OT stanky basement!

For the 99.999% of you that do not follow my life religiously...we added an additional parcel to the farm this past summer which included the original homestead. House was built in the 1840's. Over 20 rooms, each with a fireplace. One of those fireplaces had an issue and the whole place went up in smoke in the early 1930's. 1.5 original stone foundation walls from the first place survived, so they filled in the remaining walls with block and built the now much smaller home. Original settlers sold the place several years ago and that fella jacked the house up so as to give just about 6' of headroom down there and put modern block across the top of everything. So you have three evolutions of masonry in the walls. This fella also removed about 24" of the ugly old concrete floor all around the perimeter and put in a drain system with two sumps that pump any water out to the front ditch. Then he sold it to owner 3. Nice young couple but they put a litter box down there...need I say more. They also covered the cement floor with rubber tiles and it would get kinda slimey under there. Then they moved and sold it to me.

Enter me. All of the junk/filth has been removed. No flooring or carpet allowed in the basement. I waited until the dry wintertime and mopped the whole thing with bleach water. No real help. The issue is a fairly strong moldy/musty, almost sour smell. I cannot really blame the cats. Their stuff is gone and it does not really smell like that. Doesn't smell too bad upstairs most of the time. Basement is staying pretty dry, even in the fall. Pumps were not running excessively. Just would really like to get rid of the smell. Any ideas how?

I have used ozone generators on some rentals. I rented the units locally. They worked pretty well on none mold types of odors. If it is mold based then you need to kill the mold.

I also would try to seal the masonry walls some how. The fact that moisture is coming through the walls makes it ripe for odors/smells.

Dave- is there a floor drain or other drain piping that may have had the trap dry up, and is allowing the sump or sewer gas to get back in? If no one is using the shower/sinks/drains, the water may have evaporated. We used vegetable oil in the floor drains at my wife's school to stop the odor.

Don't know if this will work for you but I had a fuel oil leak in our basement, wiped it all up but it smelled bad upstairs. Lovely young wife would be home in 4 hrs. I opened the windows up stairs and the walkout basement door. I put cut up onions on the floor stomped on these and ground them into the cement as best I could mixed in some charcoal, ground that in also. waited about 2 hours shoveled all that out, washed the floor down with dawn dish soap, put a window fan in the basement door blowing outside. Shut upstairs windows 30 minutes before wife came home. Let the exhaust fan run until supper time. (about 2 hrs) Lovely young wife never knew about it until I spilled the beans. Might be worth a try.

You may need a dehumidifier down there.

I don't know what kind of heating system you have, but I added an Ultraviolet light to my furnace duct system. We run the fan on constant low speed for circulation. The ultraviolet light kills mold spores. We have had water leaks in a few times, and it takes out the mustiness in a couple of days. An electronic air cleaner can also remove other pollutants.

There's two of them sitting in the corner. Not needed in winter. I'll figure out "why two" in the next few months. Likely one is on the fritz.

This house has hot water heat. That's a new one to me. Creates a bit of a void in ventilation downstairs. Although the boiler does come on and vent air up the chimbley.

Yeah...no. I'll not be stomping onions and charcoal into 7-800 sq ft of old uneven cement...well...NEXT!

My parents would spread lime on the downstairs floors

Get some Chlorine dioxide. Mix the two parts and leave it down there for two days, no more smell.

That's a good one. I had to stop and give it some thought. Thing is, there has been no gap in occupancy. I took possession the day the cat people left. I use the kitchen and bathrooms frequently. I have thought that the odd assortment of old floor drains might be the source. I found out AFTER I bought the house that the floor drains enter into the tile under my fields. Yes, after five years I found out recently that my fields are tiled. Tile has obviously collapsed long ago. Don't know what becomes of what goes down those drains...but it is a project I have planned.

Can you imagine owning property and not knowing the neighbors are tied into your drain field?

Mold is involved, but I think it is long dead. I do not see moisture above the norm in any wall. It's there, of course, but the walls are not wet. What I think this is, is 80 years of pre-drain tile flooding and mold. I think the smell is literally soaked into the masonry if that makes sense. I don't know how to get it out. I'll keep at it, I guess.

Wrong time of year but hanging bunches of sweet clover down there will take care of it. I know it works because I have done it. Since you can't get live sweet clover now I wonder if hanging some slabs of alfalfa would work the same? Won't hurt nothing to try.

Toss a couple skunks down there with a hound dog and you shouldn't smell the cat litter no more! LOL

JD has a good suggestion. The dog got skunked & I shot the skunk against the back of the house. MY coat was hanging in the kitchen & when I went in any building people held their nose. I got another coat & a friend loaned me his oxygen generator for a week.Smells much better now. Google OX generators.They are listed for mold smells.

Sorry- should be ozone generator.

Dave.........put about 1/4-cup of garden SULFUR inna ashtray on spread out newspaper and BURN-ITT!!!!......used to do that to some slum rental apartments that'd make yer eyes water. Better'n chlorine or perfume .......tearless Dell

After you have thrown everything you can at the smell and it doesn't go away, try Zinnser Shellac. It is designed to seal in smells. I purchased a slab house that had cats. I tried everything on the market to get the cat smell out, nothing worked until I bought 5 gallons of Zinnser Shellac. Poured paint on the floor and used a squeegee to spread the paint out. 2 coats later, smell gone.

did you mix up bleach water and spray the walls? Not an expert but masonary is all the same, it all holds moisture and mold. You need to run a dehumidifier even if you don't think so.

I have managed some very large apartment complexes in the past, and believe it or not, my worst nightmare was the ferret. I have had great success in using shellac. It is the ONLY product that allowed me to get rid of the horrible odor. I would say that perhaps you could give it a try and see what happens. The only problem I can foresee would be ventilating the area you are working in. Do NOT do this without having a means of allowing fresh air into the basement! Open doors and fans would be an absolute necessity. Good luck! From, johnlobbs SWMBO

You will need a dehumidifier. Any thing underground gets damp and smelly. The dehumidifier works fast. They are relatively cheap and portable.

Got a product called odoban from sams or walmarrt works great even stinky front load washers.

Dave,
I bought a house few years back in foreclosure. Previous owners had 5 dogs and lord knows how many cats. Neighbors said they didn't use litter boxes :shock: Before the bank had it fumigated, realtor had you sign a waiver (health issues) before they'd let you in. When we looked at it (after fumigation) no waiver required, but the realtor opened all doors/windows before we arrived and our eyes still burned while walking around. Ripped out the carpeting within an hour of closing. Ended up ripping up all other flooring (tile, fake wood) later. Used Odoban over the entire house, painted the sub-floors and 1 foot up the walls with Killz. No more odors.