We were all young once and made plenty of mistakes, goofs and accidents. I'm glad you didn't edit that out to show everyone, we all do it. That's a nice setup. This showed up in my feed and I'm glad I watched it. I wish you both the best. Enjoy your youth while you are young enough to do so. I am 55 and have COPD and use oxygen. I leave the house about once a month to go to the doctors and have groceries delivered. You cannot go wrong with your rainwater system. My water bill was about $150 this month. Look at what you save in the long run.
Hi Thek, I hope you’re keeping well but it’s a shame that a more mobile oxygen system isn’t available so you could go out every day if you wanted to. Do you need such a big tank all day or could a smaller one on a buggy be feasible?
Awesome setup, but you may want to consider replacing the PVC into and out of the UV light with non-plastic plumbing. The UV radiation will degrade the PVC over time.
@@truthserum8326 Need to be more worried about the pvc leaching into the drinking water with heat up there. Lots of estrogen like chemicals in it which can make it into the water and into the body to reduce testosterone in men.
@@paladain55 LOL it's funny because the two main countries that Ban PVC are America and China and both are having huge fertility issues. Drinking water that is running through copper pipe with lead solder joints is probably a lot worst for Humans but that debate is useless since the Copper Industry has flooded the Scientific community with "Scientific papers" as to why PVC is bad for you. BTW most of this states only if the pipe is heated! I don't know about you but I don't drink water that comes out of my water heater, and my pipes are underground. Anyway I have examined numerous old PVC pipes that have been replaced and in all cases the PVC itself was covered in a white mineral layer that builds up on it within months of installation. I would suggest you get a piece of copper pipe and bend it into an upright U shape and fill it with some water and then come back in a week and empty that water into a clear glass. The black copper rich water that comes out is not a pretty sight. My suggestion is that if anyone is in fear of their drinking water then the simple solution is a RO filter system in your kitchen and all drinking water is taken from that.
We can’t have pvc for potable water out here in Vegas because it leaches chemicals in the water. Better off using Wirsbro . Better burst resistance , bendable and can do long runs without connections. Need to be buried and covered for UV.
Another Old Guy here 😊. It’s great to see young Men and Women learning and Doing things themselves now a days. And ALL OF US have been Sprayed or caused Smoke when we were learning. Electrical is Always your biggest Danger. When you do have to do some Temporary (Sketchy) stuff 🙄🙄 keep it as Safe as possible. GFCI everything. Pressure Relief Vales aren’t something to skip on. You’ll still have Water to clean up, but less likely to have Pipes or Fittings to Replace. Unions are your Best Friend later on, so install a few now. Don’t take what the Old Guys say as an Insult, we’re just Repeating what the Old Guys said to us when we were young 😉👍.
Just after high school, in the mid 70’s. My parents bought a farm in Indiana where the rainwater from the roof the house dumped into a well next to the house. This is what we drank. No filters, no nothing. No one died.
Slick setup, I'm deal with this stuff day in and day out for a living. Glad you took the leap to try it all yourself. That being said a pressure relief valve should never be overlooked. It's a very important safety feature that helps prevent things from blowing up. Keep up the good work!
I would have put in individual bypasses for each filter and uv light so when you have to isolate a unit you can still be using water. It is also useful to install flat face flanges so you can break open the system without having to cut out sections of glued pipe as you will struggle to rotate the threaded joints.......I just found this channel....gotta say I loved the leak at the end followed by superb chilled response,,, and of with the electrics as they don't mix well......blessup...
I loved it guys. The accidents and mistakes… everything. Im in South Africa, planning on starting a company that’s going to fix some of the dirty water problems we have in Africa. Im still new in the business and the trade but videos like these show it’s ok to make mistakes and learn from them. Thank you
I know it's dated. jumped all comments. Love the presentation of your valuable learning experience. I've been blessed with PEX. Self alignment, eliminating the need for unions. Can reuse all fittings with a simple grind of a copper ring. Never stop the journey.
Be careful with brass fittings, a lot of them are made too thin and the pipe tears as you tighten the fitting. Your teflon tape, it only needs about three layers. Now the real thing, your pressure tank needs to be strapped to a wall or something and you need to use hoses to isolate vibration from the pump and between your tank and filters. It is important to do this since it is under your house where you won't immediately see problems. If you get a leak, you might only notice it when your tank goes dry and then you will find a real problem in your crawl space. Think electric shut-off valves and water sensors. Do it right. A few more things, I would add a hose bib at the clean end of your filters. That will allow you to purge the line after you service the filters so you don't have to have your faucets sputter so much when you turn the water back on. I would also rebuild that filter board, hang it on a cleat and add a couple unions so it is easy to pull the whole thing if you have to. I like sweat soldered copper pipe for water. Galvanized steel is stronger but yuck. Maybe a few stainless nipples would be worth it? This is a place to spend a few hundred for peace of mind.
Yep we are going to secure the pressure tank, just didn't do it in the video. Using hoses isn't a bad idea either, I've just never seen it done before (at least out here, everyone I know just runs pvc from the pump to the tank. And putting a drain on the house side of the filters isn't a bad idea at all. And I'm not too worried about being able to remove the whole filter board by itself, although I should not that we did add a few unions, we just didn't show it in the video. As far as soldered copper, I'm trying to stay away from copper, just personal preference and I agree on galvanized (I'm definitely not gonna do that lol). Oh, and we are adding a meter to the system, I just haven't found one I like that also detects leaks... yet, but it will definitely be in there. Thanks for the comment, a lot of good feedback. Hope you enjoyed it!
@@PootsPastures I'm not sure why you dislike copper. It is easy to work with, pretty strong and ages gracefully. You have seen what brand new PVC can do, imagine it 20 years later... I think I would rather use PEX than "rigid" PVC.
@@joequixotic3039 copper is way too expensive and not worth the hassle, pex is the way to go. You need more than 3 wraps of Teflon tape, if you put way more you don't have to tighten the fitings as much and it definitely won't leak. He clearly didn't put enough Teflon tape on which made him over tighten that elbow which made it leak and then crack, don't skimp on the Teflon tape.
@@Kyle-ut4jg I can not disagree with this more. Too much Teflon tape will cause leaks, three wraps is plenty. I will also stand by copper. I'm not sure what the price difference is but for small fabricated manifolds there is no real alternative. For a full building with longer runs of pipe, price may be an issue but copper is still the superior product.
Just something to think about. Run two separate systems with a T just in case you have to change out some-pieces, if something breaks or needs to be replaced. That way you don’t risk losing access to water.
I'm a a newbie trying to put in my rainwater system. I wanted to say thank you for putting all the links to the parts I need to build my system. We just bought a new house for growing our vegetables and I can't stand drinking city water, nor do we we want to use city water as our water suorce in our hydroponic growing system. Agai, thanks for your video and the links to everything. Have a wonderful day.
That's really nice system. I few remarks for you guys and the viewers. I build so many system but it was much simple than that. And I always thought about "over flow". One winter too rainny. Or you've left for traveling away from home. You need a backup plan. What I've done it's add a additional conter in amount of 10% from the original contener. For example. If you have 200 gallons. Add 20 gallons. And on this you should add pipe for the ground in case it'll over flow again. One more thing. You haven't make any air related valve. And it can damage your system. Make a hole in the highest point in the system. And cover it in a fine net to protect from bugs enter your water.
Thanks were pretty happy with it too so far! The 40 to 60 switch is working well for us, we don't get any noticeable preassure drop before the pump kicks on which is nice
I put a rainwater collection system in a property we own, and I set the Pressure Regulator to 20 PSI, and water was easily flowing up to the 3rd floor from the ground floor! 60 PSI would tax all connections, as you have wonderfully proven on video! Dial the Regulator down to 20 PSI, and you’ll still get plenty of pressure!
I'm not an engineer, but the only use for water pressure isn't to make sure it can reach the highest floor in the house, but also so appliances run correctly and efficiently. Psi and pipe size correlate to how much water you get and how quick. The standard psi for residential buildings is between 40 and 80. All the pex in our home is rated for well over that, and was actually preassure tested at 120psi. Also the fitting didn't break because of the water preassure, it broke because I over tightened it. If 20psi works for you that's great! 60psi is working for us. Thanks for watching.
I love the idea of rain water filtration. Research the plumbing going into the UV light, I've seen some videos that say the PVC breaks down over time and should be plumbed using stainless steel fittings (unsure, watch Life Uncontained water video for reference) otherwise you both did a good job explaining your process and setting up your filtration.
Thanks for a REAL installation video! Every plan requires improvisation. I’m getting ready to install a catchment and filtration on an off-grid cabin. I’m sure I’ll have my share of “oops” moments on that project too.
Great job with the filter system! Thanks for leaving in the bloopers as well. They always happen and leaving them in makes it real. We installed a whole house filtration system and I had a couple questions about yours. My big blue casings always leaked a little and leak seal helps. I had a lot of pressure loss and considered adding a second carbon filter in parallel to increase flow. Did you make the change from PVC joints to PEX or Sharkbite?
