Hi,

I recently purchased my house (October 07). It had water problems in the basement, so the previous owner paid to have a curtain drain installed around one half of the inside of the basement. Needless to say, it didn't work. In the part with the curtain drain, we have water coming up through the cracks in the floor. I had the original contracting company come out, and they were shocked that a sump pump wasn't installed (the person who came out wasn't the one who did the work). Anyway, he recommended a sump, saying the length of the curtain drain is too long for it to get back to the main drain. The curtain drain is about 80 feet long. How much of a slope should the pipes have? I don't see a drop of water coming out the pipe. Also, I have water coming up through the floor within 6" of the curtain drain. Shouldn't this have gotten back to the drain?

The other issue is that I know my gutters are leaking, and the grading against the house may not be done correctly. Shouldn't I fix these problems before installing a sump pump and more interior drains?

I suspect that the basement floor is somewhat thin in places. The original owner poured the cement himself. There are a couple of locations where there are holes where I can see dirt because the cement has chipped away.

The last thing is that I'm wondering how to seal off both my gravity drain and the hole for my well. The gravity drain is currently an open pit about a foot and a half wide, and a foot and a half deep. Should I screen the pipes and fill it with gravel? The well line comes in the side wall through a four inch wide hole. Before the hole, there is a downspout that goes straight down, underneath the basement floor and into the gravity drain. All the piping is black corrugated plastic, and both the pipe for from the well area and the pipe from the gravity drain to a swale in the back are somewhat blocked up. I don't want to totally close off the well hole or the gravity drain in case I need to snake it at some point (it could use it right now).

Any suggestions for me??

Thanks.



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