Rain water diverter valves

Designing, building, living in a bioshelter.

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Ralph
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Joined:Fri Dec 05, 2003 7:03 pm
Location:Deer Lodge, Tennessee
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Rain water diverter valves

Post by Ralph » Sat Jan 31, 2004 6:25 pm

A friend of mine here in Deer Lodge used Australian diverter valves on the house he built last year. They are 4-inch equivalents, and he had trouble making plumbing connections between metric and standard pipe sizes.

I need 6-inch diverters to use on my barn. Flo-True <http://www.flotrue.com/page/page/485471.htm> says they will have 6-inch valves available early this year (but apparently not this early). Has anyone had experience with other valves for rainwater collection systems?

The do-it-yourself roof washers look good, but I'd have to super-size the design in order for it to adequately handle my roof. The design I've seen is a see-saw contraction with a small bucket on one end of a lever. The bucket catches the first water coming out of the downspout. When the bucket fills with water, the weight of water causes the lever (2x4 board) to swing, while the opposite end of the lever opens the pipe leading to the water storage tank.

Another option would be a solenoid valve that is activated by a flow monitor. When enough water has passed through the monitoring pipe, the solenoid opens the valve leading to the storage vessel. I'd hate to see the price of a 6-inch solenoid valve, though.

Thanks,
Ralph
West Wind Farms
Organic & Grassfed Meats & Poultry
http://www.grassorganic.com

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Ralph
Posts:26
Joined:Fri Dec 05, 2003 7:03 pm
Location:Deer Lodge, Tennessee
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Gutters are up

Post by Ralph » Tue Mar 30, 2004 1:13 pm

Okay, the gutter guy installed shiny black 6-inch gutters on one of the barns yesterday. I have three downspouts on each side which I'll run into a collector and then into a 1500 gallon poly tank, one tank for each side of the building. Per Bob's suggestion, I'll plumb the two tanks to a standard pump and pressure tank affair via small diameter (1") pvc pipe.

I'm now looking for a suitable DC powered pump to use for system pressurization. It may be that I'll want to install a DC pump in parallel with a 120 VAC jet pump instead of DC only. The goal of the DC pump is for use during grid power outages.

At any rate, I soon should have raw rainwater run to the house, processing bldg, and milking parlor. I'll install filtration treatment units at point of use.
West Wind Farms
Organic & Grassfed Meats & Poultry
http://www.grassorganic.com

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nathan_lamothe
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Location:Joussard, Alberta, Canada

Post by nathan_lamothe » Tue Mar 30, 2004 11:24 pm

Thanks for keeping us up to date Ralph!

Sounds like fun...

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