You’ve probably already realised this by now but 60psi is way too much pressure. It will kill your appliances, taps and washers way sooner than expected lifespan. Great system and excellent video nonetheless. Thanks for sharing 👍
Great job! Way better than my system (I dont have one). I do a lot of commercial water treatment. I like to add SS couplings around the uv lights output. This helps some w uv damage but also especially on a uv light its important to have metal female/ plastic male to prevent cracking due to thermal expansion etc. I also like to add a flex line, or Union out of my filter connections so if there is ever a leak it can just be tightened up some without any real issues. Due to the nature of our work we have to use Sch 80, I have not seen it break before- but I did have a few small leaks after 20 plus years around a uv light in my opinion due to uv damage. I liked the videos of the tractor work- so cool to see all that you are involved with.
We just updated our system (video should be up soon), but one of the things we did was add stainless steal flex piping to each side of the uv light, and then switch most of the pvc to pex.
Great system, just a word of simple advice when attaching fittings to metal use banded fittings, this will help keep you from cracking them. Excellent job! I was a plumber for many years.
I've always wondered why our code doesn't allow PVC for pressurized water..... Now I know :D I grew up brazing/soldering copper pipes and I did my current house with pex/al/pex pipe. Although I see the advantages of pex pipe and fitting, I still like the craftmanship that copper and brass piping just a bit more. It just shows skill :)
You deffinately do have to be a craftsman to do copper. Eventually all that pvc will be changed to 1"pex, we just didn't have the time to order all the fittings since one inch isn't available in store where we are. But the PVC has worked great for the past year with no leaks or problems! Thanks for watching
@@PootsPastures Actually I'm mostly self-taught. I did my trade school in electrical engineering and I actually work in IT. But by night, I like to work with my hands. When I bought my first home, I did most of the remodeling myself. Learned to do water, sewer and tiles. Once you get a few tricks down, soldering copper isn't that hard. A couple of years ago I bought myself a welder and I can fairly say I'm currently half decent. By that time I was also introduced to brazing by a friend of mine. Basically just a combination of curiosity and just doing is what got me into doing things :) As for upgrading to pex. I think that would be a good upgrade. I actually prefer it as a building material for speed and most of it is just sitting behind walls anyway.
One more comment.....Get the wood out of your crawlspace. 2 x 4 studs laying on the ground contribute to the growth of mold which leads to a smelly crawlspace. Once you encapsulate your crawlspace with vinyl signs on the ground the odors will be eliminated. You do not want to have mold growing on wood laying on the ground. Your house is looking nice, why not add another layer of pride and make your crawlspace something inviting? Make sure the signs are underneath anything which can cut it, like the edges of the pressure tank concrete base. Put the base on top of the vinyl sign. This will be a neater look and keep the things you store down there dry.
Once the hot water heater is in, we will be sealing the crawlspace, and if the wood you are referring to is right next to the footings, we those were our concrete forms and we couldn't get them out lol, so we'll be putting the liner over top of them.
The one or two places you could consider skipping past the filters after the sediment would be to send relatively untreated water to the toilet supply and maybe to the laundry washer. You don't need to waste your filters' capacity on those.
i lived with only rainwater for 15 years, cooked with it all the time, no issues. Coffee and drinking water, I hauled, such a small percentage of total water usage I never messed with filters.
So, probably a stupid question, for all the followers: do you simple catch raw rainwater in the tank and then process? Or do you have a particulate filter before it goes into the tank? Then, do you have a purge line on the tank to remove settled particles? Looks like a really cool idea. We have a remote sight but plenty of rain.
A minute or two before the blowout I thought of something. Haven't researched but I think ,OST vity water is at about 20 - 25 PSI so you ,ight want to cut back. Nice setup though and we all ,ale errors and hopefully learn as a result. Enjoyed the vid.
Another possible way of doing this would be to pre-filter all the the rain water into a filtered water cistern, maybe 2500 gallons. Keep a solar powered pump your solar powered UV light in your filtered water cistern to keep it clean. If the rainwater filtration system fails, then you got plenty of time to get it fixed while you are using the 2500 gallon filtered water cistern. You might choose to decide what water gets filtered and what doesn't to save on filter costs and maintenance. Toilets and Washing machines might not need to pass through the lower micron/carbon filters.
having extra filtered water would be good. we have had some lengthy power outages, and although we have a generator (we haven't used it) but the water and pressure in the system does last for a while. We did update the system recently and have a hose bib that bypasses all of the filters now.
Good stuff. I bought some long handled metal wrenches for filter changes on those type of filters. Well, I have a bunch of different sizes of metal wrench for different filters. After they are in there for a while sometimes they don't want to play nice with the small plastic wrench.
That's a good idea. We've changed the filters about 3 times at this point and haven't had an issue yet, but I will deffinately pick some up, or make them.
Thanks glad we could help! And we get this question a lot. We stepped down our sediment filters from 120 to 20 to 5 microns to try and help filter life. If we just had one 5 micron sediment filter it would be doing the work of all the filters but splitting it up means each filter does less work, if that makes sense. Less work means a longer life before needing to replace them. You can absolutely do a system with one sediment filter and a carbon fter and uv and get rid of the 3 filters, it's just personal preference
Nice video, I wish you could do a do and don't kinda video showing what you did wrong and what works best for your water system. Thank you for your video and content I found it very informative. Mike
Glad you enjoyed it,I think one of the biggest things I would have done different would be to put a valve after all of the filters to isolate them when a filter needs changing. We're going to start actually collecting rain water this summer so I'm interested to see the differences, there may be a video in the future after we've lived with it for a little longer. Thanks for watching!
Neat. Enjoyed your video. I've never seen that much Teflon tape used on a joint. But hey maybe I'm the one doing it wrong. That one joint did split the fitting though. Blessings, John 20:29
Lots of over tightening in this video, especially impact into the filter housing, medium hand tight is good, with an extra quarter/half turn to snug. Same with pvc threaded connections, especially with Teflon tape making threads bigger, careful not to over tighten or your female couplers will crack. Same, hand tight is good with an extra quarter turn with channel lock to snug. Nice system though, I’d recommend a post filter after uv light to capture “bugs” as we’d call them, the bodies of everything the uv light killed, otherwise your still drinking them.
@@PootsPastures pipe dope makes such a mess, you just need to put way more Teflon tape on then you don't even have to tighten the fittings as much and you won't have any leaks.
great video, guys! i was just curious if you have your UV bulb connected with a low pressure switch of some kind? (ON when pressure drops indicating flow, then OFF when flow stops). or is there a high temperature shutoff on the bulb itself? i've found that UV bulbs should be changed out annually. UV quartz sleeves should be changed out every other year, but should be wiped down by pulling a cloth rag through it, (using a wire pull). Thanks again for the great video, (and sorry you got soaked).
Since all of our water right now is well water were not running the uv at all, once we get our gutters were just going to leave it on. Eventually I want to install some sort of flow switch so the light turns on when flow starts. And the light we got came with extra quartz sleeves, and extra uv bulbs so we should be set for a while. I hope that helps. As an aside people have told me about switches that turn on when the water flows but I haven't been able to find one yet.
Very informative video, has the system lived up to your expectations? How much was the total price? How much is the maintenance of the filters? What would you have done different? Do you add Chlorine to your water? Thanks George Cardona Jr
Thanks for watching, sorry it has taken a minute to get back to you. But yes the system is functioning great! we have some updates that we are going to make but that will be in a later video (we are going to change the pvc to pex. The total cost of the water system including the tank was probably about 4k. The 3k gallon tank was the majority of it. It cost about $25 each so it does add up a bit, but we have gotten rid of one of the carbon filters and just have an empty housing. We have not added chlorine to the water. I think once we get a larger water storage tank, and the water is sitting for longer we will need to do something but for now we don't have any issues.
thanks for sharing your install. Some thoughts as a retired builder and well user. After learning from well installers , some thoughts. I placed my filter up stream of everything , switches , pressure , tank , etc. why ... because the grit in the water will wear out your rubber bladder in the pressure tank .The grit can clog the pressure switch and gauge , also. I dropped my psi to 35 down from 50 , because it will extend the life of all the seals in your appliances , toilet and faucets. More is not always better , or needed. The reason most plumbers install the inline filters post tank , is because many owners are not that good at regular filter changes. A bonus would be the addition of an inline water use meter. THis will help know how often to do your filter change outs based on gals used. Can I use pvc fittings to plumb a uv sterilizer? The answer is that yes, you can, but you really should not. UV light will degrade PVC piping over time, causing damage to the pipe plastic to leach into your water. Instead of a hard PVC pipe, we recommend a flexible stainless steel line. www.cleanwaterstore.com/blog/using-pvc-for-a-uv-sterilizer-think-again/#:~:text=The%20answer%20is%20that%20yes,a%20flexible%20stainless%20steel%20line.
The plastic in the filter, and the pex, and the fixtures the water comes out of probably contaminates the water. The purple is just standard pvc primer, and the other stuff cures so it's completely hard. I'm not worried about any contamination from that. These are standard plumbing components that are widely used.
