New house & pool nightmare. Pool backwash pipe accidentally connected to sump pump.
Pool owner newbe here with one previous post. My new experience is turning into this
. The new pool is almost done. Today we started to move into our new house and noticed water in the unfinished basement parts around our sump pumps. Water was flowing into one sump pump at a rapid speed. Both the builder and pool builder showed up very quickly. Outside next to the pool equipment the new landscaping had turned into a swamp and traces of a huge water flow from the pool area to the street were visible.
As I said we are moving into a new house but it is not quite ready yet. Some minor and some major details like sod are still missing. We had minor water in the basement but major water outside. It turned into a real head scratcher. We also had fencing installed around the pool earlier in the day to muddy the analysis.
I won't bore you with the details but it turns out both the back wash drain pipe and sump pipe were next to each other with an air conditioner in between. The outside backwash pool pipe was then accidentally connected to the sump pump outlet pipe. When the pool's backwash was turned on to lower the water level by 4 inches (pool is 16' by 40') all the water drained into the sump pump. Amazingly, the water that actually entered the basement through both sump pumps was fairly minimal. We had some puddles and a small amount of carpet / trim in one area that is affected.
The only explanation I can come up with is that the sump pump successfully pushed back. The pushed back water appears to have exited by the pool equipment (the concrete its on has settled unfortunately due to the water saturation) and then found its way around the decking until it finally build a mud canyon to the street (remember no sod yet).
That's my theory at least. I can see the sump up being strong enough to push back against the drain from the pool. The big question is how did the water exit around the pool equipment? The pool is most likely not designed to deal with a back flow and there may be natural exit points if this happens or the back flow pressure caused a leak. This is the part that I am still fuzzy on and I am looking for some constructive trouble shooting help.
In all fairness looking at the way both pipes came out of the house anyone could have made this mistake. It's not about fault, at this point I am just trying to understand what happened and that there are no other issues.
Thank you!
Pool owner newbe here with one previous post. My new experience is turning into this
. The new pool is almost done. Today we started to move into our new house and noticed water in the unfinished basement parts around our sump pumps. Water was flowing into one sump pump at a rapid speed. Both the builder and pool builder showed up very quickly. Outside next to the pool equipment the new landscaping had turned into a swamp and traces of a huge water flow from the pool area to the street were visible. As I said we are moving into a new house but it is not quite ready yet. Some minor and some major details like sod are still missing. We had minor water in the basement but major water outside. It turned into a real head scratcher. We also had fencing installed around the pool earlier in the day to muddy the analysis.
I won't bore you with the details but it turns out both the back wash drain pipe and sump pipe were next to each other with an air conditioner in between. The outside backwash pool pipe was then accidentally connected to the sump pump outlet pipe. When the pool's backwash was turned on to lower the water level by 4 inches (pool is 16' by 40') all the water drained into the sump pump. Amazingly, the water that actually entered the basement through both sump pumps was fairly minimal. We had some puddles and a small amount of carpet / trim in one area that is affected.
The only explanation I can come up with is that the sump pump successfully pushed back. The pushed back water appears to have exited by the pool equipment (the concrete its on has settled unfortunately due to the water saturation) and then found its way around the decking until it finally build a mud canyon to the street (remember no sod yet).
That's my theory at least. I can see the sump up being strong enough to push back against the drain from the pool. The big question is how did the water exit around the pool equipment? The pool is most likely not designed to deal with a back flow and there may be natural exit points if this happens or the back flow pressure caused a leak. This is the part that I am still fuzzy on and I am looking for some constructive trouble shooting help.
In all fairness looking at the way both pipes came out of the house anyone could have made this mistake. It's not about fault, at this point I am just trying to understand what happened and that there are no other issues.
Thank you!
