Damp and a french drain

[paiop]

We have a 165 year old house which has water ingress due to the fact that the ground outside is higher than the inside. We read that putting in a french drain can help with this. We just cannot find a specialist to do this for us. The company in our town we have contacted have told us they are no longer keeping this side of their business open, other further afield ones do not get back to our enquiries.
We would instruct a builder to do this but need to be sure of exactly what we need to happen. As otherwise he wants to vandex everything and water proof it all.

Is there a step by step guide we can give him to follow on french drains?
Thanks in advance- hoping @pigletjohn might be able to step in and give some advice

Bumping as I'm in as a similar spot!

Same!

Have you tried contacting ground works companies rather than looking for a french drain specialist? They may be able to advise as they deal with drainage and so should be able to propose a solution.

French drains are hardly rocket science, though digging out around a house 1m wide by x amount deep is a lot of work. You’d also need specialist advice on whether to ‘tank’ the outside, or just use a membrane, and tank the inside.
It’s a fairly hefty job. Is there falling ground for the drain to run off to?

No falling ground but we were thinking to link it up with our drains that take rainwater from gutters. Good point about the tanking - this is basically what our builder is suggesting

Have you had advice from a surveyor- definitely not someone selling damp proof courses or using a damp meter.

I was advised I needed a French drain. Turned out I needed nothing of the sort.

Surveyor suggested an evaporation zone might work but now we have dug out some of the high ground we have discovered quite how much water is sitting there and we basically need a way of getting it to run away - hence wanting to have a drain

We put a French drain in, DIY, 15years ago between our kitchen and a constantly running spring feed stream above floor level. I know that sounds a lot to take in but honestly it has really worked and that north facing, in shade wall hasn't had any damp or mould in our jumper wearing old property.

Well worth investigating. We haven't mucked about with tanking waterproofing or cement.
Lime pointing externally, lime plaster internally. Really good gutter taking the roof load to a proper drain.

We didn't dig out anything like a 1m as previous poster commented. It's literally a drain. Intercepting all the water flowing from 'uphill' down hill towards your property. I think we used an 18in bucket on a medium digger, backfilled with gravel.

Probably a spring job rather than now!

The brickwork is just exposed bricks? If so, as you’ve no doubt noticed, they will be sodden with water. I’d be tempted to dig it out, lay the drain in gravel, and if it’s not dangerous, leave the brickwork exposed to allow evaporation, but you’ll need months. Alternatively use a breathable membrane (properly‘integrated’ with the drain) and backfill with suitable stones, like 40mm ones. I would not consider tanking the outside while the brickwork is wet, you’ll get better results doing the inside.
How are the floors then if you have damp walls?

The wall is lime mortar and stone, plaster inside is lime. Floors are flagstones and cracks are damp next to the affected wall.
Wish we'd put the drain in during the summer but it was too dry to dig!

We have one leading to a soak away in the middle of the lawn. We connected the down pipes to it as well and now get a rebate from the water company as none of our surface water drains into the sewer system. It has solved all our damp problems too so a win win. We didn’t do any tanking but I can’t remember the exact makeup of it as it was so long ago now.

I recommend you join these two FB groups. They provide a wealth of information by knowledgeable people who own houses with these issues and know how to deal with them.

Traditional and Listed Building Advice
Your Old House UK - Repair and Conservation

Damp and French drains are two of the things which come up most frequently in these groups!

@RabbitRussell yes, maybe 1m is excessive. However I would guess a diy job comes with no guarantee, whereas employing a company to engineer a solution to the damp may well require 1m if it’s down at foundation height. But you are not wrong.
OP how much is the height difference and how much needs to come out?

It's about 30cm lower inside than out. And we need to do about 3.5m. Will then need to run the drain underneath our utility room (which is also damp but we'll dig into the floor to place pipe) and then into our drain on the other side.

Sounds like you would want a builder / ground work company to do it then,
If it’s only that short distance you could dig it out (well a narrow trench along the wall) yourself in half a day, if you have somewhere to put the soil. At least then the damp won’t be getting any worse.

Why not use a soak away rather than run a drain under your house?

Nowhere for it to soak away to. Garden is mostly higher than house

Our garden slopes towards our house, the builders just dug quite deeply so the pipes angled downwards away from the house and the soak away was lower than the house about 6m away. I guess depends how much higher the garden is and how much you wanted to dig!

2nd @CutesyUserName suggestion of the 2 Facebook groups. I've recently joined them to help with a damp old house and they're a real source of expertise. They might even be able to recommend someone to carry out the work.

I also wanted to suggest thr

I also wanted to suggest the Facebook groups recommended by a PP. Definitely join them.
This book shows instructions on how to install a French drain. Make sure you don't affect the (usually pretty shallow) foundations: The Victorian House Manual (2nd Edition): How They Were Built, Improvements & Refurbishment, Solutions to All Common Defects - Includes Relevant ... ... Care and repair for this popular house type amzn.eu/61N8eG6

Thanks! Will have a look. I don't do Facebook but will defo look at the book

@ISeeTheLight any chance you might be able to take photos of the relevant pages? I have the heritage house book by him and I just want to check it's not just the same info