Solid bottom in window well??

[LS6 Tommy]

I had a little water issue in my basement last Sunday when we had 4+" of rain in about 5 hours. I found a wet spot on the carpet and further investigation showed the soft wall panel was wet. I removed the panel and found water was seeping out from under the window frame. I looked out the window into the window well and couldn't see any standing water.

Yesterday I took the window well cover off to clean out the window well. leaves and debris were about level with the outside edge of the sill. I cleaned the debris and found dirt was just about 1" below the sill. I started to dig out the dirt with the idea of going well below the sill and then adding gravel. Well, that's a no-go. There's a solid bottom about 4" below the sill. No drain. It might even be sheet metal. The well itself is not attached to the bottom.

Anyway, from what I can tell from the water stains on the wall panel, we've probably only had water come in this way one other time since the basement was redone and it looked minor. I don't know if water ever came in there before we redid the basement because the basement was originally just furred & paneled, so if water came in there, I would never had seen it.

There was no cover on the window well when we moved in. I put one on about 22 years ago. I'm embarrassed to to admit I've only cleaned the window well once and even then, all I did was remove debris.

What's the general consensus? Now that the window well is cleaned out well below the sill, even though the bottom is solid, think I'll be OK?

I don't think adding a drain at this point is plausible.

Tommy

 

[77thor]

The bottom should allow drainage... I've never come across one with a solid bottom.
It wouldn't make sense to do that.

 

[LS6 Tommy]

Whatever it is, it's white. At first I thought it was concrete, but when you bang on it with the shovel it sound like it's pretty thin, just sitting on top of the substrate. A freind suggested drilling some drainage holes, or even trying to pull it out, but I'm concerned that the water will seep down the foundation and come it at the basement floor...


Tommy

 

[dfiler2]

How did the water get in with it covered? It sounds like one of the hard poly ones, does it have the rounded cover made to fit?

 

[LS6 Tommy]

Low grade phone pics:





Tommy

 

[larry4406]

Very odd with a floor. I've never seen that before either.

In new construction when we anticipate a window well might be needed, we run a vertical perforated standpipe with drainage filter sock up from the exterior drain tile prior to backfill. Then when the well is installed (corrugated half circle galvanized metal band type) we backfill with 12-16" of #57 stone keeping the sill about 4-6" of the stone and provide a screen end cap for the pipe.

 

[dfiler2]

They do make lots of different styles of covers, I think that would keep most of the rain out.

https://www.menards.com/main/doors-...1-c-6284.htm?tid=-3864209947067273802&ipos=20

 

[yeldogt]

You could install a clear solid cover on it ?

Had 4 galvanized window wells that I switched out about 20 years ago when I bought my office -- big brick cape from the late 40's.... I used the plastic type will the matching cover. I dug down and installed some loose stone under the wells so the water could not fill up and flow into the window.

If the foundation does not leak along the other parts of the wall -- why would it leak at the window well? ... getting the same amount of water. The problem with the wells is the surface is too close to the top of the foundation / bottom of window after years of junk.

They don't take very long to did out -- dig around and see what's up. People do strange things .. i have seen all kids of crazy stuff.

On new builds with permitter drains -- I normally bring a riser to the bottom and put a drain. It's a nice inspection port.

 

[LS6 Tommy]

I have a cover, but it's the type that has more of a pitched top and it goes directly against the siding. There would be a big gap between the well and the top of the window if I use a flat cover. I'm looking at new covers today, maybe I'll try a flat one and I'll make an extension that goes up under the edge of the siding over the outside of the flange on the tip of the cover.
The thing is, rain wasn't really getting in other than the little bit that dripped off the siding into the well. I think the water was coming in from the ground itself.

Tommy

 

[Mooky]

First house had a rectangular, concrete window well, solid bottom. Filled very quickly and leaked in through the windows. Tried grading, external drains.... Final solution was to drill through the foundation wall at the bottom of the well and install a drain line.

Ran along the walls, inside the basement, sloping to a utility sink (through a trap with a disconnect to cap off if the township found it during an inspection). Clean out and a screen at the wall penetration, filled the bottom of well with large gravel to keep junk out of the drain.

Fair amount of work, but cured it once and for all. Luckily I was able to borrow a large Hilti drill from work, made short work of drilling through 70 year old concrete.

 

[MikeF2316]

We had this happen way back when I was a kid. There was a huge rainstorm, and two window wells on the side of the house started filling up - filling up so the windows in the basement looked like the side of an aquarium. Fortunately, the basement walls weren't finished. My younger brother and I went out with buckets and baled. My father threw towels on the floor inside to deal with the little bit that had come in. After the storm, we noticed that the metal wells were not attached to the house, and there was just dirt below them, and the patio slab walkway had settled so that most slabs were tipped toward the house. So we dug out the wells, put in a couple of feet of gravel below them, sealed and bolted them to the house, put on covers and relaid the patio stones to promote water going the other way. We never had that problem again (Mother is still in that house).

Theoretically, it would be better if they had a drain pipe that took the water away, but there wasn't enough slope to do that easily. And since the builder had done such a poor job, we didn't know what we'd find down at the footer level.

 

[kbs2244]

Standard way around here is to plumb them to the foundation drain.
They use perfed black flex in a sock.
Back fill with dirt up to apx 12 inches from window bottom then pea gravel.