Browse Forums Eco Living Re: Water Tanks - Difference to make "drinking" safe 3Dec 13, 2016 9:56 pm 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Water Tanks - Difference to make "drinking" safe 4Dec 13, 2016 10:58 pm 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Water Tanks - Difference to make "drinking" safe 5Dec 14, 2016 10:25 am Wow, that is a thorough response. It might take me a couple of detailed readings to get all the information out of it. Thanks a alot. To add a little more info: The Red roof is 6.1m AGL on the tank side. The Blue and Green roofs are 2.7ish AGL. The water tank hasn't been "designed" yet, and I had just made an assumption that it would sit on ground level, but need not. Similarly, we haven't picked the tank profile yet, and up to this point I had only been thinking something short enough to fit through the carport (blue roof), but happy to consider shorter, or taller options. (underside of blue roof is about 2.4-2.5m). Now, I have done some more reading, and have a "minor" problem. The green roof will have a wood fired chimney running up through it, and some sites say that this therefore makes it unsuitable for potable water - but still good for garden/laundry. From what you are saying, we might have the opportunity at this point to "choose" wet system or dry system, but then say that wet systems can be better but more troublesome. What factors/tradeoffs should we consider to make the decision? My gut feel at this point is the increase in pump system complexity for the shower and the loss of use of the green roof eliminates the advantages of going to the showers. But will keep analysing. Once again, thanks for the detailed response. Re: Water Tanks - Difference to make "drinking" safe 6Dec 14, 2016 12:20 pm planeguy From what you are saying, we might have the opportunity at this point to "choose" wet system or dry system, but then say that wet systems can be better but more troublesome. What factors/tradeoffs should we consider to make the decision? SaveH2O Wet systems are usually troublesome but they can be better than dry systems if done correctly. I'll give a reply later tonight when I have time and explain with example photos why standard wet systems are the 'pits'. They should be avoided at all costs. I would still direct connect to a dual cistern valve WC system and also to a separate laundry cold water tap, this can be done without the need for a mains water switching device or check valves. The value of connecting to toilets is not what it use to be when cisterns were single flush 12 or 13 litre units and utilisation of course also depends on the number of occupants, the amount of time they are home and even how much coffee (and other beverages) they drink. The average person flushes a toilet six times a day. Switching to cold water clothes washing is a great way to utilise rainwater and the added benefits include water heating cost savings, softer towels etc and needing less laundry powder/liquid. I often do a second rinse cycle and I also have a simple 2 way diverter on my outside laundry pipe so that I can divert the rinse water to the garden during the warmer drier periods. Are you planning to have a metal or poly tank? If you have a metal tank, it has to sit on a slab. I assume by the roof slope that the tank will be on the south side which is good. You don't always need a concrete base, the poly tanks in the photo sit on compacted sand bases 80 mm below the surface. Were you planning to have a submersible or an external pump? 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Water Tanks - Difference to make "drinking" safe 7Dec 14, 2016 1:56 pm SaveH2O Are you planning to have a metal or poly tank? We have got as far as knowing we want a tank - not what type SaveH2O Were you planning to have a submersible or an external pump? See previous answer As a follow up, can the washing machine be connected to a tap with failover to mains if the tank runs dry, similar to the functionality of the duel cistern loo? Re: Water Tanks - Difference to make "drinking" safe 8Dec 14, 2016 4:55 pm It is best to have separate mains and rainwater cold water taps. When you have a tank, you are generally aware of the water level and it is easy enough to manually switch taps. A dual cistern valve cistern has an air gap that prevents cross contamination plus the wall isolation valves are the manual change over devices...one is off while the other is on. Practically all cisterns have two bottom entries for the valve. I always use the Fluidmaster 400UK063 valve because it is compact, cheap ($20 in Bunnings) plus you can get an optional low pressure valve seal or a very low pressure gravity fed valve seal (242LP071) to replace the standard high pressure valve seal. This is easier on the pump. 