Andrew Bellinger's Blog

Lowest Water Bill

2010-02-03T13:47:00.000-08:00

I got my latest bill the other day and it is down to £50 for the last 3 months. It was around £100 before my leaking problems right at the start of my project. I had to shutdown the system for 4 days when the tank froze in the cold weather.

So I am really happy with the system and will look into expanding it in the summer.

Almost Finished.....

2009-10-08T10:52:00.001-07:00

I have installed some extra water butts that were around the garden not being used and have connected them up together. I use these for reserve when my main tank runs dry. This has only happened once so far. My main tank is full again now.

I have moved the connections and the pump away from the electrics and into the corner of the garage and have finished insulating the pipes.

My meter has almost reached 5000 liters. That equates to around £21.00. I still need to do final calculations and also monitor how much electricity the pump uses to work out what I am saving.

I have also swapped out the timer for a digital one as the manual one broke down. I know run the pump twice a day for a 5 minute period. Within this 5 minute period the pump will switch off when it is full.

Update

2009-09-10T12:04:00.000-07:00

I have almost finished the job at last. I have lagged most of the pipe work and have been running on rainwater for the toilets for the last few months. I have used almost 4000 liters. Will try and post some more photos soon.

Running on the tank again.

2009-07-21T10:57:00.000-07:00

I have started on lagging the pipe work going from the garage into the loft now.

The last picture shows the new float switch and it is much better quality than the last one. For a start the magnet is not exposed and so will not rust. Also the switch has a better connection allowing for a tight fit. I have been monitoring for 1 week and finally no leaks.

Next up is to finish the lagging and boxing in the outside tank.

Redesign of tank float connector.

2009-07-08T01:46:00.000-07:00

Due to my leak I have been spending some time redesigning my float connector connections. It has been far too hot to go in the loft space lately so I am waiting for it to cool down. I have got some new connectors to use which sould solve the leak problem I am hoping.

The filter that I made from an old drinks container seems to be working well. We have had much rain lately and my tank is full again.

Another Leak!

2009-06-08T14:50:00.001-07:00

There was a leak where the float valve went into the tank and it has made some of the artex fall off the ceiling. Wife is not happy. Another job to do. It is not too bad and I think that I should be able to repair it.

I have added an extra filter going into the main tank. I used a plastic container with some filter media in it. Not sure if it is going to work but did not cost me anything as it was just going in the bin.

I have got a manual timer that just runs during the day. Will see how this works out. Still lots more to do.

Rain water is flowing in more ways than one!

2009-06-08T14:36:00.000-07:00

Well what a weekend. I have now connected up 3 toilets and they are using rain water. I have had lots of problems to over come. Had some real problems with the relay the I got from ebay and after 2 failed ones arriving I decided to get one from maplins. It is working well.

As you can see I have already used 300 liters of water.

I added in a small hose pipe as the water was gushing out quite a bit and making the relay switch the pump on an off again. It is just pushed in so I am not sure how long it will last.

Internal Pipework Complete.

2009-05-05T02:59:00.000-07:00

It's been a busy time lately. I have got the internal pipework complete now.

Connected mains to new tank.
Connected pipework going to 3 toilets and 1 washing machine.
I have had some help from a Friend getting the pipework in as needed to do some pipe bending and soldering. He has done a great job. It took a little long than expected as I had to remove a toilet in the en-suite to get better access. I have to now test for leaks.

Got the ball valve modified so that it sits at the bottom of the tank.

Will follow up with some more pics later this week.

What I have got left:

I have got to connect up the overflow on the tank and leak test the cooper pipe work.
Connect up the plastic pipe work to the loft tank.
Connect up the electrics to the pump.

We have also just got a price rise in the water also. So should have this working in time before we start paying the new price.

Loft Tank

2009-04-28T13:42:00.001-07:00

Well It's been a busy time lately. I have some even more updates soon.

I have been getting the loft tank ready. I have installed a ball valve which I still need to make some modifications to so that the ball will be lower. Also connected the float switch the same way as I did in the downstairs tank apart from the float switch being the other way up.

Also installed the water meter so that I can track what I am using/saving.

More updates soon!

Tank still holding.

2009-03-30T08:01:00.000-07:00

Well as I only seem to be able to put in about 2 hours at the weekend when my daughter sleeps, I am hoping to really get a move on now that we have lighter nights.

I have got the pump plummed in along with a water metre. I now need to work on putting it into the roof space of my house. I will put some more photos up soon as I can.

My tank is still holding the water also. We have not had any more rain lately so still about 200 litres full.

Leaking Tank

2009-03-10T13:38:00.000-07:00

Well I could not believe it. It rained the other day and I filled my tank up in 1 day.

The Next Day it was Empty again!!!

I has been leaking from the float switch. I have had to redesign how it is connected to the tank completely. With the help of my local plumbing shop, I have used a waste pipe joint to fit to the tank and then fitted the float switch to that.

It was a real pain getting it connected to the tank but will allow easy servicing on the float switch if required.

As you can see from the pictures the switch is recessed with in the waste pipe joint.

