Help, please, with rain barrel questions

After much research, I've opted to forgo installing a rain garden and instead equip all of my downspouts with rain barrels. This decision was predicated on the fact that I already have a huge section of my yard comprised of forb and grass communities and while they're drought tolerant, they are young enough to where I need to water them in when rain is lacking. If I installed a rain garden, I would be diverting this roof water and my sump pump out flow to yet another area with "wetter" plants. In the end, I figured - why construct yet another area in my yard where I have to worry about weeds and watering in the event that it doesn't rain. If anyone sees errors in my thinking, please point this out.

I have a nice rain barrel in my garage for the past three years. I'll order two more if the first works out well. Here's my objective: I want to be able to harvest the water in the barrel to be utilized for future use should rain not occur and I have to water in my garden. My questions........

1. I want to use some type of a hose attached to the spicket punched with holes or a soaker hose punched with holes. Is this feasible given that this water isn't under much pressure, or will the water just pool up in the hose making this ineffective? If you've implemented something like this, what type of a hose and what alterations have you implemented to ensure that as much water exits the hose as possible?

2. Does it assist gravity to mount the barrel on cinder blocks?

3. In sub freezing climates, is it necessary to bring the barrels in the garage and reconfigure one's downspouts? The manufacturer informed me that it's not, that the barrel will bulge but will retain it's normal shape when weather warms.

The manufacturer presented a pretty dim picture for my objective of watering my garden. They basically said that because the water isn't under pressure, using an attached hose to water a garden won't be very effective. I'm looking for any pics, any experiences that you've had and any drawbacks I might not have considered. I want to cut my downspout this weekend, but want to be researched before doing this.

Thanks a bunch guys.

 

Thank you.

I just remembered another question -

Do I have to secure the rain barrel to the house so that it doesn't blow or tip in strong winds. This may be a problem when the barrel is empty.

 

http://www.sprucecreekrainsaver.com/

This is the site where I ordered mine years ago. They have connectors that they sell, if you want to link two, three or more barrels together to capture overflow. Or, you can just put a sump pump hose attached to an overflow valve at the top of the barrel to redirect overflow into a garden.

The top is fully enclosed with plastic except for a screened in area where the water enters. Supposedly, this inhibits mosquito egg laying. Also, it prohibits algae formation in the barrel and prohibits debris accumulation in the barrel.

Their site says you need a 6o degree elbow and this isn't true. I called them when I couldn't locate this and they said any angle will do.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(CMonster @ Apr 18 2007, 07:59 AM) [snapback]425237[/snapback]</div>

Isn't it, though... hee hee

There are two holes in the front of the barrel. Last year I think I moved the spigot (I see I spelled this wrong earlier) down to the bottom hole. There's a plug type thingy I switched to the top hole. I haven't looked at the barrel for a year, and my memory is a little fuzzy on this. I'll get a good look at it this weekend as I'm surely installing it after all of your helpful replies. I was veeeeery nervous about setting it up and then not having it function as I require.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(chogan @ Apr 18 2007, 08:14 AM) [snapback]425244[/snapback]</div>

I don't care if it takes a day, so long as all the water gets to where I want it to go. I'm going to buy soaker hoses and drill little sporadic holes near the barrel and larger more frequent holes towards the end. I'll let you guys know how this works out in case you're interested in this. If it works out well, I'm getting at least three more barrels for all downspouts. I would even consider connecting multiple barrels together with attachments.

Chogan, I'm sure you know about this but if not, try putting window screen over your barrel opening and it'll cut down on mosquito egg laying and debris collection. My barrel comes with this but I'm concerned as I don't remember if there's a way to get this off of the barrel to clean out the debris that does collect.

 

Maybe you'll have to invest in rain barrels equipped to catch the debris, but away from the screen itself. The lid in my barrel is slanted away from the screen and has a lip on it, so the debris will slope down but be caught by this lip. I don't know if you'd be able to use this with your closed system, however. I'm going to be taking pictures of the install and I'll make sure to include a picture of the top of the barrel in case you're interested.

