This is probably an old issue for you drainage ninjas, but I couldn't find anything directly on point, so here goes: I recently purchased a ranch-style foreclosure in southeast Michigan. The crawl had evidence of water, including three dead sump pumps lying in the corner, but no water at the time, and actually stayed pretty dry until snowmelt a few weeks ago. Long story short, the existing sump died, and quite a bit of dirt has washed away from around the sump basin on account of cracked drain tile and overflow. I intend to replace the drainage around the inside cinder-block wall of the crawl, and will probably have to have a foundation firm in to check out the support under my now-visible footers. In the meantime I got a new 1/2 HP sump in, hooked it up to the same 1 1/4 in. pipe the previous sump was hooked up to, added a check valve (which was conspicuously missing from the previous 4 sump pumps) and it has been running every 5-10 minutes ever since. Outside the house, which sits up probably three feet higher than the neighbors yard adjacent, about 8 feet south of the crawlspace wall, a 6" metal pipe sticks 2-3" out of the ground with a perforated cap. When the sump runs, that pipe overflows, pushing off the cap and draining water into the yard, and ultimately down the slope into the neighbors yard. When the sump doesn't run, the water level in that pipe is only 3-4" below ground level (considerably higher than the level in the sump basin). Not knowing much about drainage, and being a good neighbor, this seems odd to me. Shouldn't this pipe drain out to the ditch at the road, and not just into the yard, 8' from the house? Is it possibly plugged up, or collapsed?

I have a 220v, 3/4hp well pump in my basement. It is in a small "room," about 6 x 8 with the basement concrete walls on 2 sides, the stairway on another and paneling that separates this area from the finished part of the basement on the 4th side. The 4th wall also has a hollow-core interior door which is kept closed. The pump typically runs for only 30 seconds or so but may cycle frequently when the clothes or dishwasher is running or someone is showering. It's about 2' high and sits about 4' off the floor supports by two pipes going into the concrete wall. Looking for ideas on the best way to reduce the noise level into the finished part of the basement. I could put insulation between the studs but don't know what I could do about the door short of replacing with with a solid door. I have thought about building a "hood" for the pump but it would need to be pretty big to allow air space around for cooling. Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated. I don't want to spend a lot because I've lived with it for a number of years and the basement is used only for occasional TV watching while exercising or playing acoustic guitar. But if there are some low cost ideas, I'm all ears. :)