Nice system. What brand are the filters in the blue housings? I am working on a system. We have 3 of those filter housings but no filter cartridges and there are no markings on them. Thanks for the video.
Thanks, and we have been using "iSpring" and they have been working well for us. You can get them on along so it's also convenient. Thanks for watching
Hey there! Neat system! Couple questions for you! How many filters do you keep on hand? Do you stock pile them? Do they go bad? How long do they l last.
A little more complexity but I would be tempted to put a pressure gauge downstream of each filter that way when you have a filter plug up you know which one to change instead of just changing them all they won't plug at the same rate
I'd agree with that. After filters and before the UV. Did you get a pressure relief on the well tank tee? Did you set the air psi on the tank to match cut in psi? Cool system 😎
Good stuff, guys. One comment. Your crawlspace seems to be a layer of dirt. How about going to a outdoor advertisement sign company and purchase one or two of their obsolete signs? These signs are very tough vinyl and do not tear easily. Simply go downstairs into your crawlspace, smooth the dirt level, then put a thin layer of chat onto the dirt. What this will do is to keep the sign from tearing as you walk upon it. Plus the sign also adds a wee bit of insulation by not letting cold air to enter your crawlspace from below. I've done this to my crawlspace and the difference is considerable. On a cold winters day the crawlspace is warm. Make sure the sign has enough length to be taped onto your ICF blocks about six inches from the bottom of your floor joists. If you have vents to the outside, block them off with styrofoam insulation so the cold air cannot penetrate into the crawlspace. My house has been warmer since I've done this. It will lower your heating bills. Good luck from a fan in SW Missouri.
Our crawlspace is a conditioned crawlspace meaning we dont have any vents to the outside. We will be putting down a crawlspace liner to stop moisture from coming up from the dirt, but I like the idea of using the bilboard sign though I'll have to look into that! Thanks for watching!
A better arrangement would have been to have 2 or 3 filters for sediment in PARALLEL with valves before and after each filter so you can change any filter without shutting down the entire system, do the same for the charcoal filters. Also, add another spigot after the UV filter with valves on either side so you can drain the system or the house for maintenance. The filters in parallel will increase your filtering capacity and effectiveness by slowing the water flow thru each filter.
Should he have the charcoal filter still in series or just keep the two in parallel? I imagine in series and parallel for optimum filtering but that would get expensive. I think they have the two charcoal in series to make sure the water is perfect for drinking so if they put the two in parallel theyll need another two or even just one more charcoal filter in series with the two in parallel.
All of the diagrams from the manufacturer show filters after the pump so we stuck with that, it would probably be fine to put one before the pump, but because the manufacturer shows all of them after we didn't want to stray from that. Also out of all of the filter set ups I have seen I haven't seen any sediment filters before pumps so I'm not too worried about hurting the pump.
@@PootsPastures well that weird if you didn't see any settlement before the pump, but you will cease element after the first filtration unit. But maybe the manufacture didn't ask you to put a filter before the so you that you can burn up the pump so you can get another one sooner that later! Go LUCK
Around 60 psi is normal city water pressure, so no it is not alot. In his case 60 psi is his max, it probably drops down to 40 psi before the pump turns on, by the time the water gets through all those filters and to his shower it could be down to 20 psi which isn't very much at all for showering.
We just got a 3/4 hp pump from home depot because we were in a pinch and I didn't have time to research and wait for a pump. There are pumps that are way better and more reliable that we will get soon to replace this one, but it's working for now!
What about having a two part system, both parts do the exact same thing. If one fails, switch to secondary filtration. Alternatively, you can relieve a lot of the pressure and cycle back to storage tank with a return line.
We haven't had any issues with the filters failing, I don't really see a reason that you would spend the extra money to make two of the same filter set up so that you could switch over if something happened. It would end up costing twice as much, with double the amount of space needed. It may work for you but we definitely don't have the space.
@@PootsPastures might make economical sense if the smaller water filters are cheaper? from 5 minutes of googling the 4.5"x20" filters are 3.6x the surface area of a 2.5"x10" filter, but even if one used 4 of these smaller filters to get the same surface area they are still half the price of equivalent larger filters. how often are you having to replace your water filters?
Could you add a T valve just after the filters, but before the shut off to the house, where you could attach a hose and siphon ( or even actively suck out) the water in the filters before you change them. Just to help make things a little less messy when changing filters?
It may be hard to siphon the water out but you could attach a valve after the filters, and we will probably end up doing that at the same time that we add a water meter.
I'm so glad you got the water burst on camera that was great man LOL welcome to plumbing 101, never put metal male adapter into a plastic female adapter, most likely to split especially in freezeing weather 😂. great vid
Vortex filters are used in some wood shops to separate sawdust and large particles before the air gets to a filter, so the filter doesn't clog nearly so soon. Does such a thing exist for water? A flowing liquid (water) is different from a flowing gas (air), but the principle might still work.
I only just recently learned that PVC is toxic and is only to be used for irrigation purposes (which makes no sense to me!) CPVC pipe is what is supposed to be used for potable water. However, it doesn't have nearly the sizes needed (at least at my local big box store). I have used a small amount of PVC to connect 2 IBC totes together. Will be transitioning to a black pipe (don't know what they call it) from the totes to the pump and then using PEX into my house.
@@PootsPastures Next time you are in your local big box building supply store, take a close look at any signage where the PVC pipes are. It was a plumbing specialist who pointed the signage out to me. A sign that does not stand out, no brightly colored warning, but the text was there. As many times as I had purchased PVC pipe I had never noticed it before.
I once had to explain to a customer that rainwater harvesting would not protect them from Drought conditions. They asked why. Once you have used your stored water where does the new water come from? They did not have a mains back up.
I am curious why you chose to go with a cistern water system, rather than drilling a well. Was it simply that it was too prohibitive cost wise to go with a while? How much does water cost if you had to rely on deliveries? If you were at a high capacity for collecting water, would the two of you be able to survive on just the water that’s collected through rain?
Great question. Where we live the main aquifer is thousands of feet below ground, and there are smaller pocket aquifers that are refilled by seasonal snow fall. There are many people around our specific area that have dry wells because they never hit water at a reasonable depth, or their wells dried out from deeper wells in the area. So the cost to drill a well to maybe have water wasn't worth it. We currently have over 2k square feet of roof surface that we collect water off of, and over 8k gallons of water storage, so we can go a long time on just rain water alone. Otherwise there are a lot of people that will deliver water for about 6cents a gallon if we run out. I hope that helps explain it!
Think about putting in bleed off valves after the shut off valve before the filter so you can bleed off the pressure and water. My wife and I live in East Tennesse and will be putting in a rainwater collection system. Gravity feed to the home. The only pumps will be from the rain barrels up to the water tower holding tank. I put a 3/4-inch water pipe within a 2-inch PVC doubled looped for a total of 240 feet to use the thermal cooling effect of the ground and the water to cool down our home by force air fan through the 2-inch looped pvc pipe, trying to eliminate the need for air conditioning, we are total off grid property. any insight let us know. Information would be appreciated.
The Filters Have to be After the Pressure Switch so the Pump shuts off at the rated PSI. A filter before the Switch will cause the Pump to Over Pressurize the pipe and Filter.
Have you thought of hooking up a sump pump to help get extra water in case of a blowout? I was thinking about using one of those big moving totes from home depot and using that as my sump pan just in case my filters blow. It hasn't happened...yet.
I've thought about it, we have only ever had one issue, and it was a union that got loose on the pump and slowly unscrewed. No other issues in the 4 years. I have a little alarm that will go off if it senses water.
individual bypasses for each filter, or series, that way you can bypass some filters but not all. and also unions dude. gotta have unions. gonna suck to take the whole thing off the wall just because one lid breaks. fittings matter
At some point we plan to change all the PVC to PEX. And will be adding a shut off on each side of the system. However a bypass for each filter may be okay for some applications, but in ours I don't want to run the system without each filter functioning. Having extra parts on hand for a quick fix is a great idea. I have extra gaskets and filters, but no housings or lids. I will have to add those to the list.
Dude I have a 50 micron spin down filter - (that looks exactly like yours, which I got from Amazon), which flows into a whole house well water treatment that removes the stinky sulfur and iron rust from the well water in my house in Minnesota. That flows into a salt-free water softener. Then flows into five 20 inch 5 micron filters, which then flows into the UV system. It's been about 5 months since installation. Could you please list in order, your process for replacing the sediment filters? I have 4 replacement spin down filters. I just replace the current one with a new one, then soak and wash the used one. And repeat a week later. Thanks!
You do way more than I do with the re-usable filters. With our first sediment filter I shut off the water, open the housing, dump the old water with the sediment, then rinse off the filter and put it back in. Our filters need to be changed about every 6 months, we deffinately don't do it every week.
