Thursday, November 3, 2016

The tank

After about a month of manual labour, digging by hand to prepare a pad for our new rainwater tank. It finally arrived...




Yesterday afternoon, just after 5pm, we saw our new 5400 Gallon tank, come down the driveway. There was quite a bit of nail-bighting, whether the truck could actually make it down our driveway or not. But the truck-driver handled it like a pro.

We're glad the driveway was sealed, so such a truck could come down our slope, without losing traction. Once the water tank was off-loaded, he just reversed back up again. It was less painless than we thought, and relatively quick.




So the good news was the tank had arrived. The bad news was, it was 10cms taller than our existing tank. Which meant we had to dig down, that much again. Only we already had a truckload of crusher dust, delivered on the pad it's meant to sit on. Way more than we needed too.

It will add another 3 days labour, just to remove the crusher dust and dig down further. We are pretty exhausted at this point and were looking forward to having the tank positioned tomorrow, by a truck with a crane. But it looks like it will take an extra week until we reach that point. Thankfully, the company we bought the tank from, were okay holding off the second truck with a crane, until we're ready.


15 comments:

  1. That is disappointing, Chris. How about a working bee with your friends coming to help :-) I am sure you would do the same for them.

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    1. Problem is that David's days off are during the week, when friends have their days off on the weekend. The joys of the hospitality industry, lol.

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  2. Gosh you must be aching all over. I hope you guys have time for a good rest once it is all over.

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    1. We're having to pace ourselves now, that's for sure. :)

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  3. Did I miss something? Why did that extra height matter?

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    1. If the new tank is higher than the existing tank, the overflow pipes which join them together, enter horizontally. So we'd miss 10cms of head height on the new tank (being higher) effectively wasting storage capacity. We'd prefer to maximise the storage capacity, when we're looking at spending $4,500 in total. Ouch, that number sounds painful, but water is precious.

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    2. Thanks, thought it must be something like that. Water is definitely precious!

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  4. oh no! What a pain. :(

    It will be so rewarding to have it done finallay though. Some jobs are just a giant pain from beginning to end arnt they?

    xx

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    1. The BIG jobs always end up being painful, especially if you have deadlines to work with. We're pushing the time limit out to be able to manage and thankfully, the company we're using, is flexible. But yes, I'll be glad to put this one behind us and reminisce about the big hole in the ground that was 10cms too short, lol.

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  5. Heard you swearing all the way down on Central Coast Chris! :)
    That's a real b*****, good on the tank company for being understanding!
    Caroline

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    1. Surprisingly, there was no swearing - I reserve that for stubbing my toe, or any other kind of painful accident. My reaction felt more like wanting to collapse to the ground like a toddler, and crying "NOOOoooo!" But that would have taken too much energy, lol.

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  6. Water storage - always a hassle, but once sorted is always deeply satisfying. I used to look at the creek as a kid and wondering how to harness the thousands of litres of water as they rushed by....

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    1. Water IS fascinating to watch, isn't it? Creeks are so mellow and there's always something happening around them. My favourite activity as a kid, whenever I came to a large expanse of water, was to see if I could skip a flat pebble across the water. Glad you got to enjoy some creek time as a kid. :)

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  7. Seems like all of life is like that - exciting progress presenting new unwanted challenges! The tank is great and I'm happy for you. Hopefully the rest of the digging will be uneventful and the tank will be in use soon.

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    1. Lol, definitely unwanted in terms of energy levels, but then I think what a trouble to have - finding ways to set up our new tank that will hold water for us. I will have to update the digging progress soon.

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