In this episode, Adam shares an interesting case study about a block foundation and leaky pipe penetration.
Narrator: It’s time once again for the “Crack Man Podcast” hosted by A1 Foundation Crack Repair. I’m Darren Kincaid here with the Crack Daddy himself, Adam Tracy. Adam and The Crack Man Rich have over 30 years’ experience in the construction industry. Rich as over two5 years as the president and founder of A1 Foundation Crack Repair. This podcast provides expert basement waterproofing, concrete repair, and preventative maintenance tips for homeowners and businesses. A1 Foundation’s valuable insight will help avert a disastrous flood within the basement, health problems associated with water infiltration, and protect your biggest investment….your home. The topic of today’s podcast: The case of the block foundation and leaky pipe penetration.
Narrator: So, Adam, you have an interesting case study to share with us today about a block foundation and a leaky pipe penetration. What went on there?
Adam: So, we had a customer call us up, and they were in the process of selling their house. And in this market, a lot of houses are moving so quickly. But the issue with this particular home is that they were getting some water in a utility area and weren't really able to figure it out. And in the previous years, and they owned this house for 20 plus years, over the course of their home ownership, they've done pretty much everything you could do to ensure waterproofing this foundation.
They installed French drain, perimeter drain systems. They did regrading of the outside. They reestablished the water damp proofing membrane on the outside. They did water proofing on the inside as well. But there was one area in the corner of the utility room that continuously got wet and they couldn't figure out after all of these things that they did, why was it still getting wet.
They've invested tens of thousands of dollars over the years and it was really kind of scaring away a lot of buyers because they knew that all these systems were in place, but we still had one area that just couldn't be tamed. So, we got in there. We tried to figure out, well, what is the situation? Why are we seeing the water here? And what we found out is that many years ago, there was an old pipe penetration kind of very close towards the bottom of the foundation where a line went out towards the street. And in that pipe penetration, because it's blocked, they usually have to core a pretty big hole because it's really hard to get a small hole in the pipe penetration there because of how gentle or how delicate the block actually is.
They were able to put a pipe penetration with a sleeve in there and then ran the line that would have to go outside. Problem is is that whoever did this pipe penetration years ago probably didn't do an adequate job of actually putting water stopping or any sort of plug on the outside. So it did break down over the years, and they would just get more and more water through there. So even though they had a perimeter drain system, even though they regraded the yard. There was still this void space in the foundation which allowed the water to come in here.
What we were able to do is that PVC sleeves are really challenging because you have masonry and plastic and they don't like to marry very well in terms of things sticking to one another. And it makes it a challenge to waterproof. So, we're able to actually do, kind of, a 3 phase approach in this area where we would put a masonry material in there to at least start the blocking system. Then we use our closed cell polymer resin material. We'll actually expand and kind of totally encapsulate that. The problem is that plastic expands a lot relative to masonry.
We do have to be very careful there because the material will expand, but it will only move it so much. And then we use a specialty product which is actually from the oil and gas industry to prevent any sort of liquids coming through on gas lines. And it's a peanut butter kind of paste that goes into this thing and that was the final seal on this thing. And we were able to warranty this no problem because we knew that nothing was ever going to be coming through this pipe after that we had fully waterproofed it. Gave the warranty to the homeowners so they could put it in their realtor package and I was sold the next week because I knew that work was done.
It was a great story. It was a lot of headaches leading up to it for the homeowners and the realtors. Let's try to figure out why this area wasn't working even though everything looks seemingly in place, but just need another set of expertise in there to be able to figure out what was going on, how to properly deal with it, and seal this thing up for good with a warranty to the new homeowners.
Narrator: Thanks, Adam, for sharing this interesting case study of a block foundation with a leaky pipe penetration.
Narrator: If you have a basement water problem and think you need a crack professional near New Haven, CT, or, if you’d like more information on foundation crack repair and basement waterproofing topics, please visit A1FoundationCrackRepair.com or call (866) 929-3171. Or you can email info@a1foundationcrackrepair.com. Thanks for listening and keep that basement dry.