Dehumidifier in Basement Question

[marko]

Is it a concrete foundation? It will be cured in a month but could still give off moisture for a year or so.

Yes. Concrete walls and floors.

 

[W2R]

I think if you dug a basement in New Orleans, you would have a swimming pool.

Absolutely, which is why we don't have them. Even a hole dug to plant a rose bush will fill with water before it's finished. And I remember after one tropical storm, when bodies from Lafayette cemetary (in New Orleans) were recovered floating down the street. This is why we usually bury above ground in tombs or mausoleums.

 

[Sunset]

Our new to us cabin in the Colorado mountains has a basement. Part of it is concrete floored the other half is just dirt and is open for about 10' to the other half. Never having a basement before (I'm from south Louisiana also) I just looked at my Ambient sensor and humidity is 61%. That's just above what our house in Louisiana averages inside with AC running. Hard to get it much lower than that.
Anyway it doesn't seem damp to me and there is no mold that I can see. But I'm on a slope so would think any moisture would not accumulate much.

That is strange to me. I've seen a crawlspace without a poured floor, but not part of a basement.
Did you request this ?
Any photo to show us ?

 

[travelover]

That is strange to me. I've seen a crawlspace without a poured floor, but not part of a basement.
Did you request this ?
Any photo to show us ?

My old (1940s) house in Michigan was built this way. I had to cover the dirt floor with plastic that extended up the walls to the outside dirt level.

 

[Jerry1]

My old (1940s) house in Michigan was built this way. I had to cover the dirt floor with plastic that extended up the walls to the outside dirt level.

Yes, I’ve seen this before. Kind of a cross between a basement and a crawl space.

 

[Walt34]

Good heavens! Basements sound like a lot of work. They are rare here in New Orleans, and after reading this thread I'm glad that neither Frank nor I have one.

Generally they're really not a lot of work. I've never lived in a house that did not have a basement and I'd wonder where people put all the "stuff" that I store there. Not having a basement would be a huge "minus sign" for me when house-hunting.

That said, I've never had to deal with severe water problems in a basement either, and that can be nightmarish. I've seen homes built where no home should ever have been built because of water issues but that's the builder's fault for being greedy.

The only time I had to deal with a basement water infiltration issue was at my mother's house, and that I fixed with one or two bags of topsoil and a handful of grass seed. The ground had settled a bit and left a bit of a depression that rainwater gathered in and that seeped into the basement through the cinder block wall. Merely filling the depression so the water ran elsewhere took care of it.

I daresay that one of those "basement water leak contractors" would have charged five figures to do much the same thing.

 

[Jerry1]

Basements are nice because they allow you to put your mechanicals down there. I’m currently in my first house with no basement (slab). I actually like everything about it except there’s no where to go when there’s a tornado warning. I like having a ranch on a slab due to no steps at all in the house. There’s not even a step into the door except the one from the garage into the family room. The mechanicals are in a closet in the garage, which works. However, plumbing is run under the slab so I’m not sure how’d I’d fix anything if it went bad. All the electrical and HVAC is run in the attic. Not too bad except I need to insulate the attic and I don’t like the idea of covering everything up with a couple feet of cellulose.

 

[joesxm3]

Timely thread.

I just discovered an inch of water coming out of my sump. The pump seems to have gotten messed up. Hopefully by the gallon bottle I put in their to harvest distilled water from my dehumidifier.

Once I removed the bottle it seems to run again. Hate to have to swap in the spare tonight. Glad I have the dehumidifier to help dry up the floor.

In other news, the dehumidifier I put in the crawl space under my den yesterday stopped working. The bucket was full. Seems that the hose is not working correctly.

All said I run up to six dehumidifier in the summer. Three full time and three on demand. Not counting the free standing air conditioner on my first level.

Hate to see the electric bill this summer.

 

[Walt34]

In other news, the dehumidifier I put in the crawl space under my den yesterday stopped working. The bucket was full. Seems that the hose is not working correctly.

Eons ago when I worked on dehumidifiers a very common cause of this was dirt/dust building up in the drain pan of the dehumidifier or the drain hose. First try taking off the drain hose and blowing it out with compressed air if you have that available, if not take the hose to a hose bib and blow it out with water. If the clog is in the hose it'll be obvious when it comes out.

