Sweptline.ORG

So I've been busy setting up my water harvesting at my house. I bought 2 corrugated metal culverts, 1 3 x 8 and 1 6 x 8. Set them in concrete that I pre-plumbed for a spigot and an overflow. Here in Tucson we get most of our rain around July/August. My plan is to store the rainwater for my wives garden, plants, and trees when the rains go away.

Slick, sure that's not a cover for your "moonshine" opp.? Great job!

Maybe it is.....

Andrew, lots of labor. your hoping for lots of run off. some time back we had a place we collected rain water in a cistern. we had some home made devises that would fill with the first of the rain run off, when full they would then divert or change the flow to cistern allowing the cleaner water to be captured. dont know how to draw it here to show you but here is a similar ideal product. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q ... LkkKSJDmOw
good on you and yours. gary

Interesting.... how long can you store water without it evaporating?

Yah I thought about doing the first flush thing, but in all honesty I'm not drinking the water. If I was I would have definitely went that route. I probably should have, but I went with simplicity just to actual finish a project . Not sure how long I will be able to story water. Since I put up the tanks I scared the rain away

Are you guys allowed to capture rainfall in AZ? I thought they had a bunch of restrictions on that sort of thing out in the dry states?
I like your setup, though. I have a less-attractive version at my house for watering the gardens, but I was running on a minimalist budget
I got a pair of 275 gallon totes for free from a local fertilizer company, and used some 3" PVC I had laying around from a bathroom remodel at our old house. So I only had to buy the gutter/hardware and the PT lumber I used for the platform.
Water availability is less of a problem here; the flow rate on my well is around 6gpm and I've got a 600+/- gallon reserve capacity, but watering from the totes means I'm not running the well pump, and it's a safeguard against a potential drought in the future. Since I've got a pretty good-sized set of raised garden beds I use a lot of water in August, and if we go a couple of weeks without a good rainstorm the drums are really handy.

Gutter on the house:



Runs into the down pipe and into the totes:



Between the two of them I've got around 500 gallons of water suitable for the gardens.



Since I took these pictures a couple of years ago I've added gutter to the back side of the house and tied it into the pipe system for the totes. I also painted the totes grey to keep the algae growth down. A good heavy rainstorm will fill both of them in about an hour, and after that it drains out from an overflow port, down a garden hose, and into my duck pond.

Very cool. I have 2 totes that my big tank will overflow in to. No restrictions here with the tanks. Im actually going to get a rebate from the city for my set up.

Awesome Slick...I was pondering the same kind of setup for the water system for my tiny house I am building, but mine was going to be for drinking and the like. Its actually quite easy (and somewhat inexpensive) to rig a filter system to make it all potable

Well done set up, I collect water all the time even though I live in Florida, at My GF place I have 5 55 gal drums hooked up on a pedestal 4 ft off the ground. When it rains it will fill all 5 of them in short order. This catches rain off a 100 year old barn with tin roof about 800sq ft.. I know its paranoid to do this but we do get periods of no rain then gushers. My house has an artesian well that was put in in the 40s (ex mil housing) I use it all the time to drink and stick my head under it. Sulphur is good right?