That is a very cool collection system. When I build I may want to replicate your system even though I will have my own well. I have dowsed my lot and have a few locations of 6 to 12 GPM of potable water at 300 to 350 feet. I will also be nowhere near historical ag or runoff.
Do you have your own well or do you have municipal water? Some cities are charging a premium if they discover you are doing rain collection. You may need to put a fence around the containers.
Can you give us some details how you linked the two together?
Are you using water from only one area of the roof or did you relevel the gutters?
How do you handle the overflow?
Are you using any check values?
Thats a lot of weight very close to the foundation. Do you think it might need a reinforced slab to set them on?
We are on municipal water and it’s priced high. It’s a subdivision in the country where each lot is about 10 acres. Less than 700 population in the whole town. It’s legal here to collect rainwater but I still might hide it by planting a tree or maybe privacy lattice. But you can’t see it from the road and we own everything behind us.
Because they are stacked I had to drill a 3” hole in the upper part of the bottom tote and install a bulkhead.
There are other ways of doing it but they require a more elaborate piping and venting. This was the simplest and cleanest way to do it. What you can’t see in the pictures is the top. Both totes have a 2” threaded bung in the top. The bottom tote bung is sealed tight. The top tote bung has a 3 way pvc piece that allows water to flow in while also letting air escape through a vent. So the top tote fills the bottom one. Once they are both full the water goes out the overflow onto the ground just as the gutter would.
If you don’t stack them you can plumb them together from their existing valves at the bottom. They will fill at the same rate. Still quite a lot of pressure even if not stacked.
I didn’t do anything to the gutters yet. I’m waiting to see if it’s necessary. The roof is freakishly high and steep so I don’t want to get up there. All the areas of the roof that feed that gutter are oddly shaped and I can’t do the math to figure it out. We had a light rain today and it didn’t fill much.
The closest thing to a check valve is an empty 1 liter water bottle inside the first flush diverter pipe. As the first flush water goes into that 4” vertical pvc the bottle floats up and blocks it off at the top. The bottle gets stuck where the 4” is necked down to 2”. This keeps the churned up dirtier water from getting into the tanks. The 4” has a 1/8” hole in the bottom so once the rain stops it will slowly drain and be empty for the next rain. I still plan on putting a 90* turn in the 4” pipe to get the water away from the foundation.
I’m not sure about the weight. I have it sitting on 4” thick blocks that we’re dug in to be level. Seems ok so far. It’s free standing and not touching the house.
LDSPrepper on YouTube has a series of vids about this. He tried it a bunch of different ways and I liked this one best. But he didn’t know about the bulkhead I mentioned which made it much easier for me. And no chance of leaking.