@@PootsPastures Dude thanks for the response man. Here is what I have found out. The state of the well is the controlling factor. I live in Ham Lake, Minnesota. There is a lot of iron in my area, which if not treated, would leave rust stain on everything. So, I have to clean my spin down filter like every 7 days. I go down to the basement, and once I see that red stuff accumulating, I shut off the water from the well, shut off all the water to the filtration system, and run the basement bath until the water stops. Then I remove the spin down filter and replace with one of the 4 that I have. Then I soak the filter and the bottle case in CLR. I don't even have to wash it. The Calcium Lime Rust fluid takes care of it. Then I just rinse it out at the end, and dry, until I have to repeat. My water pressure starts to reduce if I do not clean or replace the filters. For the whole house filters, I have replaced them for the first time after installation. The 20" filter closest to the spin down was the dirtiest, which makes sense. The 2 after that first one were pristine. But I replaced them anyway, being the first time, and not knowing better 🤣🤣 I will keep them after inspection the next time, as they were spotless. I also received notice on my phone from the UV filtration thing to clean the assembly. I noticed pressure drop. Then I went down and looked. That was when I realized the thing had sent me a text message on my phone to clean it. One last thing, I noticed that the tankless water heater actually reduced the temperature by itself from 120F to 102F when I was having the pressure drop. I read that it was designed to alert you that something was not right. It's all good now though. THANKS BUD!
Question. We’re looking to do the same. We have reason to believe that chemicals are being sprayed in our area for cloud seeding. How could we filter out those chemicals
I wanted to harvest Rainwater (mostly during Monsoons in the Himalayas about 40"/year) for year-round use and decided on about 100-125,000 liter tank (300-350 litres/day) ... supplied by a 2,000 sft Rainwater Collection Area of the Cabin Metal Roof, Tiled Patio and Tank Surface too). After looking at "Tanks" (Plastic, SS, Fiberglass etc..) I concluded an underground Concrete Tank would be cheaper and "Maintenance Free".. and not worry about chemical leaching etc or embrittlement either ... (very high UV Rays at the 6,000ft elevation)... So I got a 50ft×15ft×5ft (~15m×5mx1.5m) underground Deep Concrete Tank made (I got ceramic tiles installed ... free of cost ... as the workers did not have to smoothen/level the cement surfaces as they fixed the tiles) .. so I actually ended up with Concrete "swimming pool"... with an Open Top, Tiled all around and with NO Penetrations to avoid leaks etc.. everything goes in from the top open surface. Ten years plus now .... so far so good... as the "Monsoons" deliver the rainwater annually. I have "two of everything" (except Filter).. Pumps, Pressurized Tanks, Valves, Couplings etc.. so I NEVER HAVE TO SHUTDOWN the Water Supply while fixing things.. I got the water tested BEFORE getting the Filter installed (looks very similar to in the video). The water so clean that Testing Lab near Delhi asked where I got the sample from .. as they had NEVER SEEN SUCH A CLEAN WATER SAMPLE... so no Water Softener, Treatment etc.. was needed... just a "sand filter"... and has not changed even after 10 years now (just got the water tested again.. as good as when "new").... I do add Chlorine, Alum... occassionaly... just in case.. even though we do not use it for drinking... as we have a small waterfall, with an uninhabited forest above, nearby and fill about 4-5 large Water Bottles every 10 days or so... with "sweet water" but boil it.. just being safe..)... Besides using Solar Energy for Electricity I also have Solar Hot Water Collectors (lots of problems with this) and a Solar Hot Air Storage with 2,000ft3 (700sftx2.5ft deep) of Rock Storage below the cabin as part of an insulated Foundation... (trouble free.. as I only have one 250W Blower using Solar Electricity during the day) using the Hot Air trapped in my Ceiling Space... and transfeering it to the Rocks beliw by the Blower... top surfact of the Rock Storage is my cabin floor).. Hope this helps... I have NO GRID, WATER OR SEWAGE CONNECTION (I have Septic Tanks and l use the Gray Water in the Vegetable Garden)... Once you take charge of YOUR Life.. you will see .. "IT IS EASY .. IF YOU TRY"... and always remember ... KISS .. Keep It Simple Sir...
You might want to check micron size to remove micro plastics. I'm saying this as your using PVC pipe, or polyvinyl chloride, which contain permanent chemicals that never go away. The recent train crash in PA had cars containing PVC liquid, blow up. Plastic recyclers never re-use pvc products. I think .0001 micron filters PVC but you oughta check.
Is it usual to put all the filters after the pump and pressure tank? You might need some filtration befor to prevent contaminants from entering the pressure tank. Am I looking at this correctly?
Been there done that big time, many a time. hahahhaa Plumbing is pass/fail = no inbetween and that's why Plumbers make the big $$$. If you plumb and it leaks you did not plumb it = do it again! "it's not leaking a considerable amount" @ 12:58. Any leak is fail. That thinking helps you plan ahead of every fitting leaving room for repair instead of too tight.
Quick question, could the main water line from the uv be fitted directly to a tankless hot water heater and then ran through the whole house? If so, would the valves from, say the shower or kitchen sink, be able to run either just hot, cold, or warm?
I think i understand your question so let me see if i can explain it. You have to have the cold water line running off of a T between the uv light and the tank less water heater. The valves on a shower don't modulate temperature by changing how hot the water heater is making the water, it changes by mixing cold and hot. You need the dedicated cold water line to every fixture to be able to adjust temperature. If you go directly from the uv to the hot water heater then the whole house you will only have hot water and no cold water. You need the two lines (one hot and one cold) to each fixture. And some fixtures like toilets and fridges and such only use cold water. I hope that answered your question.
![[#2024MAMA] ROSÉ (로제), Bruno Mars - APT. | Mnet 241122 방송](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/dgGqD28J6aQ/mqdefault.jpg)
![BOWKYLION - วิงวอน (ex-change) [Official MV]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/cLdnZWDaO-w/mqdefault.jpg)
We were all young once and made plenty of mistakes, goofs and accidents. I'm glad you didn't edit that out to show everyone, we all do it. That's a nice setup. This showed up in my feed and I'm glad I watched it. I wish you both the best. Enjoy your youth while you are young enough to do so. I am 55 and have COPD and use oxygen. I leave the house about once a month to go to the doctors and have groceries delivered. You cannot go wrong with your rainwater system. My water bill was about $150 this month. Look at what you save in the long run.
u still smokin cigs tho?
$4.31 for each 1,000 gallons of water used where I live...
The majority of the water bill is administration fees and taxes..
Hi Thek, I hope you’re keeping well but it’s a shame that a more mobile oxygen system isn’t available so you could go out every day if you wanted to. Do you need such a big tank all day or could a smaller one on a buggy be feasible?
@@blackpepe wait, does he or she or whatever these days? lol
Awesome setup, but you may want to consider replacing the PVC into and out of the UV light with non-plastic plumbing. The UV radiation will degrade the PVC over time.
We use pvc on roofs all over the place. UV doesn't degrade plastic as much as you might think. Especially if the gray pvc is used.
@@truthserum8326 Need to be more worried about the pvc leaching into the drinking water with heat up there. Lots of estrogen like chemicals in it which can make it into the water and into the body to reduce testosterone in men.
@@paladain55 LOL it's funny because the two main countries that Ban PVC are America and China and both are having huge fertility issues.
Drinking water that is running through copper pipe with lead solder joints is probably a lot worst for Humans but that debate is useless since the Copper Industry has flooded the Scientific community with "Scientific papers" as to why PVC is bad for you. BTW most of this states only if the pipe is heated! I don't know about you but I don't drink water that comes out of my water heater, and my pipes are underground.
Anyway I have examined numerous old PVC pipes that have been replaced and in all cases the PVC itself was covered in a white mineral layer that builds up on it within months of installation. I would suggest you get a piece of copper pipe and bend it into an upright U shape and fill it with some water and then come back in a week and empty that water into a clear glass. The black copper rich water that comes out is not a pretty sight.
My suggestion is that if anyone is in fear of their drinking water then the simple solution is a RO filter system in your kitchen and all drinking water is taken from that.
We can’t have pvc for potable water out here in Vegas because it leaches chemicals in the water. Better off using Wirsbro . Better burst resistance , bendable and can do long runs without connections. Need to be buried and covered for UV.
Is that PVC or CPVC? We don't use PVC for drinking water.
CPVC is good and schedule 80 cpvc is rated for 400 psi.
Another Old Guy here 😊. It’s great to see young Men and Women learning and Doing things themselves now a days. And ALL OF US have been Sprayed or caused Smoke when we were learning.
Electrical is Always your biggest Danger. When you do have to do some Temporary (Sketchy) stuff 🙄🙄 keep it as Safe as possible. GFCI everything.
Pressure Relief Vales aren’t something to skip on. You’ll still have Water to clean up, but less likely to have Pipes or Fittings to Replace.
Unions are your Best Friend later on, so install a few now.
Don’t take what the Old Guys say as an Insult, we’re just Repeating what the Old Guys said to us when we were young 😉👍.
Just after high school, in the mid 70’s. My parents bought a farm in Indiana where the rainwater from the roof the house dumped into a well next to the house. This is what we drank. No filters, no nothing. No one died.
There were less pollutants back then but today there are too many chemicals running off into our well/ground/roof water.
Beautiful install. My favorite part was you tightening the pvc fitting and having it burst. I heard laughter in the background.
