Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler Anyone ever fix hairline cracks in a basement wall

Are they surface cracks or through the wall? High pressure injection is generally the best for large cracks. There isn't any DIY system that works all that well, sorry. I went through this a couple years ago at work and had to bring in a specialty contractor. We tried all kinds of epoxy repairs and they just didn't cut it.

We didn't even notice the cracks but when we had the house inspected, they showed up on the report as not being all the wag through (surface only) and not leaking. Recommended resolution was just to "monitor the area" and no repair was currently needed.

Well that is fine if we weren't going to finish the basement, but I don't want this thing to get bigger once it is inside a finished wall and start leaking 5 years from now. That is why I don't think that the professional crack repair would work because it is just filling in a small crack that isn't very deep. I doubt that they could inject the epoxy into the crack after sealing it up and putting the straw like injection tubes in place. The seal would probably just go into the crack and leave no open spAce for the epoxy to be injected to.

Maybe I am making a bigger deal out of it than needs be.
On a side note it is a walkout ranch that was built 12 years ago so hopefully everything has settled for the most part.

My house was 50 some years old before the basement walls started to crack.

So true.

I think sealing the crack from the outside is more effective, but if this one isn't showing on the outside then you might not need to worry about it.

Our first house had a few small cracks in the poured foundation. Talked to a foundation guy and he said even if you patch it, if you have a water issue it will finds it way through the cement/floor anyway. How old is the house? Cosmetic cracks are not unusual, look at side walks and driveways.

I would make sure that your foundation around your house is graded/slopes "away" so water doesn't collect next to your house. Do you have a sump pump?

House is 12 years old, and the cracks are "under" the garage area. By that I mean that the particular foundation wall is shared with the inside (connected to the house) part of the garage, so you can't slope away from it there, but the yard does slope nicely away all around. There is a sump pump as well....

Nick: If they're more than 1/4" wide, there are many, and/or they're very long, get a basement pro's consult first.

Otherwise, use hydraulic cement. Technically, they need to be fixed from the outside, which an be a costly horror of digging up the yard around your house.

Mine, of course, are directly under the deck. It would have to get ripped out to reach those areas.

Your own repairs will fail every few years. Just redo as needed.

When patches are done, use UGL brand waterlock prime. No other brand actually works.

There was a guy named Earl Proulx who gave advice for years in Yankee magazine. He died. I think I have a replacement to nominate.

The cracks are very small... Probably less than 1/8" if that wide, and about a foot long for one, and about 18 inches for the other. Since the "outside" of the wall is under the garage, there is no way to get to that side of the wall.

So the trick becomes that if I need to keep patching, it will end up behind a finished wall right in the main part of the basement. Again, it isn't leaking or anything, I am just wondering if there is anything "preventative" that I can do to try to assist in preventing it from getting any worse.