Quote:
Originally Posted by shuttrbg22
I have been noticing over the years that my crawl space is very wet/muddy for parts of the year. There are mineral deposits on the perimiter wall and on top of the soil. It is not uncommom to find the soil extremely muddy at times.
The street in front of our house which is at higher elevation has a drain coming out of the ground. After a rainstorm water flows out of the ground for weeks. Even when it doesn't rain for months water trickles out of the ground 365 days a year. I suspect there is an underground spring or we have a high water table.
Do I lay plastic sheeting? Do I put in a sump pump? Thoughts?
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Here's my thoughts on the subject.
You live in a dry climate, but it still rains in San diego from time to time. During those rains, the water has to go somewhere and it appears that you're feeling the affect being down hill from the street and on the side of the hill. The water is flowing to you, on or under the ground, as it makes it's way further down the hill.
If you want to keep the vented crawlspace, here's the best thing to do in my opinion. First, you want to install an exterior french drain around the perimeter. Even if it has one, it may be old, crushed, clogged and therefore no longer functional.
It would require excavating down your foundation wall on the exterior, laying drain pipe (the one with holes in it) around the base of the foundation, installing clean crushed rock around the pipe and covering the pipe with drain cloth to keep the dirt out. You do this around the entire foundation and then finally run it out and away from your house far enough away to allow the water to flow away from your house and not soak back into the french drain.
Then, you want to fix or install the waterproofing on the exterior of the foundation wall. There are a variety of ways of doing it, it's just a matter of the money you want to invest to gain the effectiveness you want to obtain.
The second best way to do it would be to put the french drain immediatly on the inside of your foundation. It would be installed similarly to the outside installation, except you wouldn't be covering it with dirt.
You would excavate enough around the inside of the foundation to get the drain pipe (with the holes) beneath the soil level. Then, you would cover it with clean gravel.
The drain would run around the interior perimeter of the foundation to the lowest point in your crawl space where it would either enter a sump pump or gravity drain outside the foundation. Again, the drain pipe, once it exited the foundation, would run downhill as far as possible from the foundation before it let the water out.
If you can run the drain pipe outside without using a sump pump, that's the best thing to do. You don't have to worry about the GFCI plug going off and stopping your sump pump. You also don't ahve to worry about the electricity going out during a storm and again stopping the sump pump. The water will just drain out no matter what if it's a gravity drain system.
If you have to use a sump pump, do it the right way. Don't just dig a hole and put the pump in it. Don't drill a few holes in a 5 gallon Lowes bucket and call it a day. Instead, use the right size sump basin with a lid. They're much bigger that a 5 gallon bucket and go further into the ground. The lid also helps keep any standing water in the basin from evaporating into the crawlspace, especially when used in conjunction with a vapor barrier on the rest of the dirt.
Then, use PVC pipe to evacuate the water. Glue the connections, run it up the foundation wall and olut the siding. Run the pipe back down the exterior of the foundation and into a drain pipe routed far away from the house.
The problem with not excavating outside of the foundation will be the continuing weeping on the foundation walls. It's the effuescence that you're seeing. To deal with that issue, you can cover the walls with plastic sheeting, or a bumpy thicker plastic panel that will allow the water to flow into the interior french drain but keep it from adding to the moisture inside the crawl space.
The thing to keep in mind is to not insall it all the way to the sill plate. Keep it a few inches or so, maybe 6", beneath the will plate. It will allow you to see any termite tubes reaching your wood structure. You wouldn't see them if the plastic sent all the way to the wood.
No matter if you choose an exterior or interior french drain, you'll also want to cover the dirt inside the crawl space with plastic. 6mm thick would be the minimum. It helps keep down the evaporation that will always happen with exposed dirt.
Your other option is the encapsulated (closed crawl space) that was already mentioned. It also involves the installation of an interior perimeter french drain and a sump pump. However, they also use a dehumidifier inside the crawl space since it's not getting any new air circulation. Some even incorporate the newly encapsulated crawl space into the HVAC system so there is a turnover of the air.
That's about all I have to say on the subject for now. My typing fingers are about done. Good luck on whatever you decide to do.
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