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Banty

In article . com,
says...

I am rehabbing a house that I hope to move in to that has had
drainage problems in the basement. (Because I am not in the house all
the time, it is hard to closely watch drainage issues as they occur.)
About 5 days ago I installed parallel corrugated plastic piping on the
western and eastern sides of the house to take advantage of a slight
downward grade from west (back) to east (front) to take the water to a
ditch and street that are in front of the house -- in fact, I posted
questions about the piping last week.) Several days ago we had a small
rain, and I noticed that the sump pump would discharge several times an
hour about 4 hours after the rain. Last night and this morning we had
a substantial amount of rain in Cincinnati (I would guess about about
1.5 or 2 inches) and when I visited the house at 7:30 in the morning
there was several inches of water in the basement, and I did not hear
the sump pump running. (Normally, there is a whoosh sound when the
water is being discharged.) Unfortunately, I had a business meeting
scheduled in the morning and was wearing a suit, so I couldn't go down
into the water and look for the source, and I couldn't check the water
flow in the corrugated piping. Because I didn't hear the sump pump
running, my best guess was that the sump pump had shut down. (As far
as I know, the electricity had not gone off earlier, and it was running
at the time I was in the house.)

I was able to return at about 1:30 in the afternoon, and the
sump pump was running, and the water had drained from the basement. My
best guess is that the water overwhelmed the sump pump. Is that
reasonable or are there other better explanations for what occurred.
One factor that leads me to guess that the sump pump was overwhelmed
was that a previous problem in one wall caused by a nearby downspout
that emptied into a blocked pipe did not reoccur. [I installed a new
gutter and directed the water to the front of the house and away from
the pipe that was on the side of the house] I would add that water was
not pooling near the house, but there was a significant puddle where
the water from the sump pump drained out from a corrugated pipe about
20 feet from the house. Any help would be appreciated.

You just had the pump too far underwater to hear it.

During TS Floyd, the power went out and my sump well was taking in a lot of
water and the sump well was nearly full by time I got home from work to deal
with it. Once I got the generator up and running and connected, I had a moment
of concern when I didn't hear the pump working. But, once it worked for awhile
and got the column of water above it more cleared away, I could definately hear
it.

What do you mean by "corrugated piping? Do you mean perforated?

Banty

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5222154.stm