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Water Tanks - Difference to make "drinking" safe 9Dec 16, 2016 6:18 pm SaveH20, so, looking again at the numbers, I think we have confirmed our thoughts. Potable water from 150m2 of roof area gives 1kl of extra available water per year. For looking at your guidance/costs etc... we are instructing our architect to go down the 170m2 option. Now he will adjust the roof fall so that the Blue roof's gutter will be on the right side as drawn , and the green on the near edge. He was thinking a wet system, to minimise the visibility of the guttering. I don't think we matter much about the look over that side of the house, but may agree. Reading up about tank types, it looks the material choice is fairly even for our use case in metal vs polymer types. Metal 10kl tanks look to be about $300 smaller, but look better. Do you think there is any performance difference? I also read up on external vs internal pumps - I like the ability to maintain a pump easier if needed, so am leaning towards external. Can you comment on the W gutter, versus one downpipe on each end of the gutter - why is that preferred? Similarly, does that mean on the small roofs that will have a single downpipe, does that mean they should have a downpipe in the middle and not the end? The architect won't like the look of that, so what's the purpose? Thanks again for all your advice. Re: Water Tanks - Difference to make "drinking" safe 10Dec 16, 2016 11:08 pm planeguy He was thinking a wet system, to minimise the visibility of the guttering. When you have one tank and several downpipes, a dry system will entail having downpipes diverted along walls. It can get ugly, particularly when the tank is also a poor colour choice and the uPVC pipes are not painted. I will get around to doing a separate informative post about wet systems. planeguy Can you comment on the W gutter, versus one downpipe on each end of the gutter - why is that preferred? Similarly, does that mean on the small roofs that will have a single downpipe, does that mean they should have a downpipe in the middle and not the end? The architect won't like the look of that, so what's the purpose? Architects subjugating function for aesthetics is the reason why most display homes don't have downpipes visible from the street view and why downpipes are positioned at the end of walls. Eaves gutters are installed with a slope so that the water will drain efficiently and not pool in the gutter when it stops raining. The minimum slope is 1:500, i.e., 2 mm per metre. The gutter's high points determine the roof areas drained to each downpipe and the low points are where the downpipes are fitted, hence my reference to an elongated W pattern. Preferably, gutters should never be installed with the minimum slope as house settling can later result in the gutters flowing backwards and/or pooling water. A 1:300 slope (3.33mm per metre) should be considered the preferable minimum. Imagine two straight gutters, each 20 metres long. Gutter 1 has the downpipes positioned at the end of the walls as is most common. If the last short length of gutter doesn't slope towards the downpipe as is also common, the water will pool after rainfall but not very much, probable just a few mm but that section will also build up sediment. Decayed organic matter is negatively charged and metal is positively charged. Gutters rust because of contact with sediments, not because they get wet. The tolerances also allow gutters to pool water up to 10 mm deep for 3 days after it rains and so there is no regulatory requirement to slope the last section of gutter. Gutter 1 will have a high point mid way along and allowing for 0.5 metres of guttering between the downpipes and the end caps, the distance between each downpipe and the central high point will be 9.5 metres. If the gutter has the minimum 1:500 slope, the gutter would drop 19 mm to the downpipe but a better 1:300 slope would see almost 32mm of drop and this could be considered unsightly...but you do have a two storey roof. A downpipe at the far end (past the blue roof) also requires more sub surface pipe work because it is further from the tank. Our Gutter 2 example would have two downpipes positioned at 1/4 and 3/4 distance with the high points at the ends and the middle. 5 metres of guttering would flow from either side to the downpipes and a superior 1:250 slope would only result in a 20mm drop between the low and high points. Drainage would be very efficient and the guttering would carry less load. For rainwater harvesting, short gutter runs have more efficient first flush collection. Function Vs aesthetics! planeguy Reading up about tank types, it looks the material choice is fairly even for our use case in metal vs polymer types. Metal 10kl tanks look to be about $300 smaller, but look better. Do you think there is any performance difference? Metal tanks are dearer but they (should) last longer although good poly tanks do last a long time. Metal tanks haven't been without their problems though and there was a (belated) recall several years ago on metal slimline tanks after numerous structural failures. viewtopic.php?f=35&t=74141 Another brand of metal tank leached lead into the water. http://www.examiner.com.au/story/133518 ... ter-tanks/ http://www.dhhs.tas.gov.au/news/2013/le ... ater_tanks There are some good looking poly tanks but avoid the light colours if the tank will receive UV. My main tank is a Clark poly corrugated tank, it looks good and is good. EDIT The post below discusses a very common but very poor roof drainage design that is nevertheless compliant. Gutters overflowing during even medium to light heavy rain is the result. viewtopic.php?p=1289026#p1289026 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. That was always going to be a challenge and a test of patience. Full marks to your mate. Did you discuss the wet area near the trampoline? 16 18298 Not sure who you're building with, but I moved in recently to a 11month scheduled, 8 month actual build on the South coast/Illawarra NSW 3 6129 |