Pit Pro Handyman 724-544-8544
Wet Basements, Moist basements and humid basements are a typical scenerio in older homes in the greater Pittsburgh Pennsylvania area. Our hilly location provides for much movement of water that is all trying to reach one of our rivers yet sometimes tends to end up in our basements.
Water can enter our basements through many different methods such as weeping through the walls, cracks in the block work from shifting of the home, emerging through the floor in cracks or through the actual concrete floor, gushing thorugh a window in a storm, foundation shift, or other less typical methods. The rule with water is that gravity pulls it through the path of least resistance.
Newer homes are built with basement walls that have been reinforced and a waterproof membrane applied to or painted onto the outside of the wall before the soil is backfilled. Our older homes have walls built of rock that was quarried and laid in place. These walls are solid yet they are not waterproof. These walls tend to do much good at keeping the water out yet as more and more areas are developed and paved, water becomes more aggressive in attacking our homes.
At Pit Pro Handyman we provide basement waterproofing services for those who need to dry their basement or cellar. Having a damp or wet basement causes a home to be sick and cause structural issues for the home as well as health and quality of life issues for the homeowner and their family.
The process to dry a Greater Pittsburgh PA basement is quite extensive and labor intense. In some cases this causes a homeowner to attempt to dry a basement with a paint on finish, this is what a person might believe to be a quick fix yet it is just a waste of resources. The truth is we must provide an exit point and a method of travel for the water and moisture to follow once it intrudes. As the water is coming in, it must go out and that is what we provide, a way out.
We will cut the concrete floor around the perimeter of the basement and excavate to lay a pipe and gravel for drainge. This gravel and a portion of your wall will be covered with a specialized sheet such as polydrian (TM) that will promote the movement of water / moisture toward the pipe below. This gravel will have many open spaces between pieces of gravel that will be of lower pressure so that the water gravitates toward the gravel bed. The pipes have holes in them and are open inside providing an area of even less resistance so that water travels through the gravel and into the holes int he pipes. The water will follow the pipe system that will go through the wall and exit at an area of lower elevation outside of your home.
When a homeowner desires to finish their basement so that it can be used for living space we will provide drains that connect to the piping system. A dehumidifier can be be set up and operated continuously and drip into this drain so that the air in the basement will have the humidity level reduced so that it is comfortable for finished living space.
In addition the perimeter of the walls can be excavated and a sheeting applied to the exterior walls such as J-Drain. This sheeting promotes the movement of water down to a pipe that we will lay adjacent to the wall footing. We will backfill with gravel and filter fabric. This exterior wall treatment will direct the water down to the pipe and into the pipe and then it will exit away from your foundation into a swale so that it can continue on its natural path to a lake, stream, river or engineered water management system that is installed by the city or county government.
Upon client request we can examine the perimeter of the home for any immediate dangers that might promote flooding. Downspouts that empyt next to the house and not into an ADS or NDS drainage piping system can cause wet walls, mold and mildew in the home and water intrusion in the basement.
If a home is on a slope or at the bottom of a slope a system of swales can be developed to provide a path for the water to travel so that it avoids your home and your neighbors home yet still mimicks the natrual drainge system. Every hillside has a drainage pattern and a natural destination for the water, placing a home in the middle of that pattern always requires a swale system otherwise the water will crash into basement windows and fill the basement to the top in heavy rainstorms.
There are additional ways to water proof your basement, some may be to place NDS and or ADS drainge structured and pipes in window wells with rain covers so that if any water would make it into that well it would immediately enter an atrium drain or other drain and them travel to a pop-up emitter located at a lower elevaiton on the property so that it can continue to follow the natural drainage pattern until reaching the natural water body or stream or a city or county drain inlet which will carry the water through an engineered system of pipes and to a river or lake or other water body.
For more information about basement waterproofing please contact Justin of Pit Pro Handyman at 724-544-8544
