Back from Traveling. Back to work.

First off, a public service message: I don't even remember what they call it. "That's No Moon. It's a Cheeseburger!" would be appropriate. Do not attempt to eat a cheeseburger that is the length of a big steak knife in height and as big around as a hubcap!!!!! This is at "The Home Plate" outside Taunton, MA. Three of us challenged the humongo burger. None of us succeeded. One of the guys cheated by asking for his with no veggies or other stuff on the burger. He still didn't finish it. I made it through 3/4 of the burger and about 1/4 of the fries before I decided that I didn't want to hurt myself that badly.


In homage to a true American classic film - "That isn't a water tank."


"This is a water tank."
Did I mention there are two of them?

Each tank has a total capacity of 1500 US gallons. That is about 5700 liters for my international friends. To allow for expansion, I'll set the float switch to cut off around 1300-1400 gallons (~5100 liters) for each tank. These were the missing item that was holding up the pressure water system. These should be fun to get all plumbed in! I picked up some fittings and valves at Lowe's on the way home so I can start filling them. My pump puts out around 112gph so to fill both tanks would be a continuous runtime of around 25 hours. Needless to say, I'll be doing it in smaller steps of a few hours at a time.

The only factory installed fitting is the 2in female threaded outlet fitting a few inches up from the bottom. I will have to drill holes for the inlet, vent, and float switch in one of the tanks. I may put float switches in both tanks and wire them in series so they both have to indicate more water is needed before the pump turns on. Since the tanks will be plumbed together in normal operations, they should always equalize to the same level. Putting a pair of float switches in series means that a switch failure won't start the pump.

Each pump will have an independent shutoff vales mounted as close to the tank outlet as possible. Those are some of the items I picked up today. Since the tanks expand/contract a bit due to both the water level and temperature of the tank, I'll need a flexible section between the tank outlet and the buried hardlines running to the pump/filter cabinet. The flexible section keeps from cracking the hardline piping as the tank flexes.

They put large tabs on the tanks to allow tying them down. At 500USG in a tank, it will weigh 4000 lbs. What do they expect is going to move these tanks? About the only things I can think of are an earthquake or a bomb blast. In the case of the former, I want them to move a bit so they don't rupture. In the case of the latter, I think the location of my water tanks is going to be a long ways down my list of priorities. We don't get many tornadoes in Washington so I won't consider that one likely. If the tanks were going to be empty for a long period then it would make sense to tie them down.

I picked up a trailer today. It is a 16-20ft (I didn't measure and the guy didn't recall) tandem axle. The GVWR is probably around 10-12Klbs which is perfect for my needs. It needs a new deck and the wiring for the electric brakes cleaned up. The existing deck will work fine for picking up lumber, insulation, etc from the store and hauling light equipment around. Fixing the brakes is just a wiring project.

It was getting dark when I snapped this pic so I'll take some more tomorrow and post a couple of better ones.


Tomorrow morning, I'll pickup a 1-man auger at the rental place. Now that the tanks are in, it is time to dig the holes, install the fence posts, and get the pump cabinet built. Oh, I suppose I might actually put some fencing on the fence posts too. While I've got the auger, I'll likely also make holes for a mailbox and some new gatepost holes down at my back gate. Time permitting, I'll do a few more in locations I want near-term future posts. Friday I'm picking up a trencher from the same place. That is to trench for all the water lines I have to run.

I'll try to update as I do things tomorrow and Friday if I can still lift my arms after all that.