# Drainage Issue In my Lawn



## kirridam (Dec 25, 2008)

Folks,

I'm having some severe water drainage issue in my lawn. Here's are some picture: http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/

Can someone advise me as to how I can solve this problem? Spanish Drainage may be..or something else? 

thanks
kirridam


----------



## Scuba_Dave (Jan 16, 2009)

What does the landscape/level of land look around this area?
Further out back?
It looks like a lot of land slopes towards this area
Plus your neighbors ground is higher, you are probabl;y getting water fromn them
Are there more houses further (higher) up?
Are you the lowpoint in a row of houses?
Where are you located?


----------



## KHouse75 (May 14, 2008)

Looks like poor grading. The builder needs to get out there and do some better grading.

They should have set the house higher as well.

If it looks like regrading won't help, I'm recommend a pipe drain with several basins fed into the drainage system for the neighborhood (or to a low spot that will drain to the road).


----------



## kirridam (Dec 25, 2008)

Scuba_Dave said:


> What does the landscape/level of land look around this area?
> Further out back?
> It looks like a lot of land slopes towards this area
> Plus your neighbors ground is higher, you are probabl;y getting water fromn them
> ...


Yes the neighbour's house is couple of feet up and all of his water and from the back is also flowing into this gully. My only hope is to setup some kind of drainage. I'm in GA. Almost all the houses in that row is designed in a similar fashion where the neighbour's house is couple of feet above yours.


----------



## kirridam (Dec 25, 2008)

KHouse75 said:


> Looks like poor grading. The builder needs to get out there and do some better grading.
> 
> They should have set the house higher as well.
> 
> If it looks like regrading won't help, I'm recommend a pipe drain with several basins fed into the drainage system for the neighborhood (or to a low spot that will drain to the road).


What you see now is what the builder did, based on the warranty, which according to them would have solved the problem. I showed them the picture and argued but they said as long as the water drains in 24hr there is no problem. My only option is to file a law suit! 

I'm thinking of doing it on my own. What kind of drainage would help?


----------



## KHouse75 (May 14, 2008)

Is it gone after 24 hours? Builders around here require 48 hours. The heavy clay soil drains slow around here. This happens on every step lot around here. A friend of mine has this same exact problem.

Based on my experience, here's what I'd do:

Get 3 or 4 drainage basins with grates for 4" pipe. Square, round, whatever you prefer. Get 3 or 4 wyes as well. At the other end where the water will drain, you can use a popup emitter another drainage basin or just leave the end of the pipe open if you have enough fall to cut it at an angle to match the ground.

Dig a trench about a foot wide and about a 18" deep from the start of the wet area all the way to a low spot that can drain naturally. For you, it looks like that's your front yard.

Dig holes for the basins a foot or so to the side of the main line (The first one at the end can be inline, however). Dig a trench from the basin hole to the main line at an angle that matched the wye adapter. The reason to do this is because I don't like to have my basins inline with the main drainage pipe because the water will flow through each basin on it's way through the pipe causing the basins to drain slower during heavy rains plus it will take the sediment from the basin into the pipe and clog it up.

Taper the ground out a few feet from the basin holes so the water will drain toward them.

Place your basins in the basin holes and make sure you have some fall from the basin hole to the main line. I like to have enough fall to where the top of the main pipe is below the bottom of the basin pipe hole. This may require digging the main line a little deeper than a foot.

Once everything is the correct depth, lay your main line in the hole making sure to cut it and and install the wye adapters and connect the basins to the whe adapters with short sections of pipe. Place piles of dirt on the pipe to help hold it in place as you go.

Cover the pipe with dirt. Don't pack too hard to where you crush the pipe.

Final grade and reinstall the sod.

Here's a little text diagram of what I'm trying to say.

O===================================================O Low End
     //     //     //
    O     O     O





You can also run your gutters into this system if you want.

If you don't want basins, you can get perforated corrugated pipe pre-wrapped in a sock and put it in an 18" deep trench, back fill with very coarse sand, cover with well draining top soil then cover with sod. There are many different variations of this. There's a drainage system called akwadrain that I've used successfully. You can wrap the hole with drainage fabric, install a pipe then rock then wrap with the fabric then cover with soil then sod, etc...

I prefer the pipe with basins if it's just surface water from rain and sprinklers causing the problem like in your case as it will almost instantly remove all the water.

If you have saturated soil like me, I use perforated pipe with no basins.


----------



## zoolou (Apr 12, 2008)

you definitely need to make some type of culvert run-off between your houses....the neighbours downspouts run directly to the affected problem area....I would grade your yard higher up from the foundation and run a weeper underneath out to the street away from the property....I have had a similiar problem in our backyard where the properties around us are higher and the rain water builds up and runs to our foundation....we made a trench along the entire backyard 20" across and a foot deep and back filled with river rock for a dry river bed to solve the problem


----------



## Bigfoot (May 10, 2009)

Two off the wall thoughts. How deep do you have to dig to hit sand (if there is eventually any down there?). I've been running most of my downspouts back into the ground water, slowly but surely channeling my runoff away from city drainage. Of course here, the sand layer is shallow, the water table around 20 feet.
Second thought, Trench, gravel, drainage pipe and a buried rain water reservoir. I'd be tempted to use that water again (and my neighbors runoff) in the dry periods. Even eventually tie in the downspouts from the house. The buried reservoir would pay for itself rather quickly (depending if you have well water, the depth of the water table and if you have to use city water for the garden during the dry periods). A good selling point if you decide to sell.


----------

