Before my parents moved into our current house, the water heater was apparently in the kitchen. The FHA made them dig out a spot in the basement to put the water heater. So basically what we have is a crawlspace basement…with an area about 15 feet long, 3.5 to 4 feet wide, and about 3.5 feet deep that is bricked off all the way around with cinderblock bricks to hold the surrounding dirt in place. When it rains a lot (usually 2-3 days), water runs in due to the hole being “under” the ground level.

A pedestal sump pump (with motor above water level and a propeller on the bottom) has been down there since we’ve moved in…and it has been changed out with a new one a few different times over the years. One year we had a tropical storm pass right over us. It knocked out the power and that hole filled with about 1 foot of filthy dirt water, since the pump couldn’t get power to pump it out. I dipped all that crap out with a bucket that night. Dried the water heater…it re-lit, thankfully. The heating/air machine also was fine (that’s also down there and closer to the sump hole than the water heater is).

I dug the sump hole deeper after that incident – it’s about a 40 gallon sump hole now, about 3 feet across. I lined the big hole with cement (it was previously just a dirt bottom and still is in a lot of other areas). I installed a new pedestal sump pump, along with a battery backup sump pump (submersible) operated by a marine battery. However, the battery backup pump seems to have died/frozen up. I’ve looked all over for a solution online, or for a better backup pump that can pump dirty water without getting clogged and freezing up. They don’t seem to exist.

Any suggestions on a backup pump for when the power goes out? The battery backup pumps are quite horrible with dirty water. They might work well in a nice and clean sump pump in a new house…but not for what I need it to do. I know they make “water powered pumps”…but that’s not all that great, either.