 

To those of you interested in irrigation mechanisms with regards to rain barrels, soaker hoses can be a solution. Initially, I had tried to irrigate with an unmodified soaker hose and this just didn't work. The water would drain from the barrel to fill the hose but due to the lack of pressure, the water just sat there. I went to the hardware store and purchased the two smallest drill bits available. I then drilled holes about 5 inches apart along the length of the soaker hose. These holes were sufficient enough for the water to drain through. Because the smallest drill bit didn't seem large enough to allow water to escape, I used the second smallest drill bit and I think the holes are actually too large. The water streams out of these holes very readily. Because I appreciate very slow irrigation, I'm going to use the smallest drill bit on another hose and see if that works better.

All in all, I love the barrels. They're so convenient as I no longer have to drag a hose to the other side of the house and mess with the sprinkler to try to get the right pressure and placement.

Also, our crawl has leaks and since I've set these up, our sump pump hose runs significantly less.

I haven't had a chance to take and post pictures, but I will in case anyone is interested in the barrels that I purchased.

The best part is that my neighbor has said that I'm inspiring her to be more green and that she wants some. She's talking w/ her husband. He's constantly poking jabs at me so I'm not sure how far she'll get with a "yes", but it's promising to see how receptive some people are to these types of solutions.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ilusnforc @ May 22 2007, 12:46 PM) [snapback]447404[/snapback]</div>

I can't see pictures on my work screen so easily. My screen is too dark, unfortunately. What I can see in these pics is a screen that fits the entire top part of the barrel. This looks like a nice feature. I would just make sure that they fit securely to the barrel and cant' be blown off by wind or easily removed by a critte. Since I can't make out the rest of the barrel, I'll just comment on what I've read are necessities in proper rain barrel selection.

The barrel should be opaque so that no, or minimal, light enters the barrel. This prevents algae growth. In operating my barrels, I've thought that a nice feature would be to have a see through stripe down the entire barrel so that I'm able to see how much water is left in the barrel. My barrels are completely opaque and don't have this, but I would really like this feature.

The barrel should have a very secure screen on the top to prevent mosquito egg laying and also to prevent critters from entering the barrel. My barrel has two screen, one on top of the other. The first screen is a like a window screen and the second is a wider holed, more firm screen that's screwed over the first.

I've found a useful feature on my barrel to be that there are two spots for the spigot, one higher and one lower. If I didn't raise the barrels on cinder blocks as I did, I could have the spigot higher so that I can have enough room to place a bucket under the spigot. Since I've raised the barrels, I moved the spigot down lower so that I can draw more water out of the barrel. Maybe you'd find this feature to be useful too.

Lastly, make sure that there's an overflow valve so that if the barrel fills to the top, the water doesn't just spill out of the top of the barrel. The ones that I purchased have an overfill that can be fitted with a typical sump pump hose. I drilled sporadic holes in this so that over flow also gets directed to my garden.

Then, you should check on capacity of the barrels to ensure that you're purchasing the quantity that'll fulfill your needs. Here's the formula for the roof water run off volume per your roof area.......multiply roof area by 623 and divide by 1,000. This will provide you with the number of gallons that leaves your roof during a one inch rain fall.

I was frightened by the installation, but really it wasn't too difficult. I used a hack saw on the gutter. Once that was off, I removed the old elbow and just slipped it over the new cut. This proved to be the most difficult task as it didn't really just "slip" over the new cut. I had to fight with it and ultimately called on my husband to help me pry it over. Other than that, the install is a breeze.

If you have any other questions, let me know.

I should ad that Spruce Creek said that if the barrels aren't disconnected in the winter, they'll bulge and then retain their normal shape in the warmer climate. This would probably shorten the life span of the barrel, so I'm going to opt to put a tarp over the barrel in the winter and just let the roof run off spill over this. Not sure if this is a wise idea, but I'll let y'all know in next Spring.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(tripp @ May 22 2007, 02:33 PM) [snapback]447475[/snapback]</div>

Never heard of this contraption. Awesome. I'll check it out. I reeeeeeeally want a measuring mechanism as the areas I'm irrigating don't require 60 gallons of water. I'd like to have each barrel irrigate two separate smaller garden patches and there's not way to do this without getting an idea of water volume. Thanks!