Originally Posted By: Walter Engelking This post was automatically imported from our archived forum.
I just inspected an old 150 year old farm house, and found a huge concrete cistern below a trap door in the middle of the living room. It does not appear to have any active inlets, but did have half a foot of water in the bottom.
I reported its existance, and potential safety hazzard, (and the lead pipe to the bottom) but nothing further.
I’ve never seen one inside before, and would appreciate any comments you folks might have regarding these.
Originally Posted By: phinsperger This post was automatically imported from our archived forum.
Many have been knocked out to expand basement space but I still often see them - unused. Have yet to see any with water in them anymore. The concern is of course the moisture that will be getting into the floor boards and joists/beams etc.
You indicated that there were no active inlets. Was the bottom of the cistern below the basement/crawspace floor?
Originally Posted By: Walter Engelking This post was automatically imported from our archived forum.
The cistern is at least 10-12 feet deep. There is a an adjacent 4 foot deep crawl space (which gets wet from reverse grade and a broken laundry discharge pipe). There is also a adjacent 7 foot deep partial basement with no floor drains, as the sewer piping is above in the crawl space.
I think this should be filled with concrete or clay, but don’t have the background to make that kind of recommendation.