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I just talked to a landscaper and he is kind of against the french drain system. He said the fine clay soil will eventually blocks all the openings between the rocks inside the french drain system, make it nothing more than an underground pipe. Plus tree root can mess up that pipe since the pipe is not solid.
So, he thinks it is better just to lay down a solid pipe with drain boxes.
Is that true? I am a little bit skeptical about this.
I can't speak to the long-term condition of a french drain system, but in my experience the clay soil does limit the effectiveness of perforated corrugated pipe to drain away water. It helps some, albeit slowly, but the clay soil itself doesn't drain well so it limits how much water makes its way into the pipe to be carried away. If you have standing water you're trying to deal with (such as after a heavy rain), drain boxes in those areas are really the way to go to quickly get rid of the water. I installed 6 of them, along with 150 feet of corrugated pie, in my yard in Raleigh and they helped tremendously.
I just talked to a landscaper and he is kind of against the french drain system. He said the fine clay soil will eventually blocks all the openings between the rocks inside the french drain system, make it nothing more than an underground pipe. Plus tree root can mess up that pipe since the pipe is not solid.
So, he thinks it is better just to lay down a solid pipe with drain boxes.
Is that true? I am a little bit skeptical about this.
We moved into a house that had pipe openings in the ground directly below the downspouts, but the downspouts had elbows installed to direct water away from the house. I guessed that there was once a drain system that had gotten clogged, so the owner installed the elbows. I dug it up earlier this summer and found French drain pipe totally filled with soil. I replaced it with solid pipe.
The clay here is terrible. To have any hope, you will need to overdig by quite a lot, use socked pipe, lots of stone and probably a barrier fabric around it all. Otherwise your trench will more or less act like a pipe. It is really best to run your French drains to daylight in a creek or other surface drainage.
ok, looks like everybody agrees with the landscaper that solid pipe and drain box are better solution. I think even solid pipe has the risk of being filled with dirt, but hopefully a good rain can carry most of them away. I personally prefers just a swale or creek, at least it is easier to spot issues if there is any. But that makes mowing a lot of more difficult.
A drain box will only collect surface water, right? If so, it's serving a totally different purpose. French drains are super cheap and even if they filled up every 10 years I would totally recommend one if the issue is standing water. I have both in my yard and the surface drains definitely weren't doing the job so we added a bunch of french drains that made a huge difference. I used a landscape architect to draw up the drainage plans so assuming he knows what he is dealing with and the company who did the work is well respected. I don't think both would agree it was a solid solution if french drains don't work.
A drain box will only collect surface water, right? If so, it's serving a totally different purpose. French drains are super cheap and even if they filled up every 10 years I would totally recommend one if the issue is standing water. I have both in my yard and the surface drains definitely weren't doing the job so we added a bunch of french drains that made a huge difference. I used a landscape architect to draw up the drainage plans so assuming he knows what he is dealing with and the company who did the work is well respected. I don't think both would agree it was a solid solution if french drains don't work.
I do have a bit of standing water issue after a rain. Well, during the rain, my neighbor delivers a huge amount of water to my yard (thanks to the nice neighbor!). After the rain, roughly an inch of water stands in a 5ft x 10ft strip for anytime from 24 hours to 72 hours depends on how saturate the ground is and how dry the weather is. I think where the water stands is a little bit low in the water path. So, do you think I need a French Drain instead? What's the name of your landscaper?
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