This of course is the 20,000 gal storage tank on my place. I had marked with the blue tape where 4000 gal was indicated by the level indicator (red bobber). This was the amount we put in at the installation of the tank. No water had been used since the plumbing has not been topped out yet. Some evaporation must have occurred due to the 100 degree days but not much.
Therefore, the Collection system added about 8000 gallons to the storage with one rainfall. With my roof able to collect 2000 gallons per inch of rain, that means it must have rained at least 4 inches. Who says I won't be able to get enough water off my roof?
BUT...I was at the site when it rained and it just poured for over an hour. I wished I had taken some pictures of how the water was overflowing the collection boxes which have a filter in them. But it was a signification amount that was being dumped onto the ground. It can be seen that the brown downspout was not going directly into the white downspout. The heavy rain moved these brown downspouts so that a lot of water was lost.
This hole was dug by the water overflowing the collection system.
As well as this one which was about 10 ft from the house..the water was ski-jumping from the collection filter boxes and not making the turn to go down the pipe. I got totally soaked when I took off the filters to see if the water would go directly down the pipe. Didn't seem to make any difference. The water only went directly down the pipes without any overflow when the flow from the roof slowed down significantly.
This is on the back porch near the pantry window and the water was gushing out of the box and soaking the stone wall and hitting the window as well. This downspout is a 4 inch pipe which should have been able to take the heavy flow.
This was the hole dug by the water right under the above downspout...
Notice the brown section is no longer directed into the white section. When it was raining, I walked around the house and ALL the downspouts were overflowing onto the ground.
SOOOOO guess who was out right away to modify the downspouts.
They cut off the filter boxes and added extensions so the water would go directly down the pipe with no turns to slow down or divert the water.
The pipes were also strapped to the rock to keep them in place. Now we will see where the water goes. If it comes down in the same volume, there may still be some overflow but then it will probably overflow the gutter.
We will see where the water goes next.
What also showed up are small leaks in the seams of the gutters. Austin Gutter King to be out Monday to seal them better. Much cleaner connections with the brown pipe extended down into the white pipe.
The major offender....Just think how much water I could have collected if all of the rainwater coming off the roof could have been collected. Even with loosing a major amount of the water to overflow, I still gained 8000 gallons. I now have enough water (12,000 gallons) for over 6 months if I am the only one using the water.
This was an extraordinary rain event but now I am prepared for large or small rain falls. In addition to taking out the filter and box on the downspout, they also added a filter over the inlet to the downspouts in the gutters. So the leaves, rocks, twigs, etc will still be caught before they enter the downspout from the roof. This will require some periodic cleaning of the gutters to keep the screens clear.
I am still extremely happy with the Rainwater Collection System especially since we modified it.
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