I moved into a new house a couple years ago, and I almost immediately began fighting with the basement. Whenever we get really heavy rain -- usually a couple times a year -- the sump fills up and a couple inches of water gets into the basement. This is a major pain! I have put up some defenses: I removed the carpet and wooden baseboards and replaced them with an epoxy-based, painted floor and vinyl cove base. This has stopped the serious damage from floods, but cleaning up is still a hassle. What I really want to do is stop the water from coming in. The sump pit is sealed, because there is a radon mitigation system installed, but the water creeps out from underneath the lid. The sump pump runs constantly during these floods, so I know it's working -- it just can't pump the water out fast enough. I'm looking for some options. Could the drainage pipes be backed up? Do I need to have those snaked? Are the drain pipes coming into the sump pit too large? Do I need to smallen them? Do I need to re-route some of the groundwater that's coming into the sump pit? How on earth do I do that? Do I need a faster sump pump? The one I've got down there is 1/3 HP, but it doesn't list the gallons per minute. A second sump pump? Do I route that through the same output pipe? Or can I assume it's overloaded, and I need to send it out some other way? Does my sump pit need to be bigger? It looks like it's about 36" deep by 18" across. However, the most recent flood covered 300 sq ft about 4" deep, so that's like 100 cu ft of additional capacity I'd need, and that seems like a big hole to dig. Suggestions are welcome. I have called a contractor, but I haven't heard back from him yet.

Is it satisfactory to use 2x2 framing for a soffit? Are drywall screws OK to fasten them together? Is it OK to screw into the ends of 2x2's or should all connections be made thru the faces of the boards? This soffit will be ~3' x10' x1' high.