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Do you have a rain collection system?
I just finished my green house and I want to build a rain barrel system to use for water in it.
I had a pretty good idea how I wanted to put a faucet in a plastic barrel, but did some online searching to see if there might be a better way. And I came across a site that was all about catching rain water and it said that a 1200 sq ft roof will dump 700 gallons with a 1" rain. My house roof is 2100 sq ft so I am guessing it would tally about 1500 gallons per inch. I was talking with Karla about it and we both agree that our next improvement here is going to be gutters and a large collection tank. I mean we can do a lot of hand watering with , say, 3000 gallons of rain water. Any of y'all have a collection system ? I'd like to work up to having a tank on the house, shop and barn. |
We have 5 55 gal black (former) pickle barrels, 3 set up around the house and 2 are waiting for homes near the fire pit. We used these http://store.rainbrothers.com/produc...verter%29.html to connect to gutters.....they are idiot proof (thank goodness) and worked great. We didn't have a drought this summer, but we did have some dry stretches....the barrels provided more than enough water for my small garden.
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There may be better suggestions, but I intend to bury a cistern and pipe all my roof rain to it. I will then pump it to locations I want to water from. I will catch it in barrels from downspouts along the way where possible, with a passive overflow to the cistern.
We need the tank underground due to below zero winter temps, and also algae is a problem with our 425 gallon above ground tank. One needs to catch the rain when it happens to fill the needs when it isn't available. |
Yep, that's all we use for the gardens. Added 3 more tanks since this picture was made.
http://i748.photobucket.com/albums/x...ictures338.jpg We started out with 12-55 gallon barrels and that got to be a headache. Started searching Craig's list for tanks. Be careful and make sure you know what they have been used for too. |
My wife and I have five rain barrels, and we intend to add three more. You will be amazed at how much water is collected even from a light rain. I have two sets that are tandum...when the first barrel maxes out, the water begins flowing to the second barrel. Spigots at the bottoms of both barrels. Each of mine is a 55 gallon drum (plastic). I fitted screens for the tops of all of mine to keep the mosquitos out and it also acts as a filter to prevent leaves from getting in, as well. I bought diverters on line. I can switch the diverter off in the winter and on in the spring. Good luck. Very much worth the effort.
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We have an underground cistern. It's not the cheapest option, but it came with the house. We can water the garden, water animals, wash cars, water the lawn, and still have left over.
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Pheasant- Did you have to cut the tops out or were they bunged somehow? All I see around here are sealed.
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I only used rainwater at my last house -- 3 3000 gal black water tanks from Tractor supply using a metal 2400 sf. roof for catchment. A 4" rain would fill the two primary tanks and anything after that would flow into the 3rd tank (which wasn't plumbed into the house). I used a roof washer (10' L shaped sewer pipe downspout between roof and tank with a cleanout at the end). Then ran the water through a chlorine injector and ag filter. You wouldn't need the latter for watering the garden.
At my current house I have a 350 gal black tank on the shed, a 1500 gal black tank on the rear of the house and two square crate tanks (550 gal. total) on the front. These are all used for garden only and I didn't bother with roof washers. I figured if stuff built up in them I could clean them out. |
I only use rain water at my house. When I built it I had an 8,000 gal tank poured just outside the back door. Top was at ground level so it served as a back patio. House gutters all plumbed into it.
Also have a 275 gal tote under a gutter on a small building by my garden for watering there. Kathie |
We use the Rain Brothers system which simple to install and sealed. Taking it down for the winter is also easy.
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We have rain water system. Part of it is dismantled now since we put in two underground tanks (2400 gallons) to store spring water and they stay full so we took apart part of the rain collection. Everything you want to learn about water can be found at one of the sites below:
http://greywateraction.org/ http://www.harvestingrainwater.com/ http://www.oasisdesign.net/index.htm |
If you want a huge system, you'll need a big tank.
Medium sized system can be linked together. Greenhouses can benefit from black barrels, they will absorb/put off heat during the winter. This set-up can be added onto with as many as you need... http://www.billyjoesfoodfarm.com/1/p...arrel-diy.html This is one we did just for carrying around in the back of the Mule, to water baby trees and such where there is no water... http://www.billyjoesfoodfarm.com/1/p...trash-can.html |
Redirecting water runoff from the roof or other impermeable surfaces to mulch basins, swales or other earthworks is another option to huge tanks. Good books:
http://www.harvestingrainwater.com/ I like huge tanks, myself! :) The cost, not so much. Pond liner with strawbales and metal frame Intex brand pools can get you 5000+ gallons pretty cheap. Not permanent, but they are good for directing water to them for one or two season storage (establishing trees). We're still working on getting set up to put in some permanent tanks. pumping water up above the house to large tanks is our critical path. I think we'll need at least 14 psi for an on-demand propane hot water system to use as backup to solar hot water. |
Hi,
This is my system: http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects...inCol/Main.htm Pretty easy to put together and not too expensive. We drained it for last winter, but I left about 1/3 rd in the tank for this winter to see how it does -- I think it will be OK as there is plenty of room for the ice to expand. I've collected a few other homemade systems here: http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/Water/Water.htm Found the Texas Manual on Rainwater Harvesting to be quite helpful. Gary |
I built a small metal roof. At the end of the slant I placed a gutter. That feeds two 275 gallon tanks. The roof is ten feet from the ground. The two tanks are side by side and four feet off the ground. This gravity feeds my rain water to my hoop house.
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Here's a really good article from the University of Hawaii. Out in Hawaii, it's not simply a clever idea, but one of the only sources available for water in some areas.
