Floor Drain Backing Up: What's first?


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Old 06-08-08, 10:35 AM
C
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Floor Drain Backing Up: What's first?

Hello everyone!

Well, yesterday evening, I installed Fleck water softener and everything went perfect. I installed it in our utility closet, located in our basement. In the same closet reside the water heater and furnace, with the sump pump being on the other side of the wall in the crawl space.

Today I decided to manually run the back flush on the softener to test it out. I have both softener drain tubes going to a floor drain in the same closet, and after about 15 seconds, water started coming up!!!

So I shut everything down and after a few minutes, the water went down to within a couple of inches from the floor. I pulled the drain cover off and started fishing out stuff (pencil, some pipe insulation that must have fallen in there, as well as some goopy mud looking stuff - washed my arm pretty good after that).

Visually, the drain looks like a hole in concrete, rather than a PVC pipe or iron pipe laid in concrete. I figured since the sump pump is on the other side of the wall in the crawl space, that there would be horizontal run to it from this drain. When I was fishing around in the drain with my arm, I couldn't feel the horizontal run (if there is one?) as I could just feel goopy stuff down there. Actually feels like there might be pebbles and small stones down there.

I live in a townhome which was built in the late 70s.

Any help? Should I just go buy a shop vac and suck everything out? Use a snake? Should there be a horizontal run to the sump pump basin as it's only about 5 feet away?

Or since this drains slowly, should I just route the softener's drain tubes through the wall to the sump basin? I heard this can cause premature failure of the pump (brine water).

Thanks!
Gabe
 
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Old 06-08-08, 05:42 PM
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first you will have to make sure that there is actually a drain line hooked up the the floor drain, it really doesn't sound like it. try cleaning it a little more and inspect with a good light.
but if you can get your arm inside it i would say no.

if that is the case you will need to run the water softner lines to a good drain. yes it might cause premature failure of the sump pump, unless you have a stainless steel or plastic impeller.

life begins when the kids leave home and the dog dies
 
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Old 06-09-08, 07:31 AM
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Now that I've looked closer, the floor drain is indeed a vertical metal tube. I couldn't tell from before since there was some dirt, etc.

So if I am able to put the length of my arm (from my hand to my elbow) in this drain and not feel any other connection... then it's safe to assume there's no horizontal run? That the water just drains back into the ground, and the sump basin nearby is just maintaining the proper ground water level?

BTW, I'm going to route the water heater drain tubes to the pump basin. Thanks Speedwrench. What's the proper way to do this? Meaning, should I just drill two holes into the sump basin lid, and secure it? Or do I need to have the air gap clearance between the tube and cover?

Cheers,
Gabe
 
 

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