The best part when it exploded none of you guys got mad. That makes projects enjoyable when no one gets mad but having fun.
Slick setup, I'm deal with this stuff day in and day out for a living. Glad you took the leap to try it all yourself. That being said a pressure relief valve should never be overlooked. It's a very important safety feature that helps prevent things from blowing up. Keep up the good work!
I really like your rainwater filter set up, it might be a little overkill but that's better than not enough!
Thanks! That was the plan, and hopfully we don't have to change the filters as often
I would have put in individual bypasses for each filter and uv light so when you have to isolate a unit you can still be using water. It is also useful to install flat face flanges so you can break open the system without having to cut out sections of glued pipe as you will struggle to rotate the threaded joints.......I just found this channel....gotta say I loved the leak at the end followed by superb chilled response,,, and of with the electrics as they don't mix well......blessup...
I loved it guys. The accidents and mistakes… everything. Im in South Africa, planning on starting a company that’s going to fix some of the dirty water problems we have in Africa. Im still new in the business and the trade but videos like these show it’s ok to make mistakes and learn from them. Thank you
Awesome! We wish you and your community the best of luck!
Man that is awesome 🙏🏽🌏. I'm starting tomorrow at a company doing filtration installations but with the same goal in mind.
Where are you based?
A drain is always necessary for these systems but I definitely learned that lesson the same way you did 😂😂 love this video!!
I know it's dated. jumped all comments. Love the presentation of your valuable learning experience. I've been blessed with PEX. Self alignment, eliminating the need for unions. Can reuse all fittings with a simple grind of a copper ring. Never stop the journey.
Be careful with brass fittings, a lot of them are made too thin and the pipe tears as you tighten the fitting.
Your teflon tape, it only needs about three layers.
Now the real thing, your pressure tank needs to be strapped to a wall or something and you need to use hoses to isolate vibration from the pump and between your tank and filters.
It is important to do this since it is under your house where you won't immediately see problems. If you get a leak, you might only notice it when your tank goes dry and then you will find a real problem in your crawl space.
Think electric shut-off valves and water sensors. Do it right.
A few more things, I would add a hose bib at the clean end of your filters. That will allow you to purge the line after you service the filters so you don't have to have your faucets sputter so much when you turn the water back on. I would also rebuild that filter board, hang it on a cleat and add a couple unions so it is easy to pull the whole thing if you have to. I like sweat soldered copper pipe for water. Galvanized steel is stronger but yuck. Maybe a few stainless nipples would be worth it? This is a place to spend a few hundred for peace of mind.
Yep we are going to secure the pressure tank, just didn't do it in the video. Using hoses isn't a bad idea either, I've just never seen it done before (at least out here, everyone I know just runs pvc from the pump to the tank. And putting a drain on the house side of the filters isn't a bad idea at all.
And I'm not too worried about being able to remove the whole filter board by itself, although I should not that we did add a few unions, we just didn't show it in the video. As far as soldered copper, I'm trying to stay away from copper, just personal preference and I agree on galvanized (I'm definitely not gonna do that lol).
Oh, and we are adding a meter to the system, I just haven't found one I like that also detects leaks... yet, but it will definitely be in there.
Thanks for the comment, a lot of good feedback. Hope you enjoyed it!
@@PootsPastures I'm not sure why you dislike copper. It is easy to work with, pretty strong and ages gracefully. You have seen what brand new PVC can do, imagine it 20 years later... I think I would rather use PEX than "rigid" PVC.
@@joequixotic3039 bacteria does not like sitting in copper, as well.
@@joequixotic3039 copper is way too expensive and not worth the hassle, pex is the way to go. You need more than 3 wraps of Teflon tape, if you put way more you don't have to tighten the fitings as much and it definitely won't leak. He clearly didn't put enough Teflon tape on which made him over tighten that elbow which made it leak and then crack, don't skimp on the Teflon tape.
@@Kyle-ut4jg I can not disagree with this more. Too much Teflon tape will cause leaks, three wraps is plenty. I will also stand by copper. I'm not sure what the price difference is but for small fabricated manifolds there is no real alternative. For a full building with longer runs of pipe, price may be an issue but copper is still the superior product.
Just something to think about. Run two separate systems with a T just in case you have to change out some-pieces, if something breaks or needs to be replaced. That way you don’t risk losing access to water.
You’ll need to add a Flow Control after the UV to increase dwell time inside the chamber.
Even with stuff going wrong and blowing lol y’all still laugh together and enjoy the experience! Much love from Tennessee! Great video!
I'm a a newbie trying to put in my rainwater system. I wanted to say thank you for putting all the links to the parts I need to build my system. We just bought a new house for growing our vegetables and I can't stand drinking city water, nor do we we want to use city water as our water suorce in our hydroponic growing system. Agai, thanks for your video and the links to everything. Have a wonderful day.
That's really nice system.
I few remarks for you guys and the viewers.
I build so many system but it was much simple than that.
And I always thought about "over flow". One winter too rainny. Or you've left for traveling away from home.
You need a backup plan.
What I've done it's add a additional conter in amount of 10% from the original contener.
For example. If you have 200 gallons. Add 20 gallons.
And on this you should add pipe for the ground in case it'll over flow again.
One more thing.
You haven't make any air related valve.
And it can damage your system.
Make a hole in the highest point in the system. And cover it in a fine net to protect from bugs enter your water.
I have a water filtration system and I found 40 psi more than enough. I like your set up it is very similar to mine
Thanks were pretty happy with it too so far! The 40 to 60 switch is working well for us, we don't get any noticeable preassure drop before the pump kicks on which is nice
I put a rainwater collection system in a property we own, and I set the Pressure Regulator to 20 PSI, and water was easily flowing up to the 3rd floor from the ground floor! 60 PSI would tax all connections, as you have wonderfully proven on video! Dial the Regulator down to 20 PSI, and you’ll still get plenty of pressure!
I'm not an engineer, but the only use for water pressure isn't to make sure it can reach the highest floor in the house, but also so appliances run correctly and efficiently. Psi and pipe size correlate to how much water you get and how quick. The standard psi for residential buildings is between 40 and 80. All the pex in our home is rated for well over that, and was actually preassure tested at 120psi.
Also the fitting didn't break because of the water preassure, it broke because I over tightened it.
If 20psi works for you that's great! 60psi is working for us.
Thanks for watching.
I love the idea of rain water filtration. Research the plumbing going into the UV light, I've seen some videos that say the PVC breaks down over time and should be plumbed using stainless steel fittings (unsure, watch Life Uncontained water video for reference) otherwise you both did a good job explaining your process and setting up your filtration.
We are going to change the fittings to brass, which will also help with the cracking lol!
Thanks for watching, also I love Life Uncontained!
Was going to point this out after also watching that from Life Uncontained. It’s amazing how TH-cam brings communities together
I like that you left the mishaps in. You learn through trial and error
Thanks for a REAL installation video! Every plan requires improvisation. I’m getting ready to install a catchment and filtration on an off-grid cabin. I’m sure I’ll have my share of “oops” moments on that project too.
Great job with the filter system! Thanks for leaving in the bloopers as well. They always happen and leaving them in makes it real. We installed a whole house filtration system and I had a couple questions about yours. My big blue casings always leaked a little and leak seal helps. I had a lot of pressure loss and considered adding a second carbon filter in parallel to increase flow. Did you make the change from PVC joints to PEX or Sharkbite?
we have an update video coming, but one of the things we did was change most of the pvc to pex.
You’ve probably already realised this by now but 60psi is way too much pressure. It will kill your appliances, taps and washers way sooner than expected lifespan. Great system and excellent video nonetheless. Thanks for sharing 👍
Exactly what would have happened to me. Thank You. Very entertaining and instructional. Great video.
Thanks for watching, glad you enjoyed it!
Great job! Way better than my system (I dont have one). I do a lot of commercial water treatment. I like to add SS couplings around the uv lights output. This helps some w uv damage but also especially on a uv light its important to have metal female/ plastic male to prevent cracking due to thermal expansion etc. I also like to add a flex line, or Union out of my filter connections so if there is ever a leak it can just be tightened up some without any real issues. Due to the nature of our work we have to use Sch 80, I have not seen it break before- but I did have a few small leaks after 20 plus years around a uv light in my opinion due to uv damage. I liked the videos of the tractor work- so cool to see all that you are involved with.
We just updated our system (video should be up soon), but one of the things we did was add stainless steal flex piping to each side of the uv light, and then switch most of the pvc to pex.
Great system, just a word of simple advice when attaching fittings to metal use banded fittings, this will help keep you from cracking them. Excellent job! I was a plumber for many years.
Thanks for the info!
Try a paste sealant instead of tape. Tape and over tightening is the reason threaded female pvc fittings crack.
I've always wondered why our code doesn't allow PVC for pressurized water..... Now I know :D
I grew up brazing/soldering copper pipes and I did my current house with pex/al/pex pipe. Although I see the advantages of pex pipe and fitting, I still like the craftmanship that copper and brass piping just a bit more. It just shows skill :)
You deffinately do have to be a craftsman to do copper. Eventually all that pvc will be changed to 1"pex, we just didn't have the time to order all the fittings since one inch isn't available in store where we are. But the PVC has worked great for the past year with no leaks or problems!
