It has rained or snowed here at least twice a week for a couple of months. My basement used to flood with every big rain, but I installed new gutters and now it mostly does it when either A. it rains twice a week for two months or B. I forget to clean the gutters.
Since I haven't had a real basement flood in a couple of years, I stopped checking it with every rain. So of course half way through the last flooding rains the water heater went out. Yes it flooded out. Since it is gas there was no damage really except to my pride since I can't get the darn pilot light lit. I have to call the gas company to take care of it.
So I pumped out the basement. This year I decided to make it more user friendly pumping system for my wife, when she finds herself alone. The first thing I did was to set it up a bit easier for her to manage. Like everything else in my life, the basement water clearing is a rube goldberg affair.
The most frustrating thing is that the sump hole is so small that no sump pump will fit inside it. I found a coy pond pump that will do the trick, but alas it will not pump it all the way up the eight foot basement wall. So what I ended up doing for her was to use the coy pond pump to pump the water from the sump hole to a holding bin (very large plastic box used for storage previously). Inside the box is a second pump that is bigger and will move the water to the driveway 7 or eight feet above the sump level.
It is set so that I can flip a switch at the top of the stairs and the coy pond pump begins to fill the holding tank. I have it set so that the coy pump line splashes into the tank so that I know when it is work rather than burning up the pump while dry pumping.
The pump inside the tank is much faster so I can let the coy pump run about ten minutes before I turn on the big pump. If I should forget to turn on the big pump, the water over flows and runs back on the floor so the coy pond pump is in no danger of pumping dry and burning up by accident. It takes about eight minutes to pump the holding tank dry enough so that the pump whines in objection. Then I turn it off and go back to my coffee cup for another then minutes. I do this about twice and the floor is empty. Usually it takes several hours to fill up again.
So the last part of the lil ole system for momma, and for me, was an alarm so that I know when the basement has the amount of water needed for a pump project. That really should have been a quick fix, but alas it was all frustration and evil words. The evil words were mostly from me.
I did my research and found that the alarms are being made by a couple of companies. I could get one on ebay for about ten bucks shipping included. Then I found that home depot carried them for about the same amount. So of course I chose to buy it locally.
First of all I had to check to make sure that my local HD actually carried the device. The internet said sure as heck they had it. So this morning I convinced my wife to drive me to HD, I told her she would surely have time to pick up her breakfast. I had a feeling that they sold so few of those things that I would need help finding it.
So I went right to the service desk rather than waste my time walking around. I had to deal with two different people. Each of who had to be retold the whole story. Including yes I checked on line to be sure. And yes they website said that the local store had them in stock.
No one ever heard of such an item but I finally, after talking to three people who all said, "I never saw one of those on the shelf", got someone to look on line. Low and behold everything I said was STILL true. I convinced the woman in Customer Service to look at the inventory to be sure they actually had one in the store before I began searching.
"We have three," she informed me with a confident smile. "Follow me I know exactly where they are." I should mention here that it had taken me fifteen minutes to progress to that point.
Shocking but true, the alarm was not where it was supposed to be. A male from that department said, "It's supposed to be right there and it's not." As if that were the end of it
"Your inventory says there are three of them, so where are they." I was a little snappy by then.
"Sir we are trying to help you," the woman said.
"Ma'am the gentleman just dismissed me."
"No Sir, I assure you we are going to keep looking until we find them." At that point I was losing my temper. My wife would surely be out in the parking lot in the car. After anther fifteen minutes and another look up on the net, they managed to find them. I paid eleven bucks for the thing.
These guys wonder why they are losing business to online shopping. A man on ebay has twenty items or so to rummage through to find your purchase. It takes a couple of days longer but it is a lot less frustrating.
Oh yeah when I got to the car my wife was happily drinking a cup of coffee with the heater and the radio on. "They gave me a free cup of coffee at the restaurant because I had to wait a long time for my food." she explained.
"I got a free plastic bag," I countered.
Upon reaching home I tested the device and it did work. Not only did it work but the device doesn't have to be reset. I just drilled a hole with a hold saw into a 1/2 inch piece of plywood and mounted it over the hole. So when there is about 3/4 " of water on the floor it will beep. fob accomplished.
