Shared Knowledge

 

“Just Say ‘No’ to a Drywell”

 

26 September 2005

 

 

 

 

Doubt most people even know what a drywell is and perhaps they are not installed with homes built today but if you are building a new house or having a house built for you or are buying an older home and the question or subject of a drywell comes up, do yourself a favor and just say ‘No’.

 

In my case, I ran across a drywell in a house I owned, which had a below grade, walkout basement. In the concrete of the basin of the stairs leading out of the basement was a drain, which instead of it being tied into the sewer system of the house, was run out to what is known as a drywell.

 

A drywell, is the pit dug into the ground, lined in my case with cinderblocks, which supposedly will allow any water poured into it to slowly drain away into the surrounding soil. I am not sure, in my case, if the location of the drywell was wrong or the drywell was not constructed deep enough or large enough for what, but for years and years, when it rained heavily, water would actually come up the walkout basement drain and fill the basin until it overflowed into our basement. The first time it did this, we did not have a clue where all the water came from in our basement as it was inches deep and we had not been told when we bought the house that it flooded during heavy rains. After I finally determined that water was coming in the walkout basement door, I ran a drain cleaner wire down the drain, thinking it was clogged up. Next time it rained heavily, same thing. Drain cleaners poured down the drain: same thing. Finally, through a neighbor or someone, I learned that most of the houses in our neighbor, which had a below grade walkout basement, had a drywell associated with the drain in the stairs basin. Drywell?

 

Finally, after years of always having to watch the walkout basement drain for signs it was going to flood, I begin digging in the yard to locate the position of the drywell. After digging around for some time, I finally came across several cinderblocks, which turned out to be the top cover of the beehive-shaped drywell. The drywell was full of dirt! No wonder it was not working. So, I set about digging all the dirt out of it, then replacing the cover and thought the problem was solved and it actually was for a year or so and then the drain began backing up again! What?

 

Since I now knew where the drywell was located in the yard, it did not take me long to get the cinderblock cover off and looking in, the drywell was full of dirt again! Water from the surrounding soil was carrying dirt into the drywell in the form of silt and depositing it there. In my case, a drywell was never going to work and so I began the long slow process of digging a trench away from the drywell, 5 feet down at the start, down the grade of my yard until it almost reached the sidewalk. I then tied a plastic 4-inch flexible pipe to my walkout basement drainpipe and ran my plastic pipe down the trench I had dug in the yard. I then filled the drywell up with dirt and closed up the trench. No more drywell for me.

 

Once I actually went to all the trouble of getting rain water to flow down the walkout stairs drain down my graded plastic pipe, I never had any more problems with water getting into my basement.

 

Perhaps a drywell works in certain locations and situations but simply tying a walkout stairs drain to the sewer system makes so much more sense.