Thread: Water Tower - Any Experience?

Itchy's build is getting closer, the perimeter wall is being built at the moment - to keep the nosey facking neighbours out once we start to build.

The first major job is going to be drilling two bores and building a water tower with two tanks.

Why two bores, why two tanks?

Because we'll have one deep bore and one tank for household water - deep to get clean water, and we'll have another bore and tank for garden water (about 5 Rai).

The point of shallow bore is the water does not have to be as good quality as the house water, and I don't want to use unnecessary power lifting water from deep down when lifting perhaps 10 meters will suffice.

The question is what tower to put in - I understand available options are, a cast concrete structure - base, four reinforced pillars, platform and roof.

Or a steel framed structure, kit assembled on a pre-cast concrete base. With platform and roof.

I expect the concrete build is cheaper and perhaps easier to modify if I want to add a solar water heater at a later date.

I might consider two platforms - The first at about 3 meters above ground to for the garden water tank, the second perhaps at 8 meter above the ground to for the house water.

Next the tanks themselves:

Options are Stainless Steel (They look good but I've heard of corrosion problems).
Fiberglass/Polycarbon
Cast Concrete tanks lined with cheap tiles. (Could look like a dogs dinner if not done right).

So anyone have any experience:

What tower have you found best?
What tanks have you found best?
What elevations did you use? (for a tank to supply a two story house)
What size outlet pipe did you install? (no point putting all that head of water behind a tiny outlet line).

Any tips you might have.

FYI... I'm thinking of getting the water supply in early so it is available for the builders and for the gardens, which I can get started on ASAP.

Originally Posted by Itchy

What elevations did you use? (for a tank to supply a two story house)

you will need a pump if you want useful pressure

Why on earth do you want a tower for the house, big, ugly expensive?
To get enough pressure to run a shower unit it needs to be about 12 meters tall, maybe more to compensate for the 2nd story.
Just put in an on demand pump. Building a big assed tower doesn't save money as it costs you to to pump the water up into it.
The only benefit is you still have pressure if the power is off, and a cheap genset can fix that.

For the garden a 3m tower is gonna give fuck all pressure to irrigate 5 rai.