If the clog is in the drain pan of the dehumidifier that can be more of a pain to get to. You have to take the cover off the machine and on some of the newer ones with lots of plastic that can be a pain.

 

[joesxm3]

Thanks. I will do that tomorrow. It was working fine when I brought it in last fall and was in the garage all winter. Maybe a bug nest in the hose.

The hose was not quite in a gravity fed position. Today when he emptied the bucket I smoothed the hose out to make a nice sloping flow.

Not fond of crawling into the crawl space through the tiny opening.

 

[Winemaker]

My basement is finished and the front wall is my wine cellar. The walls are insulated then drywalled, and I do have an AC vent but no return. My "cubby hole" is a separate area that is under my front porch but not insulated/finished, and we have to keep "moisture sucker uppers" in there, as every time the garage opens, another blast of humid SW PA air swings in. If we don't, we will get mildew/mold.
Conversely in the winter, I have to keep moistened towels, small water feature as the dry winter air will increase the evaporation of wine out of my barrels and bottles. I try to keep humidity at 50% in winter, but it is hard. I humidifer would be too much.

 

[Bamaman]

Places like Chicago and Detroit have basements built on non-basement lots. Sump pumps are required to suck the water out from behind the walls.

Where we live, basements are on lots with slope to them. Most older homes are concrete blocks, where I notice all the new homes are having fully poured concrete foundations that are under ground. It's the only way to go.

My lake house has a under grade concrete block foundation, and I have to run a dehumidifier. Westinghouse makes a nice one. You can also pipe them into a drain system to where you don't have to haul heavy drain trays to the sink. And they work well.

 

[Walt34]

The hose was not quite in a gravity fed position.

That will do it. Any place the water "pools" in a low spot in the hose is where the dirt will collect and eventually clog the hose.

 

[travelover]

Yes, I’ve seen this before. Kind of a cross between a basement and a crawl space.

Oddly, at least in Michigan, this half dirt half concrete floor is called a "Michigan basement".

 

[DaveInMi]

We coated our basement floor with an epoxy sealer. I'm addition to looking really nice, it acts as a drylock. The concrete walls were sealed with a masonry drylock.

 

[W2R]

Basements are nice because they allow you to put your mechanicals down there. I’m currently in my first house with no basement (slab). I actually like everything about it except there’s no where to go when there’s a tornado warning. I like having a ranch on a slab due to no steps at all in the house. There’s not even a step into the door except the one from the garage into the family room. The mechanicals are in a closet in the garage, which works. However, plumbing is run under the slab so I’m not sure how’d I’d fix anything if it went bad. All the electrical and HVAC is run in the attic. Not too bad except I need to insulate the attic and I don’t like the idea of covering everything up with a couple feet of cellulose.

In a tornado warning, they tell us to go to a central room with no windows. Often that's the bathroom, or a hall closet.

As for what to do when your plumbing goes bad, if all else fails then you call the plumbing company. They come out and drill a tunnel under your slab, and some poor guy crawls under there and fixes it. Then they fill it back in. Not cheap!. When I bought my present house, the under-slab plumbing all had to be replaced. It cost the sellers $23K (or was it $28K? I forgot).

I still prefer a ranch house on a slab! As I grow older, it's nice to have no stairs to deal with.

 

[Sunset]

..

I just discovered an inch of water coming out of my sump. The pump seems to have gotten messed up. Hopefully by the gallon bottle I put in their to harvest distilled water from my dehumidifier.

.....

A dehumidifier doesn't produce distilled water, it may seem similar but it's not. For example it will contain pathogens in it. Distilling will kill the pathogens as the water is first boiled.

Doesn't matter as long as you don't use it for things that require "pure clean" water.

 

[Koolau]

Our old townhouse was built into a hillside and the "basement" was dirt floor except a concrete pad for water heater. It was quite humid and required a dehumidifier half the year (rainy season). Our electricity was quite expensive and we had to go to the basement twice a day to keep up with the water reservoir. BUT then we very carefully covered the dirt with a heavy tarp. We fastened it down with pegs and the moisture issues virtually disappeared. YMMV

 

[Music Lover]

Good heavens! Basements sound like a lot of work. They are rare here in New Orleans, and after reading this thread I'm glad that neither Frank nor I have one.