Thanks for watching
@@PootsPastures Actually I'm mostly self-taught. I did my trade school in electrical engineering and I actually work in IT.
But by night, I like to work with my hands. When I bought my first home, I did most of the remodeling myself. Learned to do water, sewer and tiles. Once you get a few tricks down, soldering copper isn't that hard.
A couple of years ago I bought myself a welder and I can fairly say I'm currently half decent. By that time I was also introduced to brazing by a friend of mine.
Basically just a combination of curiosity and just doing is what got me into doing things :)
As for upgrading to pex. I think that would be a good upgrade. I actually prefer it as a building material for speed and most of it is just sitting behind walls anyway.
Uv is a must.😢
One more comment.....Get the wood out of your crawlspace. 2 x 4 studs laying on the ground contribute to the growth of mold which leads to a smelly crawlspace. Once you encapsulate your crawlspace with vinyl signs on the ground the odors will be eliminated. You do not want to have mold growing on wood laying on the ground. Your house is looking nice, why not add another layer of pride and make your crawlspace something inviting? Make sure the signs are underneath anything which can cut it, like the edges of the pressure tank concrete base. Put the base on top of the vinyl sign. This will be a neater look and keep the things you store down there dry.
Once the hot water heater is in, we will be sealing the crawlspace, and if the wood you are referring to is right next to the footings, we those were our concrete forms and we couldn't get them out lol, so we'll be putting the liner over top of them.
The one or two places you could consider skipping past the filters after the sediment would be to send relatively untreated water to the toilet supply and maybe to the laundry washer. You don't need to waste your filters' capacity on those.
Yes and our outside hose bibs! We'll be doing that in the near future when we revamp our filter system.
I agree... the water I use for the Outdoors (Garden, Car/Patio Wash etc...) Bypasses the Filter... TOTALLY....
i lived with only rainwater for 15 years, cooked with it all the time, no issues. Coffee and drinking water, I hauled, such a small percentage of total water usage I never messed with filters.
So, probably a stupid question, for all the followers: do you simple catch raw rainwater in the tank and then process? Or do you have a particulate filter before it goes into the tank? Then, do you have a purge line on the tank to remove settled particles? Looks like a really cool idea. We have a remote sight but plenty of rain.
that is real... the leaks on start up, thanks for showing it all!
Glad you enjoyed it!
You did a great job and you taught me much of what I needed to know! Thank you for this valuable information!
good day ,installation is great but if you use union fittings for allocated place less worry for any leaks or trouble ,Wilbur from Phillippines
Nice work - I would have put the sediment (spin down) filter in front of the blue filters - you'd want to catch larger sediment before them.
I think you guys had a heck of a job I like the filter system and I really like how you utilize the UV sterilizer for the bacteria in the water. 👍👍👍👍😁
Thanks! we recently made some modifications to it by adding shut offs after the filters and changing all the pvc to pex!
A minute or two before the blowout I thought of something. Haven't researched but I think ,OST vity water is at about 20 - 25 PSI so you ,ight want to cut back. Nice setup though and we all ,ale errors and hopefully learn as a result. Enjoyed the vid.
Another possible way of doing this would be to pre-filter all the the rain water into a filtered water cistern, maybe 2500 gallons. Keep a solar powered pump your solar powered UV light in your filtered water cistern to keep it clean. If the rainwater filtration system fails, then you got plenty of time to get it fixed while you are using the 2500 gallon filtered water cistern. You might choose to decide what water gets filtered and what doesn't to save on filter costs and maintenance. Toilets and Washing machines might not need to pass through the lower micron/carbon filters.
having extra filtered water would be good. we have had some lengthy power outages, and although we have a generator (we haven't used it) but the water and pressure in the system does last for a while. We did update the system recently and have a hose bib that bypasses all of the filters now.
Just finishing our 5000 gallon system. So far so good.
That's awsome! It feels so nice to be putting the rainwater to use!
Good stuff. I bought some long handled metal wrenches for filter changes on those type of filters. Well, I have a bunch of different sizes of metal wrench for different filters. After they are in there for a while sometimes they don't want to play nice with the small plastic wrench.
That's a good idea. We've changed the filters about 3 times at this point and haven't had an issue yet, but I will deffinately pick some up, or make them.
🤣🤣 Two funnies, well done for keeping calm in the spray of the storm. Excellent set up.
Thanks! It's been working good so far!
wow so amazing, thanks for all your help. kinda dumb question, why so many filters?
Thanks glad we could help! And we get this question a lot. We stepped down our sediment filters from 120 to 20 to 5 microns to try and help filter life. If we just had one 5 micron sediment filter it would be doing the work of all the filters but splitting it up means each filter does less work, if that makes sense.
Less work means a longer life before needing to replace them. You can absolutely do a system with one sediment filter and a carbon fter and uv and get rid of the 3 filters, it's just personal preference
Nice video, I wish you could do a do and don't kinda video showing what you did wrong and what works best for your water system. Thank you for your video and content I found it very informative. Mike
Glad you enjoyed it,I think one of the biggest things I would have done different would be to put a valve after all of the filters to isolate them when a filter needs changing. We're going to start actually collecting rain water this summer so I'm interested to see the differences, there may be a video in the future after we've lived with it for a little longer. Thanks for watching!
I know this is old but ty for posting, I have a similar set up in BC Canada and am always looking to improve.
Nice job!
DIY rookie mistakes. That's how you learn stuff! (and watching TH-cam videos if you don't like to do stuff twice!) Thanks for sharing!
Neat. Enjoyed your video. I've never seen that much Teflon tape used on a joint. But hey maybe I'm the one doing it wrong. That one joint did split the fitting though.
Blessings,
John 20:29
Lots of over tightening in this video, especially impact into the filter housing, medium hand tight is good, with an extra quarter/half turn to snug. Same with pvc threaded connections, especially with Teflon tape making threads bigger, careful not to over tighten or your female couplers will crack. Same, hand tight is good with an extra quarter turn with channel lock to snug. Nice system though, I’d recommend a post filter after uv light to capture “bugs” as we’d call them, the bodies of everything the uv light killed, otherwise your still drinking them.
nice work-I appreciate your real life experience with this project
Thanks glad you enjoyed it!
Use Teflon tape plus pipe dope on pvc no more leaks. Good luck🤠👍
I saw that tip a little while ago and I'm deffinately going to use it from now on!!
@@PootsPastures pipe dope makes such a mess, you just need to put way more Teflon tape on then you don't even have to tighten the fittings as much and you won't have any leaks.
great video, guys! i was just curious if you have your UV bulb connected with a low pressure switch of some kind? (ON when pressure drops indicating flow, then OFF when flow stops). or is there a high temperature shutoff on the bulb itself? i've found that UV bulbs should be changed out annually. UV quartz sleeves should be changed out every other year, but should be wiped down by pulling a cloth rag through it, (using a wire pull). Thanks again for the great video, (and sorry you got soaked).
Since all of our water right now is well water were not running the uv at all, once we get our gutters were just going to leave it on. Eventually I want to install some sort of flow switch so the light turns on when flow starts. And the light we got came with extra quartz sleeves, and extra uv bulbs so we should be set for a while. I hope that helps.
As an aside people have told me about switches that turn on when the water flows but I haven't been able to find one yet.
@@PootsPastures try searching for pressure switches, you can choose between mechanical and electronic switches
Very informative video, has the system lived up to your expectations? How much was the total price? How much is the maintenance of the filters? What would you have done different? Do you add Chlorine to your water?
Thanks
George Cardona Jr
Thanks for watching, sorry it has taken a minute to get back to you. But yes the system is functioning great! we have some updates that we are going to make but that will be in a later video (we are going to change the pvc to pex. The total cost of the water system including the tank was probably about 4k. The 3k gallon tank was the majority of it. It cost about $25 each so it does add up a bit, but we have gotten rid of one of the carbon filters and just have an empty housing. We have not added chlorine to the water. I think once we get a larger water storage tank, and the water is sitting for longer we will need to do something but for now we don't have any issues.
@@PootsPastures Do you know for sure that you need more than 3K gallons? If so, how close is this one to meeting your needs?
@@PootsPastures by the way, for me (alone), 3,000 gallons is about 100 days.
thanks for sharing your install. Some thoughts as a retired builder and well user. After learning from well installers , some thoughts. I placed my filter up stream of everything , switches , pressure , tank , etc. why ... because the grit in the water will wear out your rubber bladder in the pressure tank .The grit can clog the pressure switch and gauge , also. I dropped my psi to 35 down from 50 , because it will extend the life of all the seals in your appliances , toilet and faucets. More is not always better , or needed. The reason most plumbers install the inline filters post tank , is because many owners are not that good at regular filter changes. A bonus would be the addition of an inline water use meter. THis will help know how often to do your filter change outs based on gals used. Can I use pvc fittings to plumb a uv sterilizer? The answer is that yes, you can, but you really should not. UV light will degrade PVC piping over time, causing damage to the pipe plastic to leach into your water. Instead of a hard PVC pipe, we recommend a flexible stainless steel line. www.cleanwaterstore.com/blog/using-pvc-for-a-uv-sterilizer-think-again/#:~:text=The%20answer%20is%20that%20yes,a%20flexible%20stainless%20steel%20line.
