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Posted by Jim Elbrecht on July 29, 2006, 8:00 am
>The house I'm trying to sell is a rehabbed old farmhouse with a 2-ft
>thick field stone foundation. It's really quite nice ... except for
>the basement.
>
>My first question is: How solid are these things? The house was built
>100 years ago. I don't see any evidence of settling - no cracks in the
>living area walls. No stones have fallen out or even moved inward into
>the basement. Potential buyers are sure to ask this question.
You're in upstate NY. You should be able to easily locate a 200yr
old house with the same foundation that you could point to. Ask
your local town historian-- or if he/she isn't aware, ask the
neighboring town or county historian. [I'm in Schenectady county- and
I'll bet I could find a 300yr old one in a day.]
>
>My second question has to do with water seepage/leakage.
-snip-
>I don't believe there is anything I can really do about the water
>entry. The outside perimeter of the house is slanted away from the
>foundation and my gutters take roof water to the streets. The house
>just sits at a low area in town and I think that's the problem. It was
>wet down there from the day I bought it in 1987.
>
>I have some ideas I'd like to bounce off you. There is a fourth window
>now boarded up. I'm thinking of installing a fan there - like the ones
>used to pull out radon gas - that runs permanently, venting air to the
>outside.
>
>I'd also like to put a liner in the sump hole and put a pump in it
>that pipes water out to the street.
If the hole is dry- why bother? If I was a potential buyer it would
just draw my attention to the damp problem-- and from what you
describe, it sounds like it would make it appear worse than it is.
>
>I'd like to install a dehumidifier with drain into the sump.
I'd go with this plan.
>
>Although the fllor is damp, I'd still like to try to dig a channel
>around the inside perimeter than drains water to the sump, but I don't
>want to go too deep because the floor is level with the bottom-most
>layer of fieldstone and undermine the strength of the wall.
You sure don't. You're selling the house- so there's no way I'd go
to that effort or expense. Here's how my perimeter drain worked
out.
My plan was to go down 2feet- lay a 1'square drain with landscape
cloth and #2stone- then put a footer under my stones and end up
gaining a little ceiling height in my basement.
I got 2 walls dug out- a 30foot and a 20foot.. I was about to order
the stone when we got the hardest rain I've ever seen- 3" of rain in
about 4 hours. [there are areas where that may not be terribly
unusual, but it is a 100yr thing in my neck of the woods]
My wife and I were sitting in the living room and heard/felt this loud
'whump'. My first thought was that the neighbor's oak tree had
toppled on our house. Then it hit me. Both walls had collapsed
into my basement.
6 weeks, lots of help from my friends, a few equipment rentals, and
$10 grand later- I have 2 block walls with excellent inside and
outside drainage. Not the way we planned it-- but I did gain a lot
more headroom than I had originally planned for.
[oh yeah- most insurance doesn't cover 'wall collapse'- mine doesn't]
In a year or 2 I'll do the rest & finish the basement.
>
>It looks like back in the 70s someone tried to solve the problem by
>pointing the whole inside wall with cement. It apparently didn't work;
>most of it has fallen out. I believe in my case that water pressure
>from the outside exerts far more power than any sealant can handle.
The engineer the bank hired when I bought this house in 1984 had me
parge and seal the inside walls. Cosmetically it makes things look
better-- but apparently he had never heard of hydrostatic pressure.
As soon as we moved in I installed gutters and did some landscaping-
that probably saved the walls long enough so I could collapse them
myself.
Good luck-
Jim
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