Installing a sump pump....

[sachbvn]

So, how difficult would you guys rate installing a sump pump?

Without going into pages and pages of instructions - any advice you can give? What are possible concerns to be aware of?

The basement floor is concrete so we'd probably have to rent a concrete saw.


Just curious - at this point it's quite a ways away....ground is waaayyyyy to wet to be breaking up any concrete - we'd pry having flowing water shooting up through the hole!


Thanks,
Zac

[TDHofstetter]

Not a hard job at all. Yep, you'll want either a concrete saw or a hammerdrill. You can drill a series of holes to outline the sump hole, then break out the middle with a sledgehammer. Been there, to install a floor safe. Then, when you pour the sump box (got no bottom in it), you'll pour it clear up to floor level & smooth it out to make it seamless.

Once the sump hole's in, it's time to rig the pump. It's just a submersible drop-in pump, got flexible plastic tubing that connects to the rigid plastic pipe that carries the water out of the house & as far away downhill as you can get it. Some folks have flexible hose on the outside, too, the kind that automatically rolls itself back to the house when there's no water in it. Like the type sometimes used on rain gutters (eavestroughs).

Actually, you'd have nearly all the plumbing done before you ever punch that hole through the floor. You'll finish it up while the concrete's curing.

Be prepared to run into rocks or rebar or remesh when you open that hole... it'll happen someplace or other. It's OK, just be aware that you'll run into something you don't like. You'll just make the hole a little bigger, that's all... and wind up pouring more 'crete in to make the sump walls.

[art3427]

I did this several years ago. All I did was buy a 30 gallon garbage can, drill it full of 3/4" holes at the bottom. I dug a hole big enough to get about 6-8" of gravel under and around the garbage can. I set the pump in the bottom of the can and wired & plumbed as necessary. No concrete involved. Worked perfectly.

art

[sachbvn]

Tim - I didn't know that the walls of the hole needed to be concreted - not to sound stupid - is this just a "good idea" or is it a MUST?

This is actually for my parents, and we would certainly be seeking the advice of someone who knows exactly what they are doing - I just thought I'd get a head start and start checking on here.



Zac

[woodmannie]

They make a can for them. Lowe's has em. We used to use a 5 gal bucket. Walls dont need to be crete, dut it's easy to do when ya patch the floor.
If ya use a saw, rent one that has a vac to it. And use their vac. It's a special system that beats the filter clean as it sucks the dust. It'll get about 90% of the dust. Saw the sides then make an X corner to corner. This helps when ya whack it with the sledge.
Ya still might need a boogie picker(hammerdrill) to chip out the edges.

Tom

[TDHofstetter]

Mar 14, 2010 21:18:39 GMT -6 sachbvn said:

Tim - I didn't know that the walls of the hole needed to be concreted - not to sound stupid - is this just a "good idea" or is it a MUST?

This is actually for my parents, and we would certainly be seeking the advice of someone who knows exactly what they are doing - I just thought I'd get a head start and start checking on here.

Zac

There really needs to be SOMETHING for sump walls or it'll collapse & trap the pump inside. The walls can be nearly anything, though - concrete or steel or even heavy plastic would do the job. PT lumber. Heavy galvanized sheep fence with stainless screen wrapped around it. Anything to keep it from collapsing. Ya' gotta' pull the pump once in a long while to work on it, and ya' can't do it if the sump has collapsed & you're ankle-deep in stormwater...

What you're doing is making a tiny well inside the basement, and pumping it out every time it fills up. There needs to be some way for the water to get into it, hence leaving the bottom open or punching holes in the bottom & walls.

EDIT: ...WHICH brings up something else to consider. Have them also get a small, cheap submersible pump that can be used with a garden hose. Have 'em tuck it away safe somewhere. SOMEDAY it'll be handy. Nothin' like stormwater coming in ankle-deep & rising three inches per hour and the sump pump dead and every hardware store within two hundred miles jammed with a panic of OTHER PEOPLE trying to buy sump pumps!

[sachbvn]

Tim - the plan was to put a HEAVY duty plastic barrel in the hole, or part of the barrel anyways - I'm not sure how thick it is, it's pretty thick, I'm pretty sure at one time something like chemicals must have come in it. From what you described, I think this would be perfect.

I have no idea if this is something we will do this summer or not..... I'm pretty sure my dad is tired of sucking up water with shop vacs several times a year. Water comes up through the floor in hairline cracks..... you don't even see the cracks really - but water sure finds em! I think we've probably shop vaced.....hmm..... 50 gallons or more since all the snow melted and we got a bunch of rain.


Zac

[TDHofstetter]

Wow!

Better than one of Marie's brothers, over near Boston... he's got six feet of groundwater in his basement right now.

It's OK - he's losing the house to the mortgage company.

[sachbvn]

Tim - as awful as all that water is - I feel worse for the issue with the mortgage company. Doesn't matter who it is happening to, it makes me feel for them - people I don't know, doesn't matter - it's got to be an awful place to be.

Six feet of water? Ouch! At least it's ground water and not straight sewage or something!

Zac

[TDHofstetter]

Yeah, it really does suck that it's happening, and in a house he's actually occupying at the moment, too. We've advised him to contact the mortgage company & ask what they intend to do about it...

