Backyard Farming Forum
Bringing food production home

We need new gutters as well as leaf guards if we are to catch the water that comes off our roof. To get new gutters we have to decide what downpipes should go where, getting the water to the tanks and then getting it back to the house. I have more questions than answers at present.
Currently researching and doing the maths on :-
roof catchment area
rainfall for Jandakot
water tank sizes
average family consumption 4 people
different types of leaf guards
Oh well you gotta start somewhere!

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Faye's aquaponic system http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum ... start=1785

= every square meter collects 1L water per ml of rain
= 826mm http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/averages/ ... 9172.shtml
= roof catchment area x 862 = average litres of rain you can harvest
= minimum 150,000L to be safe, this does not include water for gardens or lawn but then you still have the bore for that.
= from the look of the tall gum trees around your house you will need complete gutter protection with the steel mesh that covers all open gutters. I wouldn't bother with the leaf eater type sieve systems as you will still get leaves building up in the gutters creating a fire hazard, rusting the gutters prematurely and leaching tannins into your drinking water everytime it rains.

If you can put the tank in an area where no leaves will fall onto its roof you can also put gutters on the tank roof and catch another 826mm of rain each year

A 150,000L tank installed with siteworks will be around $10,000


Hope this helps a bit.

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Why did the chicken cross the road? ... To have her motives questioned.

Kool, thanks simo Love these fourms, full of knowledgable people.

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I have called the boys at Gutter cleaning Sydney, they are very knowledgeable. And they are happy to give you information even if you do not buy anything. Give them a call if you have any other questions.

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Corporate Gifts Sydney

Dont put gutter guard on its a crock
It blocks up catches leaves then lets the compost filter into your gutter and you cant clean them.
This is the good stuff
http://www.smartflo.com.au/index.htm

That looks like a good idea Snags...there was another product/gutter system out ages ago that relied on the elasticity of water to go around and edge and drip into a second catchment area...can't for the life of me remember the name of it tho

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I shall wait for the Meek......Then take it from them


http://backyardaquaponics.com/forum/vie ... =18&t=8219

heres a great app.
Type in your address click on each corner of your roof and it calculates your local average rainfall and catchment potential

http://www.save-the-rain.com/world-bank/

Thats an awesome toy. Dads shed can harvest 1025430 litres a year.
One of my sheds gets 177450ltrs and I'm allowed to flush the toilet 29575 times.

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To think before you act is a wise option. But not as funny.

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I shall wait for the Meek......Then take it from them


http://backyardaquaponics.com/forum/vie ... =18&t=8219

If you mark out the area of the dirt garden it will tell you how much water will soak in during the year.

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To think before you act is a wise option. But not as funny.

Building on Faye's original thread.......

I am looking at putting in a number of smaller tanks over the next 12 months to use to collect some rain water and to act as header tanks for a pump for irrigation. I intent to top the tanks up via a small low flow solar operated pump pulling from the ground water that flows through the ground here at around 2 metres and from scheme if needed.

If I am looking at a range of tanks between 2000 and 20000 litres, what is the best long term corrugated or plastic and where in Perth has good prices on each?


Any info on suitable small 12 volt spear pumps to push around 4-5 metres and automated controllers?

I have no association with these guys but they are fairly local to you (Midland) and when I looked a while ago they had good prices but please shop around to make sure:

http://www.tankmasteraustralia.com.au/index.php


They sell both poly and corrugated and list the prices on their web page, poly is cheaper, less easily damaged and will last longer in my opinion.

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Why did the chicken cross the road? ... To have her motives questioned.

Thanks simo, always shop around but good to ask as it sometimes leads to someone you didn't know about. I thought poly would be best, didn't realise they were cheaper.

I have to agree with simons post about tankmasteraustralia, have purchased from them in the past but i belive they are based in Victoria?

if you are after someone more local check out TopTanks. My dad purchased a poly tank off them last month and is happy.
http://toptanks.com.au/

hope this helps

Hi Faye, I have met you a couple of times at the shop where I dream about aquaponics systems. I use leaf eater guards, with a first flush diverter which I know when inspecting my tanks work well
I have 4 x 4500 litre tanks down the side of the house hooked up to two down pipes. The tanks are full at the moment. I run a davey submersible pump and rain bank setup which automatically draws water from the mains or the tanks depending on the tanks water levels. This intern feeds to my toilets, washing machine, dishwasher and hot water system.
With the tanks full I run out of water around December/jan, but will look at hooking up two more tanks in the future. Looking at my water bill there is a huge saving in litres consumed from the mains. At present in a household of three we are using 145litres per day, with the rest being drawn from the tanks. Our water use charge for the July bill was $12.43 which in suburbia is pretty good.