Larry,

The first contractor (new foundation man) is a jackass and the second (magic
jury rig man) is a shyster. I am allowed to call them that because I've been
a contractor for longer than I care to remember.

Your problem is typical for that type and age of foundation. It's being
caused by one of two things; failed footer drains or lack of them. Footer
drains go on the OUTSIDE of the foundation by the way. If the water happens
immediately after or during heavy rains you may also have failed storm
drains.

I have fixed many foundations of this type back in the day and more often
than not we found that the footer drains were either poorly installed in the
first place or poorly designed. 

The first step is to determine the type of drainage systems your house uses
or should be. Footer drains either have to go to "daylight" which means they
run downhill slightly until they can be opened to a location on your
property that is lower than your footer drains. The other method (inferior)
is to run them through the footer to a sump pump inside the house which then
lifts the water to a suitable drain pipe. 

Next step is figure out where the water from your gutters is supposed to go.
It should go to splash pans around the house (pretty ineffective), or into
storm drain pipes which the go to daylight or the city storm sewer system.
Some older neighborhoods still have combination storm and sanitary sewer
systems which lead to some real nightmares when they flood.

Once you know what you've got, you hire somebody with a mini-excavator and
set about repairing the walls one at a time along with the drains. I'm not
much for CMU foundations but at least you can take them apart and rebuild
them. Without seeing the situation I would hate to WAG the cost, but that's
the right way and the least invasive way.

OK Pinheads. Rip me limb from limb!

Rudy


-----Original Message-----
From: The listserv where the buildings do the talking
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Lawrence
Kestenbaum
Sent: Friday, June 26, 2009 10:36 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [BP] Basement issues

My house is a 38 x 22 foot ranch house built in 1953; we have owned it
for ten years.

We are on high ground by Ann Arbor standards.  However, there is water
on the basement floor after a heavy rain.

The basement is built of concrete blocks.  There are cracks, growing
gradually in severity over the years, on all four basement walls.  The
cracks are vertical at the corners, horizontal along the walls.  At
one end of the house, the wall is bowing inward noticeably.

One noted local contractor told us we needed to hoist up the house,
tear out the basement, rebuild it from scratch, and attach the house
to the new basement.  He offered to do this for $50,000.

Of course that doesn't include the cost of moving or replacing our
relatively new furnace, hot water heater, and circuit breaker box,
disconnecting and reconnecting the plumbing, re-landscaping the yard,
etc.

Friends of ours who had to do this with a much larger and older
2.5-story house spent a total of some $100,000.

A second contractor recommended a different strategy.  He would tear
out a couple feet of the basement floor on all four sides, install new
footing drains, and replace that part of the floor.  He would also
install 21 vertical 4-inch I-beams along the basement walls to
preclude further movement.  He offered to do all this for $16,100, and
guarantee a dry basement for a lifetime, transferable to future
owners.

What do Pinheads think?

                                                          Larry

---
Lawrence Kestenbaum, [log in to unmask]
Washtenaw County Clerk & Register of Deeds, http://ewashtenaw.org
The Political Graveyard, http://politicalgraveyard.com
P.O. Box 2563, Ann Arbor, MI 48106

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