# Wet under house



## marc412 (Apr 6, 2008)

very interesting that you are asking this as I'm am curious as well... we have the same problem under our house and I was told you don't want any water under there as it will make mold grow which is a bad thing, we cured it by going to the lowest point in the crawl space and digging a hole, place a sump container there with a sump pump and piped it out one of the vents away from the house, this is only a temporary fix as we will probably end up digging around the foundation and finding out why the drain tile isn't doing it's job


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## Ron6519 (Mar 28, 2007)

Ideally you want to keep the water out, as opposed to dealing with it after the fact. Check the water dispersion when it rains. Grading, gutters and leaders.
What construction is the foundation?
Ron


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## buletbob (May 9, 2008)

I did a job a long time ago where the crawl space had a dirt floor. we installed a pedestal sump pump inside a 12"x12" clay chimney flue buried the flue and put 6" of gravel in the bottom. then we laid 6 mil Poly over the soil and up the foundation wall 12" AL the way around the foundation, if there are any piers in the crawl do the same. any over laying lap joint must be lapped 2' and taped. we added foundation vents and one with a fan incorporated in it. that solved the problem.
you must keep the crawl dry, my friends house up state ( his vacation home) built in the late 70's.
house was built on a poured foundation concrete floor, outside water would leak in from the basement windows from snow and rain, they had a small sump pump. well the basement was all way's damp with puddles of water standing in spots. this was going on for about five years. 
He invites me up to do some work on repairing some floor joists that were rotted under the rear slider. well I go down in the basement and discovered the inti-er floor structure was covered with black mold. including the main girder. the floor was insulated with fiberglass insulation and any part of the floor joist that was not covered with the insulation was destroyed from the mold. I could take my hammer and hit the bottom of the beam and knock off 2'' of the bottom of the beam. I hit the triple 2x10 main girder and went into the outer 2x by's on the outsides. 
the cause of the damage was from black mold and lack of ventilation and standing water. Just some advice BOB


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## Termite (Apr 13, 2008)

Hopefully the pipes are all unplugged now and are draining correctly.

Does the crawlspace have any sort of ventilation openings to allow airflow to occur down there?


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## debd (Jul 16, 2008)

thekctermite said:


> Hopefully the pipes are all unplugged now and are draining correctly.
> 
> Does the crawlspace have any sort of ventilation openings to allow airflow to occur down there?


This is our first month in the house. We are fixing the drain pipes and don't expect anymore problems there.
There are air vents all around the house. There was rot and bugs in the sill (?) but that was fixed before we bought it and the crawlspace was sprayed for bugs also before we bought. There is no standing water. We are pulling out all the vapour barrior to get a good dry. We are thinking about letting it go all winter and into next summer to dry out before butting the plastic back down. But we live in wet Oregon (rains nine months out of the year) Is it a good idea to leave the plastic off during the rainy season?


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## debd (Jul 16, 2008)

Ron6519 said:


> Ideally you want to keep the water out, as opposed to dealing with it after the fact. Check the water dispersion when it rains. Grading, gutters and leaders.
> What construction is the foundation?
> Ron


It is a continuous cement foundation...not a slab.


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