Elevator Pit References

From: Gary R. Carlson

To: Sani-Tred

This message is for Bill and Randy.

I wanted to let you know that your product worked great.

Let me refresh your memory what I had to do to the my home Elevator Shaft Pit that was flooding after each rain.

After construction of our home, the Elevator Shaft Pit kept accumulating water after each rainfall. Since the house was under warranty, our contractor used some type of sealant (sold locally at a home improvement store). The flooding stopped and the product lasted about a year. After about a year or so, each time it rained I had to pump water out of the pit. The pit is about 18 inches in depth and when we had some heavy rain the water raised to about 12 inches. I fought this for about 2 years until I decided to look out on the Internet under "Waterproofing". My brother who was in construction for years told me that there was some types of rubber base products on the market that would solve my problem. That’s why I looked out on the Web.

After looking at your Web Site (which was excellent), I decided to talk to you in more detail on what I needed to do to prep the existing surface. You were extremely helpful. Based on your technical expertise, I decided to try your product.

The hardest part of the project was removing the old sealant my Contractor originally put down to try to seal the Elevator Shaft Pit. I used paint remover and some of it came up easily however, about 50 % of it would not come up. I tried several things to remove the remainder of the older sealant. Finally, I rented a heavy-duty grinder and purchased a 5-inch wire brush that I attached to the grinder. This removed the old sealant but, what a mess. I got up about 95% of the old sealant up. After I removed the sealant we got some heavy rain and the pit flooded worse than it ever did before. I assume I opened up all the pores and that allowed the water to flow in without any restriction. This was the second hardest part of the project. It took me almost a week to get the pit dry and luckily we had a dry spell.

I finally applied the Permaflex, which went on very thick, and I was very impressed. I knew from the beginning this product was going to work. After it dried I mixed up the LRB and the TAV and applied it per the instructions. Again I was impressed with SANI-TRED Permaflex Product. After the LRB/TAV dried I applied a second coat of Permaflex. We experienced some heavy rain and the next morning I found a very small puddle of water. After talking to you, I was told that block requires three coats of Permaflex. You suggested I mix up a LRB and TAV (5% of TAV to LRB) and apply it to the block wall (the other three walls were poured concrete and only required two coats of Permaflex). This solved the minor leak in the block wall.

Since then we have had about 3 inches of rain in two days and I have repeatedly checked the Elevator Shaft Pit for water – Guess what? NO WATER.

I want to thank you for your technical help, your professionalism, and for producing a product that actually works.

Thanks again,

Gary R. Carlson