Since I haven't had a real basement flood in a couple of years, I stopped checking it with every rain. So of course half way through the last flooding rains the water heater went out. Yes it flooded out. Since it is gas there was no damage really except to my pride since I can't get the darn pilot light lit. I have to call the gas company to take care of it.
So I pumped out the basement. This year I decided to make it more user friendly pumping system for my wife, when she finds herself alone. The first thing I did was to set it up a bit easier for her to manage. Like everything else in my life, the basement water clearing is a rube goldberg affair.
The most frustrating thing is that the sump hole is so small that no sump pump will fit inside it. I found a coy pond pump that will do the trick, but alas it will not pump it all the way up the eight foot basement wall. So what I ended up doing for her was to use the coy pond pump to pump the water from the sump hole to a holding bin (very large plastic box used for storage previously). Inside the box is a second pump that is bigger and will move the water to the driveway 7 or eight feet above the sump level.
It is set so that I can flip a switch at the top of the stairs and the coy pond pump begins to fill the holding tank. I have it set so that the coy pump line splashes into the tank so that I know when it is work rather than burning up the pump while dry pumping.
The pump inside the tank is much faster so I can let the coy pump run about ten minutes before I turn on the big pump. If I should forget to turn on the big pump, the water over flows and runs back on the floor so the coy pond pump is in no danger of pumping dry and burning up by accident. It takes about eight minutes to pump the holding tank dry enough so that the pump whines in objection. Then I turn it off and go back to my coffee cup for another then minutes. I do this about twice and the floor is empty. Usually it takes several hours to fill up again.
So the last part of the lil ole system for momma, and for me, was an alarm so that I know when the basement has the amount of water needed for a pump project. That really should have been a quick fix, but alas it was all frustration and evil words. The evil words were mostly from me.
I did my research and found that the alarms are being made by a couple of companies. I could get one on ebay for about ten bucks shipping included. Then I found that home depot carried them for about the same amount. So of course I chose to buy it locally.
First of all I had to check to make sure that my local HD actually carried the device. The internet said sure as heck they had it. So this morning I convinced my wife to drive me to HD, I told her she would surely have time to pick up her breakfast. I had a feeling that they sold so few of those things that I would need help finding it.
So I went right to the service desk rather than waste my time walking around. I had to deal with two different people. Each of who had to be retold the whole story. Including yes I checked on line to be sure. And yes they website said that the local store had them in stock.
No one ever heard of such an item but I finally, after talking to three people who all said, "I never saw one of those on the shelf", got someone to look on line. Low and behold everything I said was STILL true. I convinced the woman in Customer Service to look at the inventory to be sure they actually had one in the store before I began searching.
"We have three," she informed me with a confident smile. "Follow me I know exactly where they are." I should mention here that it had taken me fifteen minutes to progress to that point.
Shocking but true, the alarm was not where it was supposed to be. A male from that department said, "It's supposed to be right there and it's not." As if that were the end of it
"Your inventory says there are three of them, so where are they." I was a little snappy by then.
"Sir we are trying to help you," the woman said.
"Ma'am the gentleman just dismissed me."
"No Sir, I assure you we are going to keep looking until we find them." At that point I was losing my temper. My wife would surely be out in the parking lot in the car. After anther fifteen minutes and another look up on the net, they managed to find them. I paid eleven bucks for the thing.
These guys wonder why they are losing business to online shopping. A man on ebay has twenty items or so to rummage through to find your purchase. It takes a couple of days longer but it is a lot less frustrating.
Oh yeah when I got to the car my wife was happily drinking a cup of coffee with the heater and the radio on. "They gave me a free cup of coffee at the restaurant because I had to wait a long time for my food." she explained.
"I got a free plastic bag," I countered.
Upon reaching home I tested the device and it did work. Not only did it work but the device doesn't have to be reset. I just drilled a hole with a hold saw into a 1/2 inch piece of plywood and mounted it over the hole. So when there is about 3/4 " of water on the floor it will beep. fob accomplished.
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