Rainwater Phase I is now in the books. Meaning, the structure is built and the roof is on. Now comes Phase II, which is adding the plumbing and getting rainwater into the tank. Phase III comes later, which is how to get the water out of the tank for consumption.
This past weekend we finished the “Loo-House” construction and detailing, which was putting on the roof and decking out the interior. I didn’t get too many pictures of the roof going on, but basically it follows my theory of collecting rain from every structure, and this one is no different. Our plan is to capture the rain from the roof into a smaller water tank (15-20 gal) and have it drop by gravity into a small hand sink for your hands after….’the deed’. That is coming up, but in the mean time Sheralee completely decked out the inside. I told her the other day it was like a little sanctuary up there. Once you close the door of the loo, you close the door on dust, wind, and dirt….because everything is so nice and clean in there.
And don’t go stealing our stolen toilet paper holding idea. That is pretty cool, just some 1/2″ galvanized pipe fittings and all done, and works great! All that is left is a little hand washing sink, which is coming soon.
We also put the metal ribbed roofing material on the water shed. These were 3’x12′ panels we bought from Home Depot.
We did seven panels and it fit really well. As you can see from the front, we had just under 2ft left over. Due to that is where I want the solar panels to reside, I am going to cut off about a foot of panel. Should work fine.
Here is the finished product:
Working out great so far….now it probably won’t rain for months…..well actually, rain is schedule today and tomorrow up there. doh!
Next week we are taking a break from that project, and completing a good weekend project. We are both pretty excited about it. We are adding some new compost bins, building them from 4×4 posts and 2×6 boards. One will encompass the current compost pile we have brewing, and the other will start the next one, with one more to follow in the fall.
This is the drawing I came up with, we shall see how the finished product looks:
Another great part of this project is that we will be using solar power to run a 12 volt water pump to spray down/clean things. Exciting!! We bought the following items:
Norwesco 35 gallon water tank
Seaflow 12 volt water pump
Microsolar 30watt panel to run the pump
This will all end up in a small garden hose. Very cool. We shall see how it turns out. Our first attempt with solar…wish us luck.
We are going back this weekend, Friday night.