Anyone ever see a storm/downspout like this before?

JakeCK

I've been redoing my front flower beds and this is what is in place where my downspout connection is supposed to be. That corner is all gravel with a broken oversized drain tile. Which suggests someone has dug down and "repaired" something in this corner before. The downspout has never been connected since I've owned the house and instead flows out to the front lawn. That flexible drain got knocked off once and I did end up with a nice little leak in that corner of the basement when half of the roof dumped there.

I'm half tempted to dig down a few feet and find out what has been done to it but I don't want to open a can of worms and being all gravel it'll be a *****.

JakeCK

I'm specifically asking about the giant drain tile where a 3 or 4 inch drain tile would normally be. Not the running of the downspout out to the yard. I know that is done all the time.

bburd

It was typical in older homes for roof drainage to flow through clay tile drain pipes into dry wells, holes filled with rock under the lawn. Over time, the tile pipes frequently become crushed or clogged, leading to rainwater dumping at the foundation line and getting into the basement.

Someone made a quick and economical fix to get the water away from the foundation. 

JakeCK

bburd said:

It was typical in older homes for roof drainage to flow through clay tile drain pipes into dry wells, holes filled with rock under the lawn. Over time, the tile pipes frequently become crushed or clogged, leading to rainwater dumping at the foundation line and getting into the basement.

Someone made a quick and economical fix to get the water away from the foundation. 

If this is what this is, it is a bit odd that the front center downspout would have this when the drain for the the rest of the downspouts and below that the footer drain run right under it. 

The six other downspouts and the driveway have functioning drains. And there is also a separate footer drain tied to the city storms as well. The connection of all of that was actually just repaired when the front porch was. 

Steamhead

bburd said:

It was typical in older homes for roof drainage to flow through clay tile drain pipes into dry wells, holes filled with rock under the lawn. Over time, the tile pipes frequently become crushed or clogged, leading to rainwater dumping at the foundation line and getting into the basement.

Someone made a quick and economical fix to get the water away from the foundation. 

This only works with sandy soil. If the soil is clay, as in the Baltimore area, such dry wells don't work. Here, the proper procedure is to run your downspout drains to the street.

JakeCK

All clay here. 

bburd

The common factor in these solutions is the clay tile pipe, not so much what’s at the end. It is usually the pipe that gives trouble.

mattmia2

in ann arbor it is common in houses built before the municipal water system to have cisterns that drain tiles from the downspouts drain in to. i suspect that is the top of the cistern. there usually will be pipes in the basement from the cistern to allow you to take water out of it for things like laundry, Usually you see them with a 3 ft or so round stone cover on them.

PC7060

What @mattmia2 said, we had one at the old Victorian I grew up in. Most got filled in the 50s / 60s / 70s. 

JakeCK

No evidence in the basement of such pipes. No patches, or areas of replaced brick that stands out other than where the water line was replaced. But I can't rule this out though. The Parma reservoir wasn't built until 1934, my house was built in 28'. I do know the water line into the house has been replaced at least once. The last time was when they smashed all of the storm sewer connections. We found a brick and a 2x1 in the lateral. Yes a full intact brick and a piece of lumber was shoved into my storm lateral. That is all fixed now.

How big were these cisterns? 

https://www.clevelandwater.com/who-we-are/history#:~:text=Since our founding in 1856,surrounding region – grow and expand.

JakeCK

And the reservoir is actually right across the street from me. 

mattmia2

I don't know how deep they were but they were usually around 3 ft in diameter.

I have also seen cleanouts for sewer laterals that were like that where a piece of sewer tile was at ground level and a concrete or stone cap was set in the hub. Could have been part of a septic system too.

JakeCK

Clean out is at the side walk for both the sanitary and storm and have a concrete cap. Sanitary is 4" and the storm is a 6". House never had a septic. sewer's were laid out in the early 20's.

PC7060

The cistern we had was 6’ deep by 4’ square. All brick construction. 

mattmia2

This is a cistern that it looks like someone didn't know was there when they started digging up a driveway:

JakeCK

Oops.