On Tue, 30 Apr 2013 09:34:59 -0700 (PDT), "
wrote:

On Apr 30, 11:19*am, bob haller wrote:
On Apr 30, 10:40*am, micky wrote:





On Tue, 30 Apr 2013 07:10:26 -0700 (PDT), "

wrote:
On Apr 29, 8:57*pm, micky wrote:
On Mon, 29 Apr 2013 11:14:40 -0400, micky
wrote:

If most of the roof water goes to the sump pump, I'm
suprised it can even handle it during a downpour.

I came home one day and found my sump pump runing full blast and still
the basement floor was flooded. Just a little bit but the entire floor
and not deep because all the boxes on the floor had sucked up lots of
water. * * *Much** of the water from my downspouts goes indirectly
into my sump pump but it takes hours or days to get there. *It's not
piped direct ly into the sump pump, like Craig's is.. **And much of
the water from the roof and downspouts seeps to the edge of my
property and into the stream bed on two sides of my house.

I was thinking about what I wrote here. * It probably doesn't take
days for water, on top of the current water table, to get from the
backt of the house to the front.

What I do, and the OP can do, is look at the water level in the sump
when it's not raining. * *I always have a little water, but it's
almost 2 feet below the basement floor.

Then look when and after it's been raining. * *My sump pump goes on
and t hen stops for 5 minutes, or more or less. * *That one time it
was runnning constantly, and even then that might have been enough to
keep up with the water if the water input had been less. * *I've had
flooded basements for various reasons, and the water level never gets
above 1/8", and only once has it gotten out of the laundry room. *I
glued a piece of wood in the doorway, so it won't get out of the
laundry room again, but it is a big sign when I sell the house that
I've had flooding, even if I've solved all the reasons it flooded. Oh,
well.

But none of this helps when there is a power failure, or pump failure,
or you're out of town for a long time and had forgotten to pay the
electric bill so you were behind before you left,l and they disconnect
your electricity.

IIRC, they make a pump of the same configuration that's bigger than
what I have 1/2HP instead of 1/3, or 1/3 instead of 1/4. *I keep
meaning to replace mine. * I also keep looking for a basepump, but
I've decided after years that all of the ones on Ebay will be almost
as expensive as new.

I wonder how much of the roof water goes into his basement
sump pit? *If it's all of it or most of it, I'm surprised that he
hasn't
had a flood even with the pump running. * It depends on his roof
area and the rain rate. *But just looking at a gutter downspout
from any reasonable size roof, during a heavy downpour, it's
a hell of a lot of water. *And you're gonna pump all that plus
some ground water too, througha 1 1/2" pipe?
As Bart Simpson would say, Ahye Karumba!

Sometimes you have to use a sump pump for some rainwater as
a last resort because of geography. *But in his case, he has
a nice sloping backyard going down to a pond.... *In the house
I grew up in, we had a gravity drain that went several hundred
feet down to the flood plain of a creek. *It was more work, more
install cost, etc, but far more reliable than a sump pump. *And
our roof water didn't go into it....

Absolutely. *He should fix this.

Arnie, start he

gravity drain to daylight is always a better choice, even if its a
overflow drain.

years ago we had a hurricane come thru pittsburgh, it knocked out
power for many, including those using sump pumps.

one neighbor prevented a flood by bucket bailing for 24 hours. I
suggested a siphon since his home sits well over the street level...

Is there a practical upper limit to the diameter of a siphon?

Is there a way to make a siphon of any diameter start automatically
when water level gets high enough, or do you have to be there to start
it?

I've used a small diameter garden hose as a siphon, but I'm not sure I
could get a bigger diameter to work.

When I was in college, our apartment bathroom had separate hot and
cold faucets, and the hot water was too hot to use. They sold mixers
at the hardware store, but because the two faucets were "pigeon toed",
the mixer wouldn't stay on. I twisted each faucet a little to make
them closer to straight, especially the cold water. A few days
later, the cold water started to leak under the sink.

Put a bucket under the leak, but what to do when the bucket filled up
an hour later. I could empty it but what about night time? I put
the waste basket upside down and put the bucket on it, then some
rubber tubing to make a siphon towards the toilet. A big soda straw
to go the last 8 inches, under the seat.

Not only did it siphon water out of the bucket, it turned out to be
self-regulating, and would siphon faster when the bucket was more
nearly full, and slower when it was more nearly empty. So it required
no attention at all and siphoned for 5 days until the plumber came.

Oh, I put a washcloth along the path of the leak so we did't have to
listen to that either.

for unknown reasons he refused to consider a gravity drain till the
next storm, he and his family were on vacation, the flood ruined his
basement that had just been remodeled, after that I noted digging had
occured, when I asked him about it he wasnt happy and swore under his
breathe......

kinda like the neighbor who mounted his dish to the chimney, I told
that fellow I was a dish dealer and the chimne was a poor choice, the
pan acts like a sail and can bring down a chimney.... he said antennas
always go on the chimney....

within a month a big storm came thru and took out his chimney the
falling bricks damaged his deck and deck stuff..

his dish went on his deck where it should of gone from day one- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Some people just have to learn the hard way....

Reminds me of the time I was living in a condo that was new
construction. Sump pumps were "optional" even though
there is no question they were needed. Some time after
closing I discovered that the discharge pipe from mine
ended just short of the sidewalk outside, buried in the soil,
instead of continuing another 25 ft over to a swale.

So, no worry, it's part of the outside and the condo assoc.
problem, not mine. So, they were fixing it. My previous
digging had established that not only was mine going
nowhere, so was the one from my neighbor in the
adjoining unit. They were built like mirror images, so
his pump was near mine.

So, I show him how his ends underground in the dirt.
He's like, "Isn't it supposed to be like that? " You'd
have to be a bird brain to think that you can just end
a pipe a foot underground and pump volumes of water
out. But I couldn't get the point across and instead of
having his taken care of while they were doing mine,
he just went on his merry way. Don't know if the
basement ever flooded, but I would bet it did.

-- End here.