It Rained last night and I have collected about 200 liters of water. So far no leak!!!!

We shall see when the tank fills up a bit more with some more pressure what will happen.

Collecting Water

2009-02-18T11:56:00.000-08:00

Well it has been a very productive weekend. I am now collecting water.

On Saturday I took the Gutter on the right side of the house down to move the down pipe onto the back of the house so that the water goes down my garage roof.

Well I had to remove the whole gutter due to the face it was caked in dirt inside! What a messy job.

I have used an old filter box to filter the water.

I have a small water leak at the moment and have to raise the filter box up a little.

I driller through the lid on the IBC and attached a water butt connector and added a small sock filter on.

As I could not reach to the bottom of the tank to fit a rubber seal I had to fashion a tool. Pair of mole grips and a old pipe.

New down pipe going onto garage roof. Due to the dish it is only fitted with cable ties at the moment. Well need to move the dish to fit properly in place.

Connected a standard rain water diverter up. I hope that this will be OK as I am using a big filter box. Time will tell. If not then I will have to buy a 3p filter.

This is showing the float switch at the bottom of the tank. This will switch the pump off when the water is low.

This is the outside of the tank. I hope that it is water tight!

It's raining tonight and kind of gives me a good feeling, usually hate it when it is raining.

Next stage is to run the piping into the roof space.

Float Switches arrived

2009-02-09T11:36:00.000-08:00

I have got an old box filter that I am going to use to filter the water and have bought some new sponge filters for it as the old ones are no up to standard.

Also purchased some piping to fit it together to a new rainwater diverter and some gutter connectors to divert the water from my roof to the garage roof.

I have also put my IBC Tank in it's place and leveled it off.

Well My float switches have arrived, they are much smaller that I thought.

It's raining tonight lots and I missing it. Hope to be collecting rain by this weekend.

Float Switches ordered.

2009-01-29T03:07:00.000-08:00

I have just ordered my float switches from REUK and am planning on getting a few other things this weekend. So I should be collecting water very soon I hope.

Hope to have some more photos up soon.

New usage

2008-12-17T05:16:00.000-08:00

Well after a week of getting the leak fixed we have now gone back down to our normal usage of 1000 litres per week. My wife has filled out the leak form and sent it to the waterboard. We shall now see what happens with the outstanding bill and see if it gets reduced.

Water Leak Sorted.

2008-12-08T13:43:00.000-08:00

Well A Big thanks to Dave!

He has managed to find my leak! It was in the upstairs toilet! The rubber valve on the filler valve was gone and overflowing by a great deal. Now need to fill out the water leak form for the water board.

I have also purchased a header tank and 25 meters of plastic pipe. Will up load some pictures soon.

Also moved blog from Iweb to Blogger to allow easier uploading....

My First Purchase

2008-12-08T13:28:00.000-08:00

Well after looking around or a suitable tank, I decided that the best one would be to get an IBC.

I managed to get this one off ebay for £30 in Torquay!

It had been used for bio diesel.

I have cleaned out detergent and water and have got to just jet wash it before moving it into place.

I also managed to get a 1KW pump for £20 from the same person that I got the IBC from which it is it of a bonus.

As it is from Germany all of the instructions are in German. Good news it that a friend from work has a son who can translate German!

I should be getting some more stuff next week. So check back then!

First Entry

2008-12-08T13:21:00.000-08:00

Hi,

And Welcome to my Blog.

Any way the main reason for setting this up is to give you the details of my rainwater harvesting project.

After being in our house for over 1 year and paying for around 30 cubic meters of water per quarter our last Any way the main reason for setting this up is to give you the details of my rainwater harvesting project.

After being in our house for over 1 year and paying for around 30 cubic meters of water per quarter our last bill was a bit of a surprise. It seems that we have used 73 Cubic meters. We are on a water meter. I have done all of the leak tests and could not find anything.

It seems that we are currently using around 4 to 5 cubic meters of water per week, which we have worked out as not being correct.

We are getting the water company to check out the meter as we think it may be faulty at the cost of £75. If it is found to be faulty then we will get that back.

During this investigation I decided that it would be a good idea to look into rain water harvesting.

After doing quite a bit of web surfing it seemed that the most cost effective would be to do my own DIY system as the professional system is far too expensive!

With some advice from a friend at work I have decided to install a tank outside and pump water up to a small tank in the loft for the toilets and washing machine to run on rain water. was a bit of a surprise. It seems that we have used 73 Cubic meters. We are on a water meter. I have done all of the leak tests and could not find anything.

It seems that we are currently using around 4 to 5 cubic meters of water per week, which we have worked out as not being correct.

We are getting the water company to check out the meter as we think it may be faulty at the cost of £75. If it is found to be faulty then we will get that back.

During this investigation I decided that it would be a good idea to look into rain water harvesting.

After doing quite a bit of web surfing it seemed that the most cost effective would be to do my own DIY system as the professional system is far too expensive!

With some advice from a friend at work I have decided to install a tank outside and pump water up to a small tank in the loft for the toilets and washing machine to run on rain water.