. That is no guarantee. Their guarantee does not say that you will never get groundwater saturation into your crawl space again. It just says that they will always bring you a new sump pump if the old one burns out.
Since most sump pumps last for years and years, this is a bait and switch proposition, disguised as a guarantee. Get it? Even insurance companies will not give you a guarantee for groundwater damage, because they can’t determine all the origin variables, or the quality of, or lack of home drainage systems installed previously, or the quality of previously installed home drainage attempts, that may have made the situation worse. Homeowners may want the moon, when it comes to guarantees, but an old proverb fits here: “He who wants it badly, gets it badly”. Do your homework. You cannot enforce a guarantee that is written to beat you.
Insurance companies just exclude groundwater caused damage all together, most often. Unless you have flood insurance, you are s.o.l.
A reputable home drainage contractor lives on the reputation of the business. The basis for the companys success is through documented referral lists of former customers, that have asked to be on the list, and that are delighted with the results of their hand excavated french drains.
Homeowners don’t need to fall for some tricky worded, fast talking sump pump salesman and his b.s. guarantee.
Almost all home drainage problems are caused by groundwater that is created by heavy rains. There are many other causes of home drainage problems as well however. Some are produced by neighbors, some are caused by broken city water lines and sewer installations.
Most home drainage problems have been made worse by the homeowners themselves, in their attempt to save money. This costs homeowners tons of money every year around the United States. This is not a good way to save money. I suggest stop buying lottery tickets if you want a guaranteed offer to save money.
A reputable home drainage contractor has a strong track record, and also is licensed, bonded, and insured in their area of the world. Your choice of home drainage contractor should be a referred professional contractor/mason. This type of contractor can solve your home drainage groundwater problems, by understanding the use of slopes, or lack of slope, and the way groundwater perks back into the earth. Green home drainage science.
Insist on architect planning and engineering for home drainage, by paying attention to the aspects I have discussed above. Many times it is too late to change grade level. When the foundation is poured, you are stuck with it that way. Sometimes it is too late to un-ring that home drainage bell, once the foundation, siding, foundation vents and windows are set at a particular grade and the concrete has been poured.
Plumb the rain drain discharges properly, and vent them at a grade of a least 2″ per 10 lineal feet, in solid pipe, installed on the bottom of your hand excavated french drain aqua duct. Install them on the bottom of your hand excavated french drains, in solid pipe, and pay attention to city requirements for foundation footing drains too, realizing they will never be needed if your hand excavated french drains at the surface levels of the foundation are installed and engineered properly, in conjunction with a increased grade compacted splash block that I have discussed above, as well.
Read about foundation footing drain installation and everything you need to know about home drainage, at aaahomedrainage.com