[rrich]

As everyone has said, the sump needs to have walls to prevent the soil, etc. from caving into the hole.

Now the really important stuff.

Install the anti back flow valve as close as possible to the top of the pump outlet. If you don't the gurgles will drive you nuts.

Make sure that the out flow pipe delivers the water from the sump pump to a point where the water won't get beck into the basement. (No sense pumping that water more than once.)

DAMHIKT

[Leo Voisine]

I first traced the bottom of a bucket on the cement floor

Then drilled a series of 1/4 holes with a hammer drill --- oh, and make sure the drill is rotating in the correct direction.

Sledge hammer out the concrete Argh

Scoop out the gravel in the hole.

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you should not do what I did as follows.

Place pump on the remaining gravel

You really should put the pump inside some protective pail.
Though, I have not had any problem, and the water is clean and clear.

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Hook up plumbing - 1-1/3 or 1-1/2 plastic piping to move a lot of water outside

BE SURE to use a check valve

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On the outside of the house - I have an old 1-1/2 hose to move the water away from the house. I hook that up when I need it - which is not at all often.

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My pump was running on and off all last night --- last time it ran was 2004/2005???

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It's really not at all hard to do

[TDHofstetter]

Boy, I'm sure glad you guys spoke up about the check valve - that's CRITICAL, and IMPORTANT to keep it as near the pump as possible. Otherwise, the pump fills all that pipe headed out of the house, shuts off, and then the pipe backdrains into the pit again & turns the pump back on.

Leo - surely your pump ran in the spring of 2007, right? That monstrous rainstorm you folks got along the coast?

[sachbvn]

Very good point on the check valve!! Is that something that just comes with the sump pump kit or what?

I'm thinking we will have hose run along the outside of our house, along the foundation....it would be fairly inconspicuous - at the corner of the house maybe have some of the hose coiled up - when the pump needs to run, stretch the hose a little further past the house. It'll be pretty obvious when it will need to run.

Thanks!

Oh - so.... is the consensus use a hammer drill and "pressure holes" and smack it with a sledge hammer - or just rent a concrete saw?? I don't care - in fact I suggested the drill thing to my dad before I even posted on here...... we was unsure of the results. Not even sure how much a saw would run us in these parts.

Thanks,
Zac

[TDHofstetter]

The drill's a bunch cheaper and a LOT less dusty. That's how I'd get after it. No need to make neat clean hole sides...

[Leo Voisine]

Mar 16, 2010 8:10:04 GMT -6 TDHofstetter said:

Boy, I'm sure glad you guys spoke up about the check valve - that's CRITICAL, and IMPORTANT to keep it as near the pump as possible. Otherwise, the pump fills all that pipe headed out of the house, shuts off, and then the pipe backdrains into the pit again & turns the pump back on.

Leo - surely your pump ran in the spring of 2007, right? That monstrous rainstorm you folks got along the coast?

Maybe - but it would have had to be days of heavy rain to get any water in my sump.

I only get it once every few years or so.

[TDHofstetter]

That storm in spring '07 was a killer... tens of thousands of people all trying to buy pumps & wet-dry shopvacs & anything else that'd pick up water.

[deathwish]

As mentioned, be sure to line the hole with something, even if it is something improvised. Improperly placed, and without a barrier of some sort, the pump can undermine a foundation slowly and unseen until it's too late. If you look in the aisle of the big box that has all the black 4" hose/pipe and perforated hose/pipe, you'll find a collector box that can be buried flush with the floor and have the lid bolted on. It will have knockout inlets for the 4" perf pipe, should you want to do the french drain.

That said . . .

My dad had a system professionally installed a couple years back, two pumps each with battery backup and a full french drain all around the foundation. Not a drop in the basement since. Cost him some pretty pennies, but he says it was worth every one of them, and also that he'll more than get that money back when he sells.

[autobodyman]

I live on a bedrock hill, it varies but not very deep to bedrock. It's basically a hill that slopes down. First year I decided to turn our basement "gargage" into an office for my wife we had spring run off that shot water giseres threw the cracks in the old concrete floor. Follows the cracks in the bedrock.

I used my old circular saw with a concrete blade to cut a 24" square threw the 3-1/2" concrete, dug down till I hit solid bedrock (only about 2 feet below the floor) got some 18" plastic pipe, cut grooves in the pipe with a circular saw, set that to the bottom of the hole back filled outside the pipe with 1" gravel then poured 3 inches of concrete in the bottom of the hole. Dropped in a 1/2 horse sump pump with a float switch and check valve, then poured some more concrete around the outer edge of the pipe 1/4" lower than the surrounding floor. Got a 1/4" thick metal plate and glued carpeting to match the rest of the floor and dropped over the top. It's run a couple of Springs but never got water to floor level again.

~mike

[TDHofstetter]

Apr 2, 2010 13:21:18 GMT -6 autobodyman said:

I used my old circular saw with a concrete blade to cut a 24" square threw the 3-1/2" concrete...

That's NASTY, isn't it? I recall doing something very similar once - the dust cloud was INCREDIBLE.