Given your location, you may want to check these guys out if you want to get a professional's take on it. Badger Basements I know of several individuals and my parent's church basement who all are very satisfied with them. I don't believe they charge for estimates and I believe they guarantee their work. Good luck!

^^^^ Thanks for the above^^^^

R
It really depends on what kind of soil is around your house and how high the watertable is. If you are in sand and the water table is low it could be that your are just temporarily getting water running down the foundation. If you are in clay it can be another problem entirely. One thing I use to keep from getting ice buildup is a snow roofrake that you can pull snow off the roof with, as long as you can reach it from the ground.
If your problem isn't just temporary runoff but your house is built in clay the water table varies a lot and it tends to hold water around your house.
The only permanent solution I know of is a real pain in the ass. Basically to insure water won't come in the basement houses should have drain tile laid around the inside of the foundation and a sump pump to take care of the accumulating water. On an existing house it involves knocking out the concrete in the floor of the basement and putting the drain tile in and then repouring the concrete over the drain tile. Hopefully you don't have that kind of a problem but like I said, if the house is in clay with a high water table and this becomes a lingering problem this is the one sure way I know of fixing it. But it is a pain in the butt and quite costly.

Good luck!

quote:

Originally posted by R MaN:
I am from Janesville and we had a record year for snow.. Anyways, we have had our house for 15 years, and this is the first time it has leaked into the basement...

1. The eaves and drain spouts are jammed with ice, there for the water drips next to the foundation..

2. We had a major thaw on Saturday and Sunday..

Is my solution as simple as getting Black dirt with a mix of clay and grade it away from the foundation?

Any tips will be greatly appreciated.

R

I have lived in my house for 35 years and never removed snow from the roof and never had a problem until this year. Now I have had water backing up under the shingles (which by the way are only about 5 years old) and pooling behind ice dams on the eaves and coming into my bathroom walls and through the ceiling. About $2500.00 worth of damage so far. May be more when the carpenter starts tearing out walls and ceilings. Thankfully insurance will cover most of it. Just a bad bad year for things like this.

Standing Seam Steel Roofs.

You have mentioned many times that you think the root of the problem lies with the gutters and downspouts being iced up.

Have you thought about installing gutter heaters in order to prevent this?

I thought about installing them on the gutters of my previous house. They would ice up all the time but I didn’t have wet basement problems, I was worried about ice dams. You can get these kits at most home centers.

T^hat is what I was thinking. You can buy and install heat tapes fairly easily. Do a Google search and see what you come up with.

Bob C1 that sounds like an insulation problem. Not enough air movement through the soffit vents to keep the water from freezing. Check with an insulation installer to see what he has to say. Pretty simple solution. Did you recently have insulation added to the attic?

Originally from Central Wis and experienced all of the above problems. Cheaper, and easier on your body, to get some experts to come in and check things out rather than try and do it yourself. May cost a bit more but well worth it.

quote:

Originally posted by FreeSafety:
Standing Seam Steel Roofs.

I just put one in, what is the benefit in this instance? -- the fact that the ice will melt faster?

Ice damming in the gutters can cause water to seep down behind the siding and into the basement.

Buy a snow rake for next year.

If you want to tac the visqueen to the concrete I would use some basement coating same stuff used to seal the basement while the sealer is wet butt the visqueen up against the concrte,it will stick as if you glued it,or you could use a caulk what ever fits your needs.

R ,I am having on the same lines of the problems as you are. I found out that my drain tiles where partially plugged and were not draining properly. I had to manually clean my drain tiles by taking a hose and washing them out. When is the last time you had yours cleaned?

quote:

Originally posted by BackThePack:
R ,I am having on the same lines of the problems as you are. I found out that my drain tiles where partially plugged and were not draining properly. I had to manually clean my drain tiles by taking a hose and washing them out. When is the last time you had yours cleaned?

To be honest, I don't know what drain tiles are.. Unless your referring to eave traffs.

A contractor came over today and said that he would dig down and pitch the sand and whatever away from the foundation about 5 to 6 feet... $1,200.00.