Great thanks, know this, there will be a similar system built in Spain in the near future
Great setup. Shouldn't the fine filter be after the course filter? Otherwise, You'll get sand in the find filter, no?
The filters go from largest opening to smallest opening. So yes fine after course. If I said it wrong in the video that's my bad.
Great water filtration system. But the pink and purple stuff you use for the pipes, wouldn't that contaminate the water? Is that non-toxic?
The plastic in the filter, and the pex, and the fixtures the water comes out of probably contaminates the water. The purple is just standard pvc primer, and the other stuff cures so it's completely hard. I'm not worried about any contamination from that. These are standard plumbing components that are widely used.
Great experience. But flexible high pressure pipes may be less hassle on tilt/angle, tighten and maintenance.
Nice system. What brand are the filters in the blue housings? I am working on a system. We have 3 of those filter housings but no filter cartridges and there are no markings on them. Thanks for the video.
Thanks, and we have been using "iSpring" and they have been working well for us. You can get them on along so it's also convenient. Thanks for watching
Hey there! Neat system! Couple questions for you!
How many filters do you keep on hand? Do you stock pile them? Do they go bad? How long do they l last.
A little more complexity but I would be tempted to put a pressure gauge downstream of each filter
that way when you have a filter plug up you know which one to change instead of just changing them all they won't plug at the same rate
You should install a backflow device or some sort of check valve system after your filters
Not a bad idea, we're going to end up adding a valve after the filters.
I'd agree with that. After filters and before the UV. Did you get a pressure relief on the well tank tee? Did you set the air psi on the tank to match cut in psi? Cool system 😎
Good stuff, guys. One comment. Your crawlspace seems to be a layer of dirt. How about going to a outdoor advertisement sign company and purchase one or two of their obsolete signs? These signs are very tough vinyl and do not tear easily. Simply go downstairs into your crawlspace, smooth the dirt level, then put a thin layer of chat onto the dirt. What this will do is to keep the sign from tearing as you walk upon it. Plus the sign also adds a wee bit of insulation by not letting cold air to enter your crawlspace from below. I've done this to my crawlspace and the difference is considerable. On a cold winters day the crawlspace is warm. Make sure the sign has enough length to be taped onto your ICF blocks about six inches from the bottom of your floor joists. If you have vents to the outside, block them off with styrofoam insulation so the cold air cannot penetrate into the crawlspace. My house has been warmer since I've done this. It will lower your heating bills. Good luck from a fan in SW Missouri.
Our crawlspace is a conditioned crawlspace meaning we dont have any vents to the outside. We will be putting down a crawlspace liner to stop moisture from coming up from the dirt, but I like the idea of using the bilboard sign though I'll have to look into that!
Thanks for watching!
@@PootsPastures It is very cheap to purchase. My local sign company sells them for around 45 cents/square yard.
Thats not bad at all, thanks for the info
@@tynyyn5344
I keep getting ads on Facebook for the old pvc sign material. You are right, that’s a good way to go. Super thick and cheap.
A better arrangement would have been to have 2 or 3 filters for sediment in PARALLEL with valves before and after each filter so you can change any filter without shutting down the entire system, do the same for the charcoal filters. Also, add another spigot after the UV filter with valves on either side so you can drain the system or the house for maintenance. The filters in parallel will increase your filtering capacity and effectiveness by slowing the water flow thru each filter.
Should he have the charcoal filter still in series or just keep the two in parallel? I imagine in series and parallel for optimum filtering but that would get expensive. I think they have the two charcoal in series to make sure the water is perfect for drinking so if they put the two in parallel theyll need another two or even just one more charcoal filter in series with the two in parallel.
I hate when that Happens 🥴. Those PVC female fitting are bad for that 😢. Less teflon tape with a little thread sealer. I like it😊. Nice video.
Great video w mistakes and all
Ty for your insight
I like your set up 60psi a lot. Question why no settlement filter Only in late of your pump you not afraid to ruin it.
All of the diagrams from the manufacturer show filters after the pump so we stuck with that, it would probably be fine to put one before the pump, but because the manufacturer shows all of them after we didn't want to stray from that. Also out of all of the filter set ups I have seen I haven't seen any sediment filters before pumps so I'm not too worried about hurting the pump.
@@PootsPastures well that weird if you didn't see any settlement before the pump, but you will cease element after the first filtration unit. But maybe the manufacture didn't ask you to put a filter before the so you that you can burn up the pump so you can get another one sooner that later! Go LUCK
Around 60 psi is normal city water pressure, so no it is not alot. In his case 60 psi is his max, it probably drops down to 40 psi before the pump turns on, by the time the water gets through all those filters and to his shower it could be down to 20 psi which isn't very much at all for showering.
Great video, was wondering what pressure pump did you use and where to buy it?
We just got a 3/4 hp pump from home depot because we were in a pinch and I didn't have time to research and wait for a pump. There are pumps that are way better and more reliable that we will get soon to replace this one, but it's working for now!
What about having a two part system, both parts do the exact same thing. If one fails, switch to secondary filtration. Alternatively, you can relieve a lot of the pressure and cycle back to storage tank with a return line.
We haven't had any issues with the filters failing, I don't really see a reason that you would spend the extra money to make two of the same filter set up so that you could switch over if something happened. It would end up costing twice as much, with double the amount of space needed. It may work for you but we definitely don't have the space.
@@PootsPastures might make economical sense if the smaller water filters are cheaper? from 5 minutes of googling the 4.5"x20" filters are 3.6x the surface area of a 2.5"x10" filter, but even if one used 4 of these smaller filters to get the same surface area they are still half the price of equivalent larger filters. how often are you having to replace your water filters?
Could you add a T valve just after the filters, but before the shut off to the house, where you could attach a hose and siphon ( or even actively suck out) the water in the filters before you change them. Just to help make things a little less messy when changing filters?
It may be hard to siphon the water out but you could attach a valve after the filters, and we will probably end up doing that at the same time that we add a water meter.
I'm so glad you got the water burst on camera that was great man LOL welcome to plumbing 101, never put metal male adapter into a plastic female adapter, most likely to split especially in freezeing weather 😂. great vid
Vortex filters are used in some wood shops to separate sawdust and large particles before the air gets to a filter, so the filter doesn't clog nearly so soon. Does such a thing exist for water? A flowing liquid (water) is different from a flowing gas (air), but the principle might still work.
Kind of, the first and biggest filter we have is a vortex filter with a screen in it, but I have never seen any for small sizes (20 or 5 microns)
Love ur content... learned a lot plus got a good laugh
I only just recently learned that PVC is toxic and is only to be used for irrigation purposes (which makes no sense to me!) CPVC pipe is what is supposed to be used for potable water. However, it doesn't have nearly the sizes needed (at least at my local big box store). I have used a small amount of PVC to connect 2 IBC totes together. Will be transitioning to a black pipe (don't know what they call it) from the totes to the pump and then using PEX into my house.
Its the standard used up here. We will eventually be changing it to pex when we have our permanent system
@@PootsPastures Next time you are in your local big box building supply store, take a close look at any signage where the PVC pipes are. It was a plumbing specialist who pointed the signage out to me. A sign that does not stand out, no brightly colored warning, but the text was there. As many times as I had purchased PVC pipe I had never noticed it before.
black pipe is a steel pipe that will rust out. Use galvanized instead or CPVC
@@zibbybujno5452 No, the black pipe I am talking about is a plastic based product that is used for running water lines underground all around here.
I once had to explain to a customer that rainwater harvesting would not protect them from Drought conditions. They asked why. Once you have used your stored water where does the new water come from? They did not have a mains back up.
We currently have 8k of water storage and still ran out of water with the little rainfall we got this year!
The system and info is awesome. But the mistakes are gems.
I am curious why you chose to go with a cistern water system, rather than drilling a well. Was it simply that it was too prohibitive cost wise to go with a while? How much does water cost if you had to rely on deliveries? If you were at a high capacity for collecting water, would the two of you be able to survive on just the water that’s collected through rain?
Great question. Where we live the main aquifer is thousands of feet below ground, and there are smaller pocket aquifers that are refilled by seasonal snow fall. There are many people around our specific area that have dry wells because they never hit water at a reasonable depth, or their wells dried out from deeper wells in the area. So the cost to drill a well to maybe have water wasn't worth it.
We currently have over 2k square feet of roof surface that we collect water off of, and over 8k gallons of water storage, so we can go a long time on just rain water alone. Otherwise there are a lot of people that will deliver water for about 6cents a gallon if we run out.
I hope that helps explain it!
@@PootsPastures That makes sense. Good price on water when you do run out of collected rainwater. Thanks for your reply.
7::00 what is the tape you are using for the connections, and what is the glue or purple stuff you are using for the PVC pipe
Think about putting in bleed off valves after the shut off valve before the filter so you can bleed off the pressure and water.
