A basement is basically a box of concrete buried in wet ground. In order for it to be built, a hole was excavated, the slab and walls were poured or assembled inside, and the hole around the foundation walls was backfilled. The soil in that backfilled portion will take many years to become as compact as the undisturbed portions of the terrain around it. It will soak up water like a sponge over saturating the ground around the foundation during periods of heavy rain. Hydrostatic pressure will build up, push against the basement walls and water will eventually find its way into the basement. We call that the "clay bow effect".
Formerly, builders addressed that issue by installing French drains (perforated drain pipes) at the bottom of the foundation footing to collect and channel ground water. The problem with French drains is that tended to clog with mud and silt, or collapse and, because they were buried do deep, you could not service them without digging out the foundations.
Over 25 years ago, Basement Systems, Inc., the world's authority in wet basement repair, developed a solution to intercept water at the point of entry, inside the basement, along the internal perimeter of the basement walls. The innovative WaterGuard system was specifically developed to be installed atop of the footing, away from the mud zone where it could easily clog. It can also be fitted with service ports for periodic maintenance, so that your basement drainage system will last for the life of the structure. They can be installed for a fraction of the cost of conventional French drains, and without messy yard excavation. WaterGuard interior drains have been used successfully for more than two decades, in thousands of homes across the U.S., Canada, U.K. and Ireland.
WaterGuard is exclusively installed in Tennessee and Southwestern Kentucky by your waterproofing experts at Frontier Basement Systems.
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