This is a very long article, but there are tons of pictures and you'll come out the back end of it light years ahead of when you went in. It covers types of tanks, types of harvest, methods of cleaning the water as well as the benefits and drawbacks... http://www.ctahr.hawaii.edu/oc/freepubs/pdf/RM-12.pdf |
I have 2 of the 275 gallon totes. I believe I will hook these up to my shop roof first.
Rainfall is so sketchy here. We had 2" last week and that was the first measurable rain since early September. My long term goal is to install tanks on the house and any other roof we have to help water the trees and garden. I need the capacity to catch and hold as much as possible when it does rain. I think I will explore using grey water from the showers here too. Thanks for the replies and links. Keep 'em coming. |
When we built our barn we added a 3000 gallon underground cistern and a shallow water well pump. For the past few years it’s been the only water we’ve used on our property. Off the 60x40 roof we get about 1100 gallons per inch. This year was the first year we’ve run it dry watering trees etc. during our drought.
They key IMHO is the pump, two years ago I bought a fairly decent shallow well pump that generates 65 PSI and has a pressure shut-off and protection from overheating. Pump #1 lasted about 8 months, and never vhad decent pressure. We’re in the process of having our house built now, and when we talked to the builder about adding another rainwater collection system he said why bother, our 9 acre pond is a few million gallon reservoir, why not just pump water from there. So that’s the next plan, either a windmill or solar pump that will work from our pond. Chuck |
We have a 3500 gallon tank setup to catch rain off our 1800 sq ft roof. When we built it we thought we would use it for watering the garden and trees during the many dry spells we have here in AZ. But at the same time we did that we seperated our grey water from our black water and piped that out to the garden and trees. We find that that more than takes care of all our plant watering needs, and then some. We recently built a sand filter and now let our excess run through it into a pond, that waters all the animals as well. Had I known how well it was going to work, I probably would have skiped the rain collection all together. Instead, we now keep that for back-up drinking water in case we ever have an issue with the well.
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Here is our monster list of rain water sites. I have not updated it in a while so there are sure to be some dead links but most should be good. We spent a long time planning our water collection here. It was worth taking more time to plan so as not to waste money.
Rainwater list of sites: Sites re Water issues: Rain Water Harvesting, Gray Water and Water Storage, including World Health Organization sites re Water projects in developing countries which are also good projects for any rain water project. 1. The Eco Tipping Points Project (India) http://www.ecotippingpoints.org/ETP-...rainwater.html 2. Rain Water Harvesting (huge site with great information from all over the world) http://akash-ganga-rwh.com/RWH/WaterHarvesting.html 3. More projects from India http://www.karmayog.com/library/rwh14.htm 4. Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond (we have this book and he is considered one of the top US experts on Rain Water Harvesting) http://www.harvestingrainwater.com/ http://www.harvestingrainwater.com/r...inforesources/ 5. Rainwater Harvesting. Org site http://rainwaterharvesting.org/ 6. Rain water Demo sites http://www.harvestingrainwater.com/r...tration-sites/ 7. Do it yourself Water projects http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/Water/Water.htm 8. Oasis Design site (we have this book) http://www.oasisdesign.net/index.htm 9. State of Virginia’s Rainwater Harvesting Guide and laws http://www.cabellbrandcenter.org/Vir...g%20Manual.pdf 10. State of Texas’ Rain water guide http://www.twdb.state.tx.us/publicat...3rdedition.pdf 11. NCSU Stormwater Engineering Group http://www.bae.ncsu.edu/stormwater 12. NCSU Biological and Agricultural Engineering Department http://www.bae.ncsu.edu/ 13. NCSU Cooperative Extension Service http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/ 14. American Rainwater Catchment Systems Association http://www.arcsa.org/ 15. International Rainwater Catchment Systems Association http://www.ircsa.org/index.htm 16. Texas A&M Rainwater Harvesting http://rainwaterharvesting.tamu.edu/index.html 17. Rainwater Harvesting in India http://www.aboutrainwaterharvesting.com/default.htm 18. Rainwater Harvesting in the UK http://www.rainharvesting.co.uk/ 19. Montana State University Rainwater Harvesting http://www.montana.edu/wwwpb/pubs/mt9707.html 20. Efficient Landscape Irrigation http://www.bae.ncsu.edu/bae/programs...ion/publicat/w NORTH CAROLINA sites for Rain Water Harvesting (includes articles about Drought and local news about rain water): 21. Water Harvesting at NC State University http://www.bae.ncsu.edu/topic/waterharvesting/ 22. Business selling rain systems / Rain Water Solutions: http://www.rainwatersolutions.com/ 23. News articles about Rain Water “come back” in style to Harvest: (most mention NC too even if the paper is from someplace else) http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article...EWS/809010373/ http://www.dailycamera.com/news/2008...ase-shortages/ http://www.prlog.org/10096416-grs-ra...ng-demand.html http://www.slideshare.net/nacaa/urba...-presentation/ http://ashevillageinstitute.blogspot...g-post_29.html http://www.sacbee.com/110/story/972737.html http://www.alternet.org/water/97455/...n_in_the_u.s./ http://www.news-record.com/content/2...e_of_rainwater http://www.star-telegram.com/nationa...ry/873491.html http://www.off-grid.net/2008/08/31/free-water/ 24. Urban Waterways (an instruction book on how to pump the water collected / from NC State University http://www.bae.ncsu.edu/stormwater/P...sterns2006.pdf - |
We have a 1000 gallon cistern fed from our roof. Right now it is just capped off. By I plan on building a small greenhouse over it and taking advantage of some geo-thermal action.
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