Thread: Recommissioning.....................a house

Originally Posted by Papa Smurf

is odd that the big tank is below the house i thought it was tradition to put them above so they could just gravity feed back down.in my experience the more tanks the better they are a good investment,

I've only had experience with the regular abiove ground steel tanks but all the houses we've looked at in the area have big underground concrete tanks.
This house is slightly different in that the concrete tank is above ground but that's probably due to the lie of the land & also due to the fairly rocky ground. What's strange is that the concrete tank they've used is quite small in relation to the steel tank.
I think the steel tank is around 20-30000 litres whereas the concrete is around 10000 litres.

Originally Posted by Vern

just drop the water out of the tanks and get a tanker to put 20,000l back in, you could use the pump and existing water to flush out the storm water pipes back to the tank (circulate it from the tank to the roof), then you can get a tank cleaning mob to clean the tank if you must, but i reckon just flush it and refill it, who knows, if you dump it out, god might be nice enough to fill it back up

That would be sacrelige down here 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.

A pretty strange setup to send the water off the roof 50 metres downhill and then pump it back up to the house but there will probably be a good reason why it's set up this way. Is the steel tank on a stand higher than the house so that the house can be gravity fed ? Quite often older farm houses had a heat exchanger hot water service coupled to a wood stove. These HWS were not designed to operate at mains/pump pressure so it was done this way. In this setup I would expect the main tank to be larger than the 'house' tank. Is the concrete tank a settling tank where water from another source, creek or dam for example can be pumped and allowed to settle before being transferred to the house tank ?
Either way the house tank should be fairly clean with all the rubbish off the roof either in the pipe connecting the house to the tank or in the tank itself. Is it a closed concrete tank or an open tank ? Tank cleaning is a pretty simple task best done at the end of summer on a warm day when the tank is at its lowest level. There is usaully a brass drain plug on the opposite side of the tank to the outlet so that the tank can be drained. Some concrete tanks have a small concrete 'coffer dam' around the water outlet (inside the tank) or have the outlet higher than the bottom of the tank (and drain) so as not to pick up the crap from the bottom of the tank. First thing though, undo the drain cap off the PVC pipe at the tank and watch what comes out. Black water and stewed gumleaves are not uncommon.
Need to be careful though. Always have two of you when tank cleaning and be careful when working in a closed tank. Don't even think about entering a tank when its got more than a couple of feet of water in it and make sure you have two ladders, one for inside and one for outside.
Interesting thing though peoples attitudes to tank water. We live in the country and have raised our family on tank water. We have the chlorinated muck connected from the town supply and use it for the stock, garden and washing the car (restrictions permitting) and reckon the tank water is far superior to the town supply. The kids mates come up from town and bring their own water as they are afraid ? of the tank water being bug infested, polluted or whatever. When we go to town we take tank water with us as we reckon the chlorinated/flouridated muck is foul and it makes a rotten cup of tea. Interesting the difference in attitude.
Anyway there will be a good reason why the tanks on this property are configured the way they are, you just have to figure it out.

Deano

Originally Posted by Scouse

I've only had experience with the regular abiove ground steel tanks but all the houses we've looked at in the area have big underground concrete tanks.
This house is slightly different in that the concrete tank is above ground but that's probably due to the lie of the land & also due to the fairly rocky ground. What's strange is that the concrete tank they've used is quite small in relation to the steel tank.
I think the steel tank is around 20-30000 litres whereas the concrete is around 10000 litres.

i was just thinking how easily can the water from the roof/gutters be put into the steel water tank near the house.maybe they put it in that tank and then when that tank got full they put it in the smaller tank just for reserve so instead of pumping it up hill they let it run downhill and then when they need it they will just pump it up into the other tank.i dont find it odd that they are both above ground.just wondering what sort of area is it?
papa smurf

Originally Posted by DeanoH

A pretty strange setup to send the water off the roof 50 metres downhill and then pump it back up to the house but there will probably be a good reason why it's set up this way. Is the steel tank on a stand higher than the house so that the house can be gravity fed ? Quite often older farm houses had a heat exchanger hot water service coupled to a wood stove. These HWS were not designed to operate at mains/pump pressure so it was done this way. In this setup I would expect the main tank to be larger than the 'house' tank. Is the concrete tank a settling tank where water from another source, creek or dam for example can be pumped and allowed to settle before being transferred to the house tank ?

There's a few strange things about the property, the water tanks being just one of them.
The steel tank is level with the house floor so it could gravity feed when the tank was full & down to about 3/4 I guess.

There's a couple of creeks running through the land but nothing permanent that could be used as a supply.

I'll drop the cap off tomorrow & check the concrete tank out. There's a ladder up against it now so I'll climb up & have a look see.

I'm not concerned with the water quality as my Dad has rainwater & it's never been an issue. I am a believer in fluoride though but I haven't researched that side of things yet.

Originally Posted by Papa Smurf

i was just thinking how easily can the water from the roof/gutters be put into the steel water tank near the house.maybe they put it in that tank and then when that tank got full they put it in the smaller tank just for reserve so instead of pumping it up hill they let it run downhill and then when they need it they will just pump it up into the other tank.i dont find it odd that they are both above ground.just wondering what sort of area is it?
papa smurf

The house has been setup from day one with the concrete tank. There's no sign of the steel tank being connected to the house. The steel tank only looks like a recent addition too (maybe 5 years at a rough guess).
I can only think the bigger steel tank was added for more capacity as the concrete tank is relatively small compared to the size of the house.

The ground is quite rocky & undulating so I guess that's why they've fitted an above ground concrete tank. I'm not looking forward to fencing the joint but it will make for great 4x4ing .

Here's the house courtesy of Google:


The red circle is where the concrete tank is (under the tree). You can just see the last bit of the PVC pipe feeding it.

The blue circle is the steel tank near the house.

When l had rainwater tanks 6 in all of which 3 of which were concrete tanks with tin roofing to cover top the other 3 were fully enclosed pvc ones l installed on the property there was a local couple who used to come and clean them with a suction pump and suck the muck out the bottom of the tanks and wash down the sides completely cleaning them out.

You might have similar service in the area

You do need to clean out house gutters for dead leaves birds rats etc on regular basis

On most modern tanks they have bypass system which flushes the first 100 litres or so of water from the gutters out of the tank to remove leaves etc and then have filters to catch fine stuff before it enters tanks which you need to clean once in while

My personal preference in terms of taste was always tank water over town water

Only other issue is you do need to map the water pipes to and from the house to the tank and any joins to connecting tanks l had lot of issues when l first bought the property with tracing the piping and where the switches were to enable water being moved from tank to tank. as the switches tend to get buried under dirt rock and get themselves lost form where people tell you they are located.

The other problem was the DIY tank pipe connections sometimes used garden watering system pipe which isn't the correct grade for pressure for moving water and splits over time, lost whole tank of water once due to ruptured piping under the house the ground being so dry it just absorbed the water so you couldn't see any leakage but you knew you were losing lots of water had to do a walk and crawl along the pipe line to discover the leak