My builder used 4″ perforated drainpipe beside my foundation walls for drainage. These run to daylight on the backside of my property. Can I connect my downspouts to this system. It sure would save me a lot of labor but I don’t want to risk foundation problems for the sake of simplicity. Thanks for any advise.
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Replies
This is difficult as we don't know the gradiants (slopes, of the land) it would also help to know where you are located. ( soil composition). Give us more info
If, at first, you fricascee, fry, fry a hen!
I live in Missouri. It's rocky clay like soil. Also I live on a pretty good slope. Obviously the pipe runs down the slope and away from the house. But I was worried that if I get a lot of output from the downspouts I would cause some problem. But I have to claim total ignorance about the subject.
No way. You'll be loading your foundation with water, especially if you have a blockage. As long as you have proper drainage away from your foundation, just run them out a minimum of 10' and either daylight them if grade allows or 90 them to the surface. If you are in an area with trees, use a smooth wall pipe.
John
J.R. Lazaro Builders, Inc.
Indianapolis, In.
Agree 100% about not running roof water to foundation drains. It appears like a "smart move"by the builder but it's a corner cut.
We actually need more info to answer your question....
If you're referring to perf pipe that's at the bottom of your basement walls, & has already been backfilled in, then tying in your downspouts would require a lot of digging just to get to the perf pipe, no?
mel.... the right guy to ask is your builder..
on my jobs if i run foundation drains to daylight , it wouldn't bother me if the homeowner wanted to hook downspouts into them..
of course.. on my jobs there wouldn't be any gutters if i could help itMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Mike:
Why no gutters?
Yes, i too ask, why no gutters? a lot of people don't realize the importance of gutters, or commonly called "eavestrough " in many parts of N America.
with a generous overhang and correct grading , gutters are not needed..
traditionally they do not have them in snow country .. and in the tropics , no gutters..
why do you need gutters ? to keep the water out of the basement ? it has nothing to do with it
to keep water from falling on your head ? why ?
to protect the siding ? overhangs..
gutters are just dumb..
and we have installed thousands and thousands of feet of gutters, so we know how to do it right..wooden, copper, vinyl & aluminum
but you get into the design stage of a house, and most gutters can be eliminated
we've had 4 houses, none had gutters, one had a wet crawl space, but that was due to a high groundwater table.. overhangs, landscaping, grading, and foundation drains are what is needed.... gutters are just lipstick on a pigMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
you say...."they do not have them in snow country"
ya, right . I guess millions of Canadian builders must of goofed when they installed them darn EAVESTROUGHS ! Does it really snow in this area?
? and like you say, you build generous overhangs (soffits), that way no gutters are necessary. High wind storms and hurricanes just love to grab onto these. and the pitter- patter of that torrent of water coming down a roofs' valley must be a great "gouging instrument for any lawn or flower bed that may lie beneath it.
And without eaves trough /gutter, the dirty water stained facer must blend in with the ground level mud that has been stirred up by the constant dripping of the gutterless buildings.
ya, gutter/eavestrough is not necessary in your area.(lol)
And yes on a brighter note, gutters even give a home a nice finished look.
Even Miss Piggy looks nice with lipstick.
say, hube... i bet we have a disagreement here...
whadda you base your opinion on ?
did you ever investigate where gutters originated ?
are you familiar with architectural styles that don't use gutters..?
gutters are used to correct the faults of bad design
none of the problems you described exist on any houses designed without gutters..
Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
hmmm....so you're saying because a house has a valley it is a bad design?
.....look there 50 more houses with valleys on em, they are all "bad" designs.
come on up here to BC Canada, I'd like to see the sad shape of your house and yard, without gutters after one go of the rainy season which can be a 6 month deluge.
all....
gimme a break... do a little research, please
stop projecting your little world onto the universe of residential construction..
and what does valleys have to do with good , bad, or indifferent design ?..
so... every house you've seen has gutters ?
... geesh, take a ride .. or take a trip..look at some magazines... study some books
you don't know much , and you're demonstrating it hereMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
I hate to jump in the middle of a battle and try to politely ask a question, but...What can you do to prevent landscaping problems from water dripping off the roof? We really do get seriously heavy rains once in a while. Seems like NOT having gutters would really make a mess of anything under the drip line.Not trying to pick a fight - Just curious what you do to prevent problems...
Ever wonder what the speed of lightning would be if it didn't zigzag?
The level of drainage/runoff design you suggest, incorporating proper French drains BELOW the footing level, perforated pipe with the holes properly placed down to keep the basement dry, foundations high enough above grade to reduce splash discoloration /dirt on siding, proper drainage slope with pea gravel, ample overhangs. With all these features in concert you will be the exception to the rule. I applaud you.How many people will pay for what they can't see or don't understand, if another builder offers a better price for something less? How many builders do it right? Especially below grade.Do you also not apply gutters over an area of deck? I’ve seen foundation walls caved in by frost from water draining off a deck that settled and pitched toward the house.
"How many people will pay for what they can't see or don't understand, "I think that comment is the answer to why the great nymber of responces here are saying something like, "most homes around here..."
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
decks are tough... they definitley put the siding in the splash zone...
if the roof water is going to fall ON a deck, then i'd recommend gutters....
lots of things can be done around a foundation.. stone chips, mulch, ground cover..
most places .. just regular grass will protect the drip area.. getting ti to grow is the trick..
but sod will usually take, and permanently protect the splash zone
to me it's always been ludicrous... what exactly do gutters do for anyone when the rain is horizontal ?
and the next one.. well, when i step outdoors the rain from the roof is going to fall on my head.... yeah, well ?
for the most part, gutters resemble Beckman's Rooftop Bordello... just a convenient planting bed to feed his livestock..
the majority of roofs i go on have gutters.. and the majority of those gutters are either full of debris, or they are rotten ( wooden gutters ) or they have caused leaks into the soffit / plate, or they are in disrepair, or they were installed so badly they don't drain....
in a lot of the old victorians around here, they are a significant part of the cornice ornamentation.. but most of them are so grossly undersized , that they get overrun in any big rainstorm...
Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
here in Rhode Island in drought years the rainfall is 33"..... wet years the rain is 60" ( 5 feet )
average is about 45"... we get enough rain.. a lot of it horizontal..
and our soil is poorly drained... i guess i know about rain, and drainage and gutters... and i've seen them from Costa Rica to Ireland ... and from the Leeward Islands to Prince Edward Island....
gutters and leaders..
wooden, aluminum, copper, vinyl, chain.....Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
cheers.. you said all that and you actually come off souding knowledgable and as someone who one would like to listen to, instead of arrogant. perhaps I struck a wrong cord with the tone of my orginal post, if so I opologize.
I swear it feels like some times we get 5' in the month of november alone. day in day out rain gear. and while the rest of Canada gets snow, here in the warm lower mainland of BC we get more rain.
Personally, I like gutters. I like the systematic approach of being able to get water and loads of it away from the house and its foundation. That being said if you truly don't need em and you don't like em, it's your house.... don't have em.
one question: any other designs other than a gable over a doorway to keep from getting doused. if gable is the only practical roof, it leaves little room for versasility in house design. yes I know it's raining and you're going to get wet anyway, but nobody 'cept my 5 year old wants to walk under that water fall during a heavy rain.
Dude, chill.....
I'm not trying project anything onto anything......
my point was made in regards to the following:
Hubedude's reference to "torrent of water coming down a roofs' valley"
your response:
"gutters are used to correct the faults of bad design".
you said it, not me.
I don't know it all... and unlike you I don't pretend that I do. I am merely stating my opinion to which I am entitled to. Just as you are yours.
You do not know what kind of or how many house I have seen or looked at, nor do you you know what magazines and books I have read.
I made my response because, to me it sounded silly to say that just because a roof has a valley that means it is a bad design that requires gutters as a "fix"
sure I have seen houses without gutters, but you sure won't find any around where I live. and if you lived where I did you might have a slightly different view of the need for gutters. I am aware that different areas of North America have different building practices, designs and needs, which I pointed out in my 1st post when I said that different ares are different.
so if you can build a house without gutters where you live - great.
But to say that one of the most common elements of a roof is a bad design (which is what you implied) just because you need a gutter makes you sound arrogant.
and for me even if if I knew as little as you say I do - at least I can learn more ( which I always strive to do) arrogance is much harder overcome.
hmmmm.
apparently you didn't know that one of my missions in life is to spread the gospel that you don't have to have gutters if you don't want them..
some houses need them..... some don't ... an awful lot of them would do just fine without them..
wanna discuss some of my other missions ?
Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
"some houses need them..... some don't ... an awful lot of them would do just fine without them.."
sure, maybe where you live that is the case, but you clearly have not lived in a place that can receive mass amounts of rain for months on end.
To me there is abosolutely nothing wrong with a house without gutters - if it works.
You clearly do not like gutters, and there's nothing wrong with that, that is your tastse. we all have our preferances, likes and dislikes. I got no problem with a guy that prefers the look of a house without gutters. what I did not like was your statement the gutters are a make up for bad design. there are just too many beautiful houses that have been built and are being built to be lumped into the category of "bad" design simply because they have gutters.
Back in the colonial days before they had gutters ( or were commonplace) they would make the reveal on the lower courses of siding much tighter so that the splash from rain dripping off the roof would have a hard time penetrating the siding. Even so eventually rot would set in.
To me gutters are a good thing.....not to say that every house in every climate needs em, but in some climates they do. and just because a house has em does not mean it is a bad design.
Miker is right.A well designed house will sit 18" above ground and the roof shape will direct water flow away from entrances so gutters are not needed. I have never seen a gutter system that did not create as many problems as it solved. Ice, debris to clean, snow and ice tearing gutters off to be replaced...Landscaping involves using shrubbery and bark chips to handle the drip line so there is no mud to be seen there.
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
No problem with 'troughs at all, provided the house is built right and the troughs are either periodiaclly cleaned out of leaves. Ice damming isn't the troughs fault, its lack of insulation ,or improper venting that is the cause.
And without trough,with a constant torrent of water spillage from the roof that lands on the ground,hitting these bark chips, etc won't disturb them, eh. get real
" its lack of insulation ,or improper venting that is the cause."
Not always, but when it is - that would be bad design, right?",hitting these bark chips, etc won't disturb them, eh. get real"
Got theem all over the place and they behave pretty well. besides, dressing up the chips once a year when you fertilize is a whiole lot easier than using a ladder and cleaning debris out of the gutter twice a year
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
bad design,? not always. most times its the flunky who installs it wrong.
And as for the bark chips, you say you got them all over the place alright, them things float good ,ya know!
you are still making claims that a thing cannot be done in the face of two of us who know it can be done and do it all the time. should I bother trying to answer your question this time about how to netatly contain chips and what I meant by the idiom 'all over the place' or do you want to remain in the 'anti' mode and remain ignorant? I just don't want to waste an electron shower on you if it is the latter.
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
OK, I guess I'm lost too. Most houses around here have gutters. How are you dealing with the runoff? Are you just letting it run off the 18" overhang and cascade on down 18" from the walls of the house? I like to get all that water a bit further away from the foundation.
jt8
"Real difficulties can be overcome; it is only the imaginary ones that are unconquerable. " --Theodore N. Vail
Edited 10/31/2005 12:46 pm by JohnT8
Just wondering....are you meaning 18" or 18'
inches= "
feet = '
I misread Piffin to say 18" overhang where he really was talking about how far the house was sticking up.
jt8
"Real difficulties can be overcome; it is only the imaginary ones that are unconquerable. " --Theodore N. Vail
I don't recall mentioning a 18" overhang. The 18" above ground is twofold. One is that runoff splashback is limited to that close to the ground. The other is that this usually eliminates attacks by most of the ground dwelling bugs like carpenter ants. i can't count how many houses I have seen built right down to ground level or only a few inches above it and THEN the new HOs go and add soil and landscping to build it up ABOVE the bottom plate and THEN decide the way to deal with the problem is to add gutters to the roof. That is a band aid when there was a bad design to begin with
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
Sorry, I misread your post. I saw 18" and immediately thought 'overhang' when you were talking above grade. And I whole heartedly agree with your point there. WAY too many houses aren't built high enough to allow for grading. And then settling... and then re-grading. And folks building up their lawns each year...while the house stays at the same level.
