sunnydays01
New Member
My basement has flooded four times in the last 4 years- twice in 2008 and twice in the last month. The flooding always comes from rainwater backing up into our basement bathroom. After the floods in 2008, we put a cap on our basement shower drain, which is where the water was coming from. In 2009 we had no flooding so we thought the problem was solved (there were no heavy rains that year). We have had heavy rains over the last month or so (I live in the Chicago area) and our basement has flooded two times. The first time it flooded while we were sleeping. We woke up to find our basement carpet saturated. We ended up getting the carpet and padding replaced. Fast forward 3 weeks and we had another flood last week. This time I saw it with my own eyes. Since the shower drain was capped the water came up through the toilet! I couldn't believe it. Our basement filled with 6 inches of water. Another important thing that I noticed. When our basement had 6 inches of standing water, we went to Home Depot to rent a submersible pump to get the water out. Two and a half hours later when we got home the water was gone. We have no drains in our basement floor so I am assuming that it just went down into the basement floor cracks. From what I've been told, this is a very bad thing. Our house is 90 years old and we have no sump pump. I am wondering if that would solve this kind of problem?
We filed a claim with our insurance company. They sent in a crew to take out the carpet and padding as well as the bottom 24" of drywall. We told them to wait before they reinstall anything because we are trying to figure out what to do to prevent this problem from happening again. Otherwise, there is no point in having a finished basement.
Some questions I have:
Should we cap the toilet? Would the water just find another way to come in?
Would a french drain and / or sump pump solve the problem?
On the street side of our home, one of the downspouts goes into the ground and ties into the city pipes. I think this is code so that the gutter doesn't drain on the sidewalk. I've been told that this may also be contributing to an overload of the pipes?
We live on a cornet lot so I think that we get it worse than houses down the block. Is that a correct assumption?
Any and all advice or comments are appreciated!
We filed a claim with our insurance company. They sent in a crew to take out the carpet and padding as well as the bottom 24" of drywall. We told them to wait before they reinstall anything because we are trying to figure out what to do to prevent this problem from happening again. Otherwise, there is no point in having a finished basement.
Some questions I have:
Should we cap the toilet? Would the water just find another way to come in?
Would a french drain and / or sump pump solve the problem?
On the street side of our home, one of the downspouts goes into the ground and ties into the city pipes. I think this is code so that the gutter doesn't drain on the sidewalk. I've been told that this may also be contributing to an overload of the pipes?
We live on a cornet lot so I think that we get it worse than houses down the block. Is that a correct assumption?
Any and all advice or comments are appreciated!