Properly constructed, basements are rarely a problem. In cold climates you have to dig down 4 - 6 feet anyway to get below the frost line so the extra cost to go a few feet deeper is negligible considering how many extra square feet of living space that is created.

Obviously basements don't work very well in New Orleans, but they're common in northern states and Canada.

 

[Koolau]

Properly constructed, basements are rarely a problem. In cold climates you have to dig down 4 - 6 feet anyway to get below the frost line so the extra cost to go a few feet deeper is negligible considering how many extra square feet of living space that is created.

Obviously basements don't work very well in New Orleans, but they're common in northern states and Canada.

We've been blessed with a dry dirt basement in our midwest homestead. In the 75 years I've lived there (off and on) I've never seen moisture unless the boiler or water heater leaked. It' not a particularly pleasant place but it's not really even musty. Even the kids weren't grossed out the few times we had to go down there when a tornado was churning in the area. YMMV

 

[target2019]

This should be simple but forgive me because we've always lived in 150 year old houses until we built new last year. Never had this issue before--maybe we did but never thought about it.

So: One year old house. Basement is damp; builder originally suggested we might get a dehumidifier to keep mold and dampness in check.

Got a nice one that does the job, taking RH from ~70% to ~45%. (two monitors to confirm)

Wondering: Does the dampness ever go away? IOW, do the concrete walls and floor ever dry out to maybe like 55% RH (thanks to the removal rate) or, even after 10 years does it pop right back up to 70% the day after the machine is turned off?

I shoot for 55% or lower. But in the summer or other periods of heavy rain you might see the dehumidifier running constantly. We have a block wall, and I try to monitor that in key areas. We also have a french drain, but I'm not entirely sure about the quality of construction.

I also have a vornado fan that goes on periodically via mechanical outlet timer. This is to make sure I get air circulating in the "blind alley" side of my basement. Same for crawl space.

 

[Music Lover]

We've been blessed with a dry dirt basement in our midwest homestead. In the 75 years I've lived there (off and on) I've never seen moisture unless the boiler or water heater leaked. It' not a particularly pleasant place but it's not really even musty. Even the kids weren't grossed out the few times we had to go down there when a tornado was churning in the area. YMMV

A dirt floor isn't a pleasant space but all the basements I'm used to have concrete floors. For just a few thousand someone can frame and insulate the exterior walls and lay down LVP flooring to create more living space.

 

[Koolau]

A dirt floor isn't a pleasant space but all the basements I'm used to have concrete floors. For just a few thousand someone can frame and insulate the exterior walls and lay down LVP flooring to create more living space.

Heh, heh, you'd have to see the basement to understand that it wouldn't be a very practical place to put in floors and walls. I'm sure it could be done, but I'd still never go down there except for tornadoes and changing AC filters. The basement feeds a series of crawl (and I do mean crawl) spaces to run ducts to the various rooms. Walling them up would still leave exposed ducts in the "finished" basement. Then, there is the water heater and the water softener and the old coal chute and bin (not used in my life time) the gas meter, the water lines, the soil pipe, etc. etc. Not a practical "work shop" or even storage for the artificial Christmas tree and ornaments, etc. Just a dirt basement - it always has been and always will be though YMMV.

 

[Montclairbobbyb]

I LOVE my basement...

Could not live comfortably without one. We live in a 1950s ranch, and our basement is more like a cellar... Unfinished with exposed rafters, concrete floors and walls. We are lucky to have a gorgeous stone fireplace, that makes working in the basement during the winter a true joy. I use our basement as a workshop (woodworking and bicycle building/repair). If I had a suitable outbuilding I could probably get by without a basement, but the basement also serves another purpose: all the plumbing is exposed and ACCESSIBLE, should I ever have any issues.

We're also lucky that our basement is reasonably dry, except it can get damp after a deluge. We keep a dehumidifier running from May through October (Frigidaire that drains into an external drain)... That does the trick.

We're planning to build a new home in the Adirondacks (Saranac Lake), and it will DEFINITELY have a basement, which we will design with utmost care to ensure it stays as dry as possible and/or can be easily drained.

#BasementLove

 

[meleana]

We have a 2 1/2 year old new construction home and the first basement for us.

The answer is yes- you always have to use a dehumidifier.

We are in the Northeast and we set it up from April to November. It’s on automatic so it will only come on when it has to.