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Stesso

Installing a French Drain

7:30
27:37
658.4K views

At 7:30 in

4 Solutions to fix a wet basement plus Noob Mistakes

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What happens here

When exterior grading is not sufficient or feasible, a French drain is presented as the next external solution. A French drain involves excavating a trench away from the foundation, lining it with permeable fabric, filling it with gravel, and embedding a perforated pipe within the gravel layer. The pipe is then covered with more gravel, permeable fabric, and finally topsoil/grass. This system allows water to permeate through the soil and fabric, collect in the perforated pipe, and be routed away from the foundation. Warnings are given about proper water diversion to avoid problems like retaining wall failures or landslides.

Goal: Divert water away from the foundation using a subsurface drainage system.

Tools and materials

  • Mini Excavator Daewoo — Digging the trench for the French drain
  • Perforated Drain Pipe — Collecting and channeling water within the French drain
  • Permeable Fabric — Lining the trench to prevent soil from clogging the gravel and pipe
  • Gravel — Filling the trench around the perforated pipe to facilitate drainage
  • Topsoil/Grass — Covering the French drain to restore the landscape

What they say

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a French drain here just sits right here - yeah a French drain the way we would install a French drain is we would come in if we had permission from this home and permission from this house we would create it swale and right at the bottom of this well then we would go 12 inches below that we would install we would wrap that in permeable fabric then we would put 3/4 super rock in that French drain system then we put a four-inch perforated drain tile in that then we put filter fabric on top of that permeable filter fabric and then we would cover that so that there's about roughly six to twelve inches of soil on top of that and that allows the water to permeate through hit that drain towel and run out be careful wherever you direct a source of water because if you direct it behind a retaining wall it can create premature failure or this next jobsite this entire hill was actually destroyed because a simple buried drain tile off from a gutter let loose and allowed all of the wat all of this hill to basically wash out all right now the third option

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