Damp Issues in Basement

Matty0682

Morning,

I bought my house recently and the survey showed high damp readings in the basement on the side of my house. The side garden is also slightly higher than ground floor hallway, so surveyor advised to reduce the side garden level (I’ll dig down 30cm) and improve water run off as any water hitting the side of the house is running into the side foundation, probability causing the basement damp. Basically at the side of the property there are wall remnants from the previously demolished adjacent property 60 years ago and no path was every laid.

So my question, what could I do to improve water run-off on the side? I was thinking about digging down (so that side garden is lower than hallway), then laying a patio slopping away from house with a drain gully on edge of property to take water away? I have asked a renderer for a quote to put a plinth at the bottom also.

Or do I lay contrate path? Or waterproof membrane with gravel on top? What would you all do?

Thanks

Matt

FreeBear

I would suggest a Zebcolm Trench and some underground drainage to remove the water to a soakaway.

As for cement - Really not recommended on a period property.

PrudentEllie

As I am disabled and thus can't do anything, my ideas are from watching lots of good tv programmes like 'Holmes on Homes'  over the years where he tackled the same problem - and from previously being practical rather long ago.  Mike Holmes and his team dug down, cleaned the house wall and either painted on some bituminous paint/put on some fabric thickly layered with a bituminous compound,  and put several layers of waterproof fabric against the building, and also then at the bottom of the trench laid some drainage fabric, and some stones then a perforated drainage pipe (note the instructions with it), which was carefully angled so the water drained away from the building, with graduated layers of stones and gravel above to improve drainage.  I've just looked at a very good video on YouTube with a man doing much the same thing 'Waterproof and French Drain a House Foundation'.  Lots of videos there.

I'd also include a good quality dehumidifier inside the house, if possible in the basement (there are ones these days which are better at colder temperatures, and separate ones which prefer to work at 16 or so degrees and above).    Hope this might help.  Also a reasonable temperature and humidity gauge for the basement and several rooms on the ground floor - I've found that really helpful in my fight against damp in this house.  If you leave damp you are in for a world of pain as wood rots, and rotten wood invites insects and mould in places you can't see, and everything goes downhill from there....I speak from experience, being trapped by my disability. 

Good luck - and well done on doing something about it.

Green_hopeful

You need to be careful about damp in older houses. It is easy to spend a lot of money and make it worse. Damp meters are for wood not walls so you can’t use them for measuring damp in walls. But it sounds like you do have an issue. There is a very knowledgeable Facebook group that can help. https://www.facebook.com/groups/youroldhouseuk/ You will need to join but they know their stuff and could save you a lot of bother. 

Doozergirl

A basement is supposed to be damp, it's what you'd expect from something underground.  Why would high damp readings be a problem down there?  

You do need through-ventilation in the form of air bricks to the cellar - it goes without saying that your ground level does need to be lower than the floor and joists so you can get your air bricks in and not subjecting the timbers to dampness.  

Is the hallway suspended timber?  

DO NOT go slapping bitumen on the house, just return it to the way it was built. Some digging is in order.  

 Can you see airbricks inside the cellar? Have they been covered outside?