CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

[wallace123456]

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I am getting ready to re-do the downstairs bedroom. It is about 4' below grade in depth. The walls are concrete brick and the house is about 30 years old.

I am considering using some type of water-proofing paint on the walls but have read mixed reviews and comments on them.

Anyone here use that type of paint in there basement?

Thanks.

wallace

[WanMan]

Being a pessimist I find it difficult to find products like Dry-Lock really capable of 'proofing' anything. Its all about the pressure a well-saturated ground can apply to a porous mason wall. When you exposed the wall, were there signs of moisture? Are there utilities coming through that wall (sewer main, etc.)?

You may want to try Fine Home Building forums and see what they have to say.

[Jester]

I, as a contractor agree with Wanman. The drylock paints are the best for turning a 100 year old Chicago basement/foundation in to an attractive/usable space. If you have a water problem it is NOT going to fix it. at best it will stop the occasional leak from the rare water event. it isn't going to stop a flood, but in my mind, if it is a 5% improvement on water security then I take it. Just don't over estimate its usefulness. Plus its really thick and goes on the rough block/concrete real nice with a big brush.

Inconclusive, use it if you want white walls. I don't think it can be tinted. If not white or willing to paint twice go for it.

any other questions about your basement fell free to ask me, I have built/remodeled quite a few basements and home theaters.

Scott

[WanMan]

Scott, a contractor? <shaking head>

I spent the first 15 months living in my home wrestling with the builder to regrade the clay that came within the foundation. Hairline cracks in the poured concrete walls allowed rain water to carry silt into the basement thanks to poor grading and the lack of a french drain. And in this area, it should have been done due to the thin soil depth (with granite underneath).

Anyway, regrading did the trick, which I follow-ed up with hydraulic cement patches to the hairline cracks. These cracks resulted from settling. Tract building around me is based on pouring concrete walls onto one-week old footings. And then a week later stick-building onto those poured concrete walls. So much for allowing anything to cure.

Anyway, during those 15-months I had brief considered Drylok, but this seemed more of a product resold under advertising to prey on those in desperate situations. While I never employed the product (regrading worked), I am glad I didn't waste money due to desperate wants.

I think folks can be best served by identifying where water is most likely to come into string hydrostatic pressure with the foundation, and then designing a method for moving that water away from the foundation. For instance, the gutter down-pipes on the back of my home are buried and move the water away to near county storm drains on my property.

Next week the gutter down-pipes will be reinstalled to move drained waters from the front-center of the home to the outer corners. This is due to the fact the the front-center location where two down-pipes are draining onto thin soil layers where the home's sewer exits. That polymer seal between the poured concrete wall and the PVC sewer main will fail over time and I do not need to allow hydrostatic acceleration of that future failure.

Wallace, what kind of topography is your home located within? I remember about five years ago someone paid to have a custom home built, cost him a lot of money, and the grade of the terrain was such to move water toward the home, which like my home have no french drain system, or any kind of system to remove moving water away from the home. Classic nature of builders in the North Georgia area.

[JustGreg]

I'm with Wan on this too...a little research shows facia coatings to be 'mildly' effective at best. More of a placebo affect for the homeowner than anything else.

I too have a 30-ish year old home with a foundation problem. I bought the house 10 years ago and even while looking at it was amazed nobody had ever finished the basement except for the building of a full bath. Good thing too as there's a crack in the foundation outside the theater that runs slab to foundation top. Somebody had covered it with hydraulic concrete and painted over it with a very heavy epoxy paint (the entire foundation was coated with this). What a bitch it was to chip all of that off! I suspect the crack is from a cold pour and not just caused by settling due to the difference in concrete texture on each side of the crack.

I bought a DIY injection kit to fix it. I've yet to get around to it as it doesn't always leak, rather it only leaks like it did on Christmas day when it's been cold enough long enough for the frost layer to make it down a couple feet and then it either rains or warms up enough for snowmelt. Kind of Perfect Storm scenario if you will. Normally the water goes to the bottom of the foundation and under the slab where it's picked up by the French drain and then to the sump pump OR the water rides on the surface and away from the house if it rains when the ground is frozen down below the foundation.
Check it out here:

http://www.basementandcrawlspaceproducts.com/product.asp?catID=101&subCatID=94

I haven't repaired mine yet so can't say how effective it is because I wanted to 'catch' the seepage in the act. Don't ask me why; I just wanted to see what part of the crack it was coming from before I used the kit. I better use it soon as I'm not sure if there's a shelf life for the components.

Good luck.

[ecrabb]

I'll offer a counterpoint to everybody jumping on the "Drylok is worthless" bandwagon.

If you have a water problem, yes - Drylok is not going to solve it. If, on the other hand, you have a humidity problem in your basement, then Drylok is certainly one possible solution.

It sounds like Wallace's basement foundation is CMU - concrete masonry unit. If it's not properly sealed on the outside, being a porous cementitious product, CMU will wick moisture from the surrounding soil, and if exposed, dry to the interior. In that situation, Drylock absolutely would help to lower the humidity level of the basement interior.

Now, if you're going to finish the walls and cover them, then that's a much deeper subject. In that case, the Drylok still isn't worthless, but would be one part of an overall solution. Most important, you'll need to have a water-proofing solution in place outside the foundation.

SC

[tri_joel]

[ecrabb]

Agreed, Joel. But, since most people are unwilling to spend the money or time to excavate the entire foundation outside their homes to do the exterior waterproofing right...

If the exterior hasn't been damp-proofed or waterproofed (or the damp-proofing/waterproofing is functionally gone), then you're not technically "trapping" moisture; you're just going to put the entire wall at the same humidity/moisture level as the surrounding soil. Like I said, it won't work if you have a water problem.

Ideally, nobody would even finish a basement until the foundation was very well waterproofed. By "waterproofed", I don't mean spray-on moisture-proofing, either... I mean a two-layer system like DELTA with a self-adhesive membrane to completely seal and damp-proof the concrete, and a second drain layer to waterproof and eliminate the hydrostatic pressure on the concrete. Next time I build a house, that's how I will do the basement foundation exterior.

SC

[wallace123456]

[WanMan]

[ecrabb]