cheap catchment ideas

[terracore]

I'm using a ~ six dollar kiddie pool as a 20-25 gallon catchment for our rabbitry. I pimped it out with a spare flojet pump / plumbing / old-used utility sink / solar stuff / old battery / etc so the rabbitry has running water from the kiddie pool. It's off-grid AF.

Then it dawned on me, other than the house, this is the only other "running water" we have on the property and it would be nice if there was a larger reservoir. The kiddie pool fills up really quickly from the rabbitry roof and although 20-25 gallons of water storage in the six dollar range is pretty cool, there is no way to scale this up.

So I'm looking for clever water storage ideas greater than 25 gallons. Any ideas?

[kalianna]

I got several of those red plastic buckets used for party drinks,( I think they're 25 gallons) and put them under a slanted roof that isn't part of the gutter system. I can catch 100+ gallons with a decent rain. If all roof space is in use, you could easily mount a few sheets of corrugated metal on a frame and send the water it catches into the buckets.

[geochem]

I used a horse trough once... a bit more than $25, but caught water real well until I was able to get a tank put together. Del's has some 300 gallon tubs that work pretty well and are very durable...

[Carey]

Obviously, getting food grade plastic 55gal barrels would be ideal if you can get them cheaply (we found one seller in Hilo that had them for $30 a couple of months before Iselle, so had that filled up as a "just in case") but you have to keep the water circulating in them if you do not want green water, so a year later we passed it on to someone who could use it more.
We have also been able to pick up the Rubbermaid open top water troughs at garage sales for pretty good prices (we bought the one that is at the Keaau Dog Park for around $25 at a garage sale about 5 years ago)
Much more pricey is our current "poor mans plunge pool", a HD 150 gal water trough with all the pool bells & whistles...

[randomq]

Kea'au Ace has the "next size up" kiddie pools for $22. I have a friend that uses plastic trash cans to collect rain off of sheds for watering plants and chickens, cleaning, etc. You can sometimes find white food-grade ones, but might cost as much as a food-grade barrel. Amazon will ship 2' high pipe-frame pools relatively affordably, but you'll need level ground and something (cardboard, carpet, old tarps) to put between rocky ground and pool liner. I typically bungee screen over small catchments to keep bugs and slugs out.

If I were in need of drinking water, I'd clean my shed roof and wait for a decent rain to really get going, then use those white plastic food-grade 5-gallon buckets and lids from Walmart. Add about half a teaspoon of plain bleach to each bucket and store them somewhere dark.

[ElysianWort]

Here's the best idea I have seen:

Materials: un-corrugated roofing, thickest black plastic sheeting available, bolts and nuts, tarp for cover, sand for base.

Of course you need to prep the area by making it level and laying down some sand. The roofing material is available in the Keaau Shipman Park industrial area. Purchase the widest, longest, thickest sheet of black plastic available. This will limit the diameter of your cistern as you obviously won't make your circle of metal roof bigger than your shortest dimension of your plastic liner.

So how big is the circle? I'm not sure, you will have to do the research and see how wide that widest, longest, thickest black plastic sheet is. The roofing material will naturally curve into the circular shape when you lay it down onto the sand. Bolt it together at the ends so it holds that circular shape permanently . Use bolts with a rounded head. Bolts poke out, (not into the center of the circle so they wont tear the plastic liner). Nuts go on the outside. Then the black plastic liner can be put in. It can be doubled too if you want. Fill with water and use a tarp and maybe a rope to keep the cover on.

I have a friend that has done many of these and they work very well. It's been 10 years or more and I know people that are still happy with them. The total cost should be under 400.

People who use this method don't drink water from their catchment. Just for bathing, washing, flushing etc.

I don't remember exactly but I think the tank size was about 1,500 gallons. Not huge but functional and cost effective.

[MarkP]

I think I posted about this before. I made a tank by overlapping two cattle panels end to end about a foot each joint and forming a ring about 10' in diameter and a height equal to the width of the cattle panels. Naturally at that point all you have is a tiny galvanized steel corral but you can see how the cattle panels define the basic shape and handle the hoop stresses. I got the ones with the horizontal wires closer together at the bottom for more strength and to better contain the liner where the pressure would be greater.

I lined the panels with tar paper then 6 mill black plastic, which came on a roll and unfolded to 20' wide by however long you needed (up to the length that was on the roll). It worked surprisingly well but the 6 mil was extremely susceptible to damage. Worked fine as long as you never messed around inside the tank but I bumped the side once while removing a submersible pump and that caused a leak. The tar paper was visible from outside the tank and it held up OK but did begin to give out after a couple of years.

All in all it cost me about $300 for a 2,000 gallon tank. That included some sand to make a relatively soft and smooth base underneath.

ETA: Cut a 20' x 20' square of the black plastic. The corners hang out when the square is centered in the ring and run up the sides. Cut off excess as desired. Secure around the top with clothes pins or a belt around the top of rope, heavy nylon monofilament, or some such.

Water pressure bulged the tar paper and plastic out through the square holes slightly in a somewhat pleasing fashion. I doubt this would work for long in an environment with kolohe kids (human bad enough but just imagine goats), lawnmowers, bb guns, etc but it worked OK for me.

[My 2 cents]

ElysianWort, I have made several pools as described by you, the first one was for myself about 20 years ago and is still looking like it has several years left, even after disassembling it once and moving it. None of the others have failed. Just a few points to add:

The un-corrogated roofing is usually about 3.5' wide, so your pool will be 3.5' high. The length can be adjusted to meet your required diameter. Diameter is dictated either by liner size or space limitations. For my first one I just wanted to use 20'x20' black plastic, so I made the pool 12' wide (38' of roofing, in a roll that will fit easily in your PU bed). 12' dia + (3.5' h x 2) = 19' and allows for 6"" of overhang on the outside of the tank. You will gain a few helpful inches when you round the bottom corners with sand on the inside where the metal meets the ground. If it's going to be in a permanent location it's worthy of a concrete ring foundation.

When you order the roofing have them put 180 degree bends in opposite directions on the ends. Minor expense. These will hook together and form a stronger joint. Use stainless steel bolts. You can slice an old garden hose lengthwise and slip it onto the top edge of the metal to protect the liner as it folds over.

This system is very flexible, but the 12' size is good for about 2500 gallons.

I swapped out the black plastic for a food grade liner, fortunately it's a standard size. Others that were custom fit were pricier. Even so, this is a very cost effective system.