But I'm not sure I'm on board with yours and Mike's no-gutter idea. I'd rather clean out the gutters occasionally and be able to pipe that water well away from the house than have to rely on landscaping/grading to divert it.jt8
"Real difficulties can be overcome; it is only the imaginary ones that are unconquerable. " --Theodore N. Vail
" I'd rather clean out the gutters occasionally "You might prefer that option, but based on the amt of debris I see and gettuers with trees growing in them, the great mojority of people are not in the same camp, They prefer to let the leaves rot in the gutters, make soil, back up water to cause rot, and eventually fal off the house before they are willing to do something about them. Or - they are totally ignorant. If I point out the need for cleaning..."oh, am I supposed to....?"
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It is impossible to idiot proof houses. They're making better idiots these days.
jt8
"Real difficulties can be overcome; it is only the imaginary ones that are unconquerable. " --Theodore N. Vail
so true
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
Strange isn't it, when anytime somebody disagrees with a peson who is right, they start accusing them of arrogance. As far aasI know, the maion first use of gutters was not connected to house design, but to a need to collect rainwater for clean drinking water in certain areas. After that, whenever people moved into a house and found the rain runoff to be inconvenient, they added gutters to correct the builder's errors.
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
mikes opinion is not what makes him look arrogant - it is his attitude.
aslo, I never said that he couldn't or shouldn't. I said that if he can then that's great. but if every house were designed to be gutterless, are you going to have a gable over everyones front door. because you have a hip roof, if you want to call that an error, I'm not going to argue with you.
personally I think that those flashing diverters that were sometimes used over a gutterless shed roof over door, if you've ever seen one, look ugly. so that leaves pretty much every house on the block with having a gable.
perhaps you've got some other designs that work, if so I'd be happy to hear about them as I'm always up for learning something new.
Edited 10/31/2005 12:12 pm ET by alrightythen
Good advice. We live in an area that gets about 8 inches of precipitation (6" rain, 20" snow) a year. Even here gutters are needed to direct the runoff from big storms and limit the damage to landscapes and the mess from splashing mud.
it's hard on the landscaping though, you generally get a gravel dripline running through your plantings when you go gutterless which may not look that nice. Maybe not a big concern but I'm a landscaper so I get to think about it!
Perf footing drains are not intended to carry the consolidated volumes of water that downspouts generate, but rather to eliminate water that perks down (or up) to the bottom of the wall. Water from downspouts should either be directed away from the wall an adequate distance or tight lined to daylight or a storm sewer connecton- your local building codes may dictate which of these is acceptable.
You're not supposed to.
Here's the (theoretical) problem, your downspouts have leaves, the leaves clog the pipe at the end of the line which then causes the water to back up and your french drain becomes a leach field. oops.
See NDS docs for more:
http://www.ndspro.com/technical_info/index.aspx
It seems like your builder did the proper installation for the footing drainage using perforated pipe,etc.
DO NOT RUN the downpipes into them. (seems like a lot of digging down to do this foolish idea anyways)
RUN the gutter down- pipes out approx 10 ft from the foundation and you will be
fine.....OR, bury them a bit and run them separately to daylight, but DO NOT join them to the footing drain pipes.
That should have been planned at the backfill stage. If you (or builder) had planned to run the water from down spouts away from house via under ground system, then this should be a solid 4" PVC pipe. As has been suggested you can run it away from house along surface. (I not sure I follow 10' away, maybe he means that that is underground - If people have good slope and sidewalk they sometimes use splash blocks) anyway.... it will not be a big deal ( at least not as big as going down to footings) to dig down a could feet and lay your solid pipe. and I think its much better- that is unless you don't get much rain where you live.
I guess some areas are different, where I live I won't pass inspection unless that is all done before backfill.
one other thing - I was also required to fasten ('hang' with plumbers straps) solid pipe to the foundation at least every 5'. This is to keep pipe from settling and having any out of slope spots in the pipe
Edited 10/30/2005 11:49 am ET by alrightythen
I remember the gully washing rains in eastern MO, so I sure wouldn't connect the downspouts to a perforated drain line. The holes let water flow out of the line as well as into it so you may end up putting more water against your foundation.
No!
Never!
Ever run downspouts into perimeter drains. Those are placed there to help eliminate excess water from the foundation and possibleentry into the basement. Why in the world would anyone want to add more waer toa location where a system has been designed and planned to take it away? Keep surfgace water on the surface and lead it AWAY fom the foundation instead of Iorecting it TO it.
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