Door advice

[whatsreallygoingon]

Hi all

I've had a couple of recent leaks through the bottom of my kitchen door. I've been investigating today - the internal weep holes were pretty clogged up - I've sorted that bit, and water now seems to pass through to the external weep hole.

The other potential issue (just based on an educated guess) is that I have decking outside - between the nearest part of the decking and the bottom of the door - there is a gap which is old ceramic tile. It's higher than the concrete below the decking so I imagine (I haven't actually seen this) that water is collecting and building up in that gap.

Would a possible solution here to be to chop a bit out of the decking, be it holes or bigger chunks, in order for that build up of water to pass down to the concrete underneath the decking, thus eliminating the build up in the gap between the door and the decking, or am I over-simplifying that?

Two pictures of said gap attached.

Cheers

 

[accelerator]

If you look at a lot of external doors, the opening will be a couple of inches above ground level. If you look at yours, the door entrance is actually very low to the ground. So yes, the problem will be caused by rain pooling on your decking and overflowing over the door frame.

Essentially you are going to need drainage outside the door frame. So yes, chopping away some of the decking near the door will improve matters. However, it still might not be enough in heavy rain if the top of the rest of your decking is water tight. So, in summary, you need to improve drainage from your decking (possibly by adding drainage holes in it), and then consider a drainage channel right next to the door frame.

 

[whatsreallygoingon]

If you look at a lot of external doors, the opening will be a couple of inches above ground level. If you look at yours, the door entrance is actually very low to the ground. So yes, the problem will be caused by rain pooling on your decking and overflowing over the door frame.

Essentially you are going to need drainage outside the door frame. So yes, chopping away some of the decking near the door will improve matters. However, it still might not be enough in heavy rain if the top of the rest of your decking is water tight. So, in summary, you need to improve drainage from your decking (possibly by adding drainage holes in it), and then consider a drainage channel right next to the door frame.

Thanks. When you say a drainage channel next to the frame - what form would that need to take?

Struggling to think what that would look like.

 

[accelerator]

Well, I wouldn't call myself a drainage expert, but if you cut away an inch of the decking nearest the door, you would then have a little channel for drainage. How effective it is would depend on how close the ground/concrete underneath it is. Also, it might not look that nice and might collect leaves etc.

So, the alternative would be to stop water pooling on the decking by drilling some drainage holes (if there aren't sufficent gaps between the decking already).

Otherwise, you could consider lowering the whole decking I guess, although that's more complex.

 

[whatsreallygoingon]

Well, I wouldn't call myself a drainage expert, but if you cut away an inch of the decking nearest the door, you would then have a little channel for drainage. How effective it is would depend on how close the ground/concrete underneath it is. Also, it might not look that nice and might collect leaves etc.

So, the alternative would be to stop water pooling on the decking by drilling some drainage holes (if there aren't sufficent gaps between the decking already).

Otherwise, you could consider lowering the whole decking I guess, although that's more complex.

Makes sense. Thanks again