Recommissioning.....................a house

You say the house is about 25 years old?,, I would think the concrete tank was there to service the building of the house to start with, especially being a bricks and mortar house.

Using the concrete as a settling tank is not a bad way to help keep it clean, but it would be better if it recieved all the water from the roof as aside to "most" of it. You can just bet, the dirty side of the house gets into the house tank first,,,:(

I've lived with rain water for years, and never had a problem with stagnation issues, only leaking, and then contamination through that leaking,, (inground water tank very poorly constructed, too close to inground septic tank,,:eek:). When that was discovered, a new plastic tank went in,, and yuck,, doesn't matter what they say,,, nothing beats the taste of a good concrete tank, or even better, a corrigated iron tank,, :)

Theres also lots of different types of pre filters etc that you can get on the market now, but a couple that we have tried, haven't been much good. Thought it was me not fitting them in the right way, but even when plumbers have done it,, still no better.
I think probably the best way, is to have a very small, (100lt) tank just prior to your main tank to act as a rubbish trap. You can periodically clean it out to make sure its all good.

:( I miss the farm,,,

ahhhh,, the serenity,,,

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Originally Posted by crash

I would suggest dumbing both tanks and cleaning them - not hard just time consuming, then get a tanker in to fill at least one of them before moving in.
I would also suggest putting filter system on for atleast the drinking water.

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Yes, I'll do that I think. I haven't been able to get the pump at the concrete tank end fired up yet so I'll need to sort that out too.
There's a filter set up (2 cartridges) between the steel tank & the house already in place.

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Originally Posted by Chops

You say the house is about 25 years old?,, I would think the concrete tank was there to service the building of the house to start with, especially being a bricks and mortar house.

Using the concrete as a settling tank is not a bad way to help keep it clean, but it would be better if it recieved all the water from the roof as aside to "most" of it. You can just bet, the dirty side of the house gets into the house tank first,,,:(

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I can't see the tank being there to use while the house was being built. It's around 50-75m away (depending on which end of the house you're at). They would have been better off using a temporary tank or something along those lines.

The way the house is set up now, all the rainwater goes to the concrete tank. The steel tank is not hooked up to the house gutters & is only filled using the lower concrete tank pump.

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Originally Posted by spudboy

That would be sacrelige down here :eek: You obviously have a much better rainfall up there than we do down here in SA.

Scouse - we have a similar setup: a concrete tank close to the house to catch the water and another tank (higher up the block) to gravity feed back to the house. We also have no mains water.

I have left water in one of the tanks for well over a year and there is no nasty tastes or anything. As long as no daylight gets to the water, it should be fine even for very long periods.

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both my tanks are full to the top, thats south gippsland for ya:)

10000L is not much to have though on a house in the bush.what are the contours like there? even though it is rocky, what is the soil?
papa smurf

Hi Scott,

from memory DB and Ian have a large inground tank at the rear of their house at Thirlmere - 100k litres I think. I think theirs has a manhole for inspection or cleaning. Their house is fed directly from this tank - might pay to give them a ring or go there for breakfast.

We have above ground tanks on our block at Elong, both gal and plastic. We have been 12 months between visits and have never had a problem with the water quality. If anyting the plastic tank has a slight aftertaste where as the steel / gal tank always tastes good. I'd say there is nothing wrong with the water in the concrete tank.

Erich

Hey Scott that house looks Huge!!!

What tank does the pool run off?
yes ours is concrete (107,000L) and it never had filters on when we moved in, water tasted OK but we fitted filters anyway.

Now if your on tank water only due to location..I would imagine your on septic tanks too, If you haven't already I would see what condition they are in too. we decided to have ours cleaned out although not full the septic was not doing well and was starting to smell can be due to what they put down the drains etc.

Looking at the place from a wider google view (worked out where it is :D). I'd be giving some serious consideration to fire as well, it looks a bit vulnerable from the east, but at least that's not the worse side. There's a bit of a gully between that place and the neighbour to the north. If you want to do any extensions etc in the future bushfire will have a significant impact on what you can do or use to build from.



Martyn

the place we are in the process of buying has a number of tanks fed off of one central tank, this first tank is about average size and is a settling tank once the crap settles the clearer water is piped to the house tanks...

MAYBE thats what it is...


digger

You'll have to invite Inc down with his little digger,,

or connect the two RR's with a chain:angel::wasntme:

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Originally Posted by Pedro_The_Swift

You'll have to invite Inc down with his little digger,,

or connect the two RR's with a chain:angel::wasntme:

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little digger?...you called it a little digger??... No no no.... its just cold today thats all:o:(


Ohh you mean a bobcat...:angel: