Shop Products
Houzz Logo Print
last1earth

Crazy sump pump water spillage problem

last1earth
11 years ago

Hello, I'm looking for any ideas to help me fix a problem I have. A few months ago my basement flooded so we put in a new sump pump. This thing seems to constantly spew out water, even during a regular rainfall. The problem is it floods my front walkway.

The pipe is a 1.5" thing that just juts out of the side of the house. I put on a garden hose adapter on it for right now to segue some of the water to the backyard. I need a permanent solution.

I thought of using pvc pipes to take it 80ft to the street, but one guy told us the pitch/leveling is not good for that.

The force of the water is probably constricted when I put in the adaptor and so am worried it might damage the pump (true?). Any ideas on the cheap??Don't have much to spend.

Comments (4)

  • Elmer J Fudd
    11 years ago

    I think I'd be more concerned with a flooded basement and constant water flowing out of a sump than with water on the walkway.

    It looks like there are puddles alongside the house, does the walkway not slope away from the foundation?. Also, that blue container looks uphill from the corner of the house. Maybe the perspective in the photo is misleading. If not, maybe your issues could be resolved by dealing with what might be the source of the problem by improving drainage and diverting water away from the house?

  • brickeyee
    11 years ago

    "I thought of using pvc pipes to take it 80ft to the street, but one guy told us the pitch/leveling is not good for that. "

    You can get a pump large enough to drive the water uphill (within reason).

    The problem you may then face is protecting a partially filled pipe from freezing.

    The worst one I recall had to put a holding tank at the far end and another pump there to get water into the storm drains.

  • ionized_gw
    11 years ago

    You probably should have bigger hose on there.

    If you can't drain to the street, how is your waste water running into the sewerage system? Is there a surface water drain system at the street? Where I live, home owners area allowed to hook into that with a correct design preceding a permit. That might allow you to get enough elevation drop over the run. It has to, really,

    If that does not work, you will have to pump a little higher into a small tank and then let it run to the street. As already pointed out, you need to think about freezing for anything that will have standing water in it and is above ground. You should be able to design a system that does not include that feature. This approach does mean that you need to have a reservoir (tank) somewhere near the pump outlet. I would assume that would be most practical near the current outlet in the picture.

  • daveho
    11 years ago

    Seems nobody really addressed your intial observation. The pump is probably running so much because the new one has the float set lower. How far below the drain tile inlets does the float kick the pump on?

    For example, my sump crock has openings on the botton due to a high water table. If I would use a pump with an attached switch & put it in the very bottom of the pit, it would run all the time. Instead I have an external switch which is set to kick on the pump just below the drain tile openings. In this configuration, it only runs when we have extremely heavy rains.