How to Water­proof a Base­ment in Chicago

Jun 21, 2012 • By Matthew Stock.

Chica­go. City of the Big Shoul­ders. Hog Butch­er for the World. Land of Leaky Basements.

OK, so there’s not much hog-butcher­ing going on in town since the Stock­yards shut down, but the oth­er two descrip­tions are still valid. I’ll let you judge the big shoul­ders for your­self but I can tell you that there are plen­ty of wet, leaky base­ments in the near­ly 500,000 homes in Chica­go, not to men­tion the hun­dreds of thou­sands more in the suburbs.

In an ear­li­er blog, I wrote about some of the unique con­di­tions that impact base­ment water­proof­ing in Chica­go homes, such as:

• Poured con­crete foundations
• Com­bined sew­er system
• Close prox­im­i­ty of hous­es with pave­ment between them
• Exte­ri­or stairwells

All of these fac­tors help deter­mine how a base­ment water­proof­ing com­pa­ny should approach the repair of wet base­ments in Chicago.

For exam­ple, base­ment water seep­age through a poured con­crete foun­da­tion can come from sev­er­al sources:

• Cracks in the wall may be caused by over-sat­u­rat­ed, shift­ing soil out­side the foundation
• Seep­age through the floor or cove joint (where wall and floor meet) may be caused by the hydro­sta­t­ic pres­sure of ground water
• Clogged win­dow well drains and/​or leaky win­dows may allow water infiltration
• Grad­ing prob­lems may allow water to seep in over the top of the foundation

A base­ment water­proof­ing com­pa­ny expe­ri­enced in solv­ing these prob­lems should take these approaches:

• Inject wall cracks with expand­ing ure­thane to ensure that the cracks are filled all the way to exte­ri­or soil, the most com­mon way to stop leaks permanently.
• Install inte­ri­or drain tile next to the foot­ing to col­lect and car­ry off ground water before it can seep into the basement.
• Repair or replace failed win­dow well drains and replace old, rust­ing win­dows to stop leaks
• Advise home­own­er on prop­er grad­ing and/​or install exte­ri­or water­proof­ing mem­brane to cov­er the joint where the home sits on the foundation 

For an old­er home with a brick, stone, tele­phone tile or con­crete block foun­da­tion, cracked mor­tar joints are a com­mon source of base­ment seep­age and may require exca­va­tion of the exte­ri­or foun­da­tion wall, appli­ca­tion of water­proof­ing mem­brane and instal­la­tion of exte­ri­or drain tile and drainage board

Of course, there are sim­pler fix­es to sim­pler prob­lems that may also have a seri­ous impact on keep­ing water out of a Chica­go basement.

• Make sure gut­ters are clean and in good repair to cap­ture water runoff from your roof that might oth­er­wise end up seep­ing into your basement.
• If your down­spouts are dis­charg­ing right next to the foun­da­tion, you’re con­tribut­ing to soil con­di­tions that can cause cracks in your foun­da­tion walls. Extend your down­spouts (under­ground for the clean­est appear­ance) at least ten feet away from the foundation.
• Bro­ken or miss­ing win­dow well cov­ers can be eas­i­ly and eco­nom­i­cal­ly replaced and will pre­vent debris from clog­ging drains and sub­se­quent flood­ing of the win­dow wells.

No mat­ter what the prob­lem or its rem­e­dy, water­proof­ing a Chica­go base­ment requires a Chica­go base­ment water­proof­ing com­pa­ny, one that knows its way around the Land of Leaky Base­ments. U.S. Water­proof­ing was found­ed in a garage on Chicago’s North Side in 1957 and has served more than 300,000 sat­is­fied cus­tomers since. Just ask; we’re hap­py to help.

Tags: basement waterproofing facts, u.s. waterproofing, chicago basement waterproofing, basement waterproofing chicago

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