What is Waterproofing
Waterproofing Crawl Space Explained
You may have heard of or seen dirty crawl spaces where the dirt is exposed and the crawl space is thriving with wood rot, smells musty, and is a thriving environment for insects and creatures. Well all that is sometimes “out of sight, out of mind” until you start to have tissues inside your home, typically starting in the first floor. The reason these issues have become present inside your house can be explained with the Stack Effect. As air warms up, it rises from your crawl space into your home, bringing with it all the mold, mildew, and musty smells from your crawl space. As you can imagine, having air-borne mold and mildew inside your home is unacceptable and unsafe, even more so if children or elderly people reside within the dwelling. To make things worse, it’s a never ending cycle as the hot air rises and exits through vents and cracks, it creates a suction, pulling in cooler air in from the bottom, entering through your crawl space, getting heated up, seeping into your home, and again, exiting through cracks, chimneys, and vents.
To narrow the issue down, the problem is typically water and humidity . Wood rot, mold, mildew, wavey hardwood floor, musty odors and insects can all be traced back to humidity issues. High humidity is a perfect environment for these issues to form, and thus enough to be of concern to you and your loved ones health. Unfortunately it doesn’t take much to boost the humidity to unsafe levels in your crawl space, something as simple as short rain showers or a nice warm day in the middle of summer, are enough influence to raise humidity above safe levels, if it isn’t already there, in an non-encapsulated crawl space.
Thankfully, There is a solution to these issues, and we can help you reclaim your crawl space.
Enter “Encapsulation.”
Encapsulation noun
noun: encapsulation; plural noun: encapsulations
-The action of enclosing something in or as if in a capsule.
The following are crucial to resolving common crawl space issues such as mold, mildew, and critters in crawl space while also helping reduce energy bills by up to 20%, according to Advanced Energy’s research.
1) Encapsulating crawl space from exterior elements
2) Sump Pump System to remove water
3) Conditioning or Dehumidifier for crawl space
First thing you will want to do is to seperate or encapsulate your crawl space. This process consists of sealing all vents and doors, coupled with installing either a 6mil or 16mil vapor barrier over the floor and up the walls. In detail, the vapor barrier will prevent water from entering your crawl space through the ground, wall cracks, vents, and door cracks.
Second thing we will do is remove water by installing a sump pump in the crawl space. A correctly installed sump pump will remove any water that enters the crawl space. We highly recommend a battery backup sump pump system. With a battery backup sump pump you can rest assured that even in the heaviest of storms, with or without power, your crawl space will stay dry. Nobody wants a sump pump systems that works on sunny days, you want one you can rely on for those storms that seem to never end. Leave the worry of a wet crawl space behind and upgrade to a battery backup sump pump today!
Third and final, we want to maintain a good Humidity in your crawl space. A humid crawl space will allow bacteria growth including mold and mildew, and will allow for musty smells to form. A dry crawl space is also not recommended, as dry air can lead to warped and twisted floor joist and can even cause wood flooring inside the house to become gapped. We recommend installing an appropriately sized dehumidifier with a programmable humidity setting to maintain the ideal humidity in your crawl space.
Have more questions? We’d be glad to give you our expert advice! Give us a call during our business hours monday through friday 8am to 5pm EST.