My wife and I live in East Tennesse and will be putting in a rainwater collection system. Gravity feed to the home. The only pumps will be from the rain barrels up to the water tower holding tank. I put a 3/4-inch water pipe within a 2-inch PVC doubled looped for a total of 240 feet to use the thermal cooling effect of the ground and the water to cool down our home by force air fan through the 2-inch looped pvc pipe, trying to eliminate the need for air conditioning, we are total off grid property. any insight let us know. Information would be appreciated.
Hope you released the pressure before removing the filters :)
Hi great video!!! Can you please link to the well pump and pressure tank that you guys used in the application?
We just got those from home depot, I will evened upgrade the pump to a higher quality one, but it works for now
Just wondering. I would think you would want your 1st sediment filter before the pressure tank to avoid accumulation in that tank.
The Filters Have to be After the Pressure Switch so the Pump shuts off at the rated PSI. A filter before the Switch will cause the Pump to Over Pressurize the pipe and Filter.
That rain water is cleaner than what the city sends out !!
Great video and setup Thanks for sharing, I realy needed this. Can you post the model of the UV filter that you used? Thanks
The uv filter should be in a link in the description.
Have you thought of hooking up a sump pump to help get extra water in case of a blowout? I was thinking about using one of those big moving totes from home depot and using that as my sump pan just in case my filters blow. It hasn't happened...yet.
I've thought about it, we have only ever had one issue, and it was a union that got loose on the pump and slowly unscrewed. No other issues in the 4 years. I have a little alarm that will go off if it senses water.
You did a beautiful job.
Very well done video !
individual bypasses for each filter, or series, that way you can bypass some filters but not all. and also unions dude. gotta have unions. gonna suck to take the whole thing off the wall just because one lid breaks. fittings matter
At some point we plan to change all the PVC to PEX. And will be adding a shut off on each side of the system. However a bypass for each filter may be okay for some applications, but in ours I don't want to run the system without each filter functioning. Having extra parts on hand for a quick fix is a great idea. I have extra gaskets and filters, but no housings or lids. I will have to add those to the list.
Give me a description of components to system and what is your frost line depth
Dude I have a 50 micron spin down filter - (that looks exactly like yours, which I got from Amazon), which flows into a whole house well water treatment that removes the stinky sulfur and iron rust from the well water in my house in Minnesota. That flows into a salt-free water softener. Then flows into five 20 inch 5 micron filters, which then flows into the UV system.
It's been about 5 months since installation. Could you please list in order, your process for replacing the sediment filters? I have 4 replacement spin down filters. I just replace the current one with a new one, then soak and wash the used one. And repeat a week later. Thanks!
You do way more than I do with the re-usable filters. With our first sediment filter I shut off the water, open the housing, dump the old water with the sediment, then rinse off the filter and put it back in. Our filters need to be changed about every 6 months, we deffinately don't do it every week.
@@PootsPastures Dude thanks for the response man. Here is what I have found out. The state of the well is the controlling factor. I live in Ham Lake, Minnesota. There is a lot of iron in my area, which if not treated, would leave rust stain on everything.
So, I have to clean my spin down filter like every 7 days. I go down to the basement, and once I see that red stuff accumulating, I shut off the water from the well, shut off all the water to the filtration system, and run the basement bath until the water stops.
Then I remove the spin down filter and replace with one of the 4 that I have. Then I soak the filter and the bottle case in CLR. I don't even have to wash it. The Calcium Lime Rust fluid takes care of it. Then I just rinse it out at the end, and dry, until I have to repeat.
My water pressure starts to reduce if I do not clean or replace the filters. For the whole house filters, I have replaced them for the first time after installation. The 20" filter closest to the spin down was the dirtiest, which makes sense. The 2 after that first one were pristine. But I replaced them anyway, being the first time, and not knowing better 🤣🤣 I will keep them after inspection the next time, as they were spotless.
I also received notice on my phone from the UV filtration thing to clean the assembly. I noticed pressure drop. Then I went down and looked. That was when I realized the thing had sent me a text message on my phone to clean it. One last thing, I noticed that the tankless water heater actually reduced the temperature by itself from 120F to 102F when I was having the pressure drop. I read that it was designed to alert you that something was not right. It's all good now though. THANKS BUD!
Question. We’re looking to do the same. We have reason to believe that chemicals are being sprayed in our area for cloud seeding. How could we filter out those chemicals
Would like to know what state you are in. Recently discovered ( Toxic ) PVC I would never use.
I wanted to harvest Rainwater (mostly during Monsoons in the Himalayas about 40"/year) for year-round use and decided on about 100-125,000 liter tank (300-350 litres/day) ... supplied by a 2,000 sft Rainwater Collection Area of the Cabin Metal Roof, Tiled Patio and Tank Surface too).
After looking at "Tanks" (Plastic, SS, Fiberglass etc..) I concluded an underground Concrete Tank would be cheaper and "Maintenance Free".. and not worry about chemical leaching etc or embrittlement either ... (very high UV Rays at the 6,000ft elevation)...
So I got a 50ft×15ft×5ft (~15m×5mx1.5m) underground Deep Concrete Tank made (I got ceramic tiles installed ... free of cost ... as the workers did not have to smoothen/level the cement surfaces as they fixed the tiles) .. so I actually ended up with Concrete "swimming pool"... with an Open Top, Tiled all around and with NO Penetrations to avoid leaks etc.. everything goes in from the top open surface.
Ten years plus now .... so far so good... as the "Monsoons" deliver the rainwater annually.
I have "two of everything" (except Filter).. Pumps, Pressurized Tanks, Valves, Couplings etc.. so I NEVER HAVE TO SHUTDOWN the Water Supply while fixing things..
I got the water tested BEFORE getting the Filter installed (looks very similar to in the video). The water so clean that Testing Lab near Delhi asked where I got the sample from .. as they had NEVER SEEN SUCH A CLEAN WATER SAMPLE... so no Water Softener, Treatment etc.. was needed... just a "sand filter"... and has not changed even after 10 years now (just got the water tested again.. as good as when "new").... I do add Chlorine, Alum... occassionaly... just in case.. even though we do not use it for drinking... as we have a small waterfall, with an uninhabited forest above, nearby and fill about 4-5 large Water Bottles every 10 days or so... with "sweet water" but boil it.. just being safe..)...
Besides using Solar Energy for Electricity I also have Solar Hot Water Collectors (lots of problems with this) and a Solar Hot Air Storage with 2,000ft3 (700sftx2.5ft deep) of Rock Storage below the cabin as part of an insulated Foundation... (trouble free.. as I only have one 250W Blower using Solar Electricity during the day) using the Hot Air trapped in my Ceiling Space... and transfeering it to the Rocks beliw by the Blower... top surfact of the Rock Storage is my cabin floor)..
Hope this helps... I have NO GRID, WATER OR SEWAGE CONNECTION (I have Septic Tanks and l use the Gray Water in the Vegetable Garden)...
Once you take charge of YOUR Life.. you will see .. "IT IS EASY .. IF YOU TRY"... and always remember ... KISS .. Keep It Simple Sir...
sounds fantastic. My little rainwater harvesting is nothing compared to yours and others contributing and commenting on the videa :)
You might want to check micron size to remove micro plastics. I'm saying this as your using PVC pipe, or polyvinyl chloride, which contain permanent chemicals that never go away. The recent train crash in PA had cars containing PVC liquid,
blow up. Plastic recyclers never re-use pvc products. I think .0001 micron filters PVC but you oughta check.
Is it usual to put all the filters after the pump and pressure tank? You might need some filtration befor to prevent contaminants from entering the pressure tank. Am I looking at this correctly?
Try putting unions between your hard pipping and your filters and other things
If that’s y’all basement hall definitely need to encapsulate it!
That is in our crawlspace. And check out our crawlspace encapsulation video to see what we did!
HAHAHA! Wonderful build and great Bloopers!
Been there done that big time, many a time. hahahhaa Plumbing is pass/fail = no inbetween and that's why Plumbers make the big $$$. If you plumb and it leaks you did not plumb it = do it again! "it's not leaking a considerable amount" @ 12:58. Any leak is fail. That thinking helps you plan ahead of every fitting leaving room for repair instead of too tight.
Quick question, could the main water line from the uv be fitted directly to a tankless hot water heater and then ran through the whole house? If so, would the valves from, say the shower or kitchen sink, be able to run either just hot, cold, or warm?
I think i understand your question so let me see if i can explain it.
You have to have the cold water line running off of a T between the uv light and the tank less water heater. The valves on a shower don't modulate temperature by changing how hot the water heater is making the water, it changes by mixing cold and hot.
You need the dedicated cold water line to every fixture to be able to adjust temperature.
If you go directly from the uv to the hot water heater then the whole house you will only have hot water and no cold water. You need the two lines (one hot and one cold) to each fixture. And some fixtures like toilets and fridges and such only use cold water.
I hope that answered your question.
Did y'all put a check valve after your pump before your pressure tank?
Yes after the pump before the tank