Expert: Daniel Humphrey - 7/8/2010

Question
QUESTION: Dear Sir,

We are building an additional floor to our prebuild house. While constructing we are facing a lots of problems related to leak at the ground floor.

Water is leaking from the concrete slab. What should we do to detect the leak, if we are not able to detect the leak what should we do avoid leaking as that is destroying all the wooden furniture at the ground floor

ANSWER: Dear Ajay,

The best cure would be to dig around the entire building and place drainage pipes and rock that will intercept the ground water and take it away. This is quite common where I live, since it is a rainforest.

It also could be a broken pipe that needs to be abandoned and re-routed.

The water must be stopped, since containing it within the building is nearly impossible.

Daniel



---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Dear Sir,

Thank you for the advice. But I would like to inform you that we donot have any conceal piping moving from the slab.

The problem is, since we are building a floor above an exisiting structure we spray a lot of water for proper curing of the cement of the newly built structure. The sprayed water is gather at the roof of the basement floor and the same water is percolating drop by drop. I am not able to locate the crack in the slab of basement floor. So I was looking for an alternative

With best regards

Ajay

Answer
Dear Ajay,

I would normally recommend a concrete sealer, such as asphaltum or a urethane product; but any sealer you put on will tend to migrate with the water and drip into the space below. I was also thinking of an expanding clay, such as bentonite. It is used to seal wells.

Daniel