Rain barrels are a simple way to capture and recycle the rain washing off your roof. Barrel systems are an ancient technology that are making a comeback as water shortages and utility bills prompt many homeowners to save and use rain that falls on their properties.
Do you have a sustainable supply of potable water? This is an important reason you may want to build one for emergencies. Of course, it will need purifying, but that is an easy task that can be done as simply as boiling it for a minute.
If you want to capture water naturally from your roof top for use at a later, dryer or more needful date, use a rain barrel. Large commercial plastic rain barrels are readily available at home and garden stores and online, but they are expensive. In this article we will learn to build one cheaply ourselves.
The biggest advantage is that rain water is softer than tap water; it has no chlorine, lime, or calcium. It has less sediment and dissolved salts and is warmer than tap water. It is excellent (some say much better) for watering plants. A secondary advantage is rain water collection barrels reduce water pollution by reducing the amount of storm water runoff.
This type of collection and storage system is very efficient. A typical house has a roof area of 1,200 square feet and four downspouts that will each drain about 300-square feet of roof. That means a rainfall of 0.3 inches will fill a 55-gallon rain barrel placed under each downspout. A roof with 1,000 square surface feet captures 625 gallons of water for every one inch of rain that falls. Does not that sound to you like an awful lot of water that you could harvest and use for free on your garden?
To empty the barrel when full use two barrels. Keep one full for watering needs, and one empty ready to catch the next rain. If you do not have a roof to use for rainwater barrel attachment, you can build a rain catchment system with some plastic sheeting or a military poncho.
For best results, try to attend a workshop put on by your county extension service. They usually do these in spring to help generate local enthusiasm for the many benefits of rain harvesting.
Choose and purchase a barrel that has at least a 42-gallon capacity. Rain barrels typically tie into your home guttering system. There are many rain barrel designs, both commercial and creative DIY styles.
No matter the design, they all have three basic things in common:
There is an opening for water coming into the barrel and two more openings for water going out. A spigot inserted near the bottom allows you to fill a watering can or connect a hose. An overflow is needed near the top to remove excess water during heavy rain events.
Now there are a lot of ways to use the water your rain barrel collects and move it to where you want to use it. My favourite way is to allow water to travel from a water barrel cistern through a hose that snakes through the garden that will disperse stored water throughout the garden over a prolonged period of time.
A 55-gallon rain barrel with a hose takes about 12 hours to drain. A spigot in the middle of the barrel can be used to fill a watering can through a hose. You can get water on demand by either gravity feed or you can add pump action. I added a cheap solar fountain pump to mine to pump water out to the garden hose.
If you have gutters on your house, you may be able to collect 55 gallons of water during a heavy rain by connecting a downspout to a rain barrel. Note that during a heavy rainfall there is the potential to fill many more barrels, take advantage of it. Bulk type foodstuffs like pickles, olives etc. often are packaged in FDA food grade barrels which can work well for our purpose.
If you are recycling a used container you for your project you need to make certain that you clean it thoroughly. Do not ever use a container that held caustic or poisonous materials. Large plastic type trash cans will also work well, just use your imagination.
Supplies
Tools
Directions
Barrels either have sealed lids or lids that can be removed. Those with sealed lids typically have two small round threaded openings. These can be used to clean out the barrel or to attach PVC fittings for incoming/outgoing water.
Barrels with flat bottoms are more stable.
Barrels made of white plastic seem to disintegrate more quickly in the sun if not painted – the darker the color the less algal growth also. When painting your barrel use a paint that is suitable for plastic surfaces.
Make sure the overflow directs water away from the foundation of your house.
Rain barrels are great for hand watering, and they are not mosquito breeding grounds if the downspout fits tightly. If your barrel is open at the top, use Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) products (often sold as floating donuts) to kill mosquito larvae in a safe way.
If you happen to have algae take root in your rain barrel, treat the water with submersible bacterial packets sold in pond supply stores. A rain barrel is not unsightly; however, a four foot shrub can easily shield it from view if needed.
Rain Chains are a beautiful and functional alternative to traditional downspouts. They guide rainwater from the roof to the ground, and are typically handcrafted of copper that will gain a verdigris patina colour as it ages – much less expensive material can also be used. They produce soothing sounds as they guide rainwater from the rooftop to the ground. Rain Chains replace the traditional downspout on a typical household gutter system.
Rain Chains, otherwise known as “kusari doi” in Japanese, are not a new idea. For hundreds of years, the Japanese have used the roofs of their homes to collect water, using chains to transport it into large barrels for household water usage. Rain Chains are easy to install by making a copper hook to rest in the gutter hole. The Rain Chain is hung from the hook.
You can easily purchase commercial rain chains, but let’s look at how we can make our own.
How To Build a Rain Chain
For an 8 to 9-inch rain chain, you will need about 40 feet of 1/4 inch soft metal tubing for large rings and 15 feet for small rings. Cut the tubing with pruning shears or wire cutters, working the pieces back and forth until they separate. Save one foot of the tubing to be used later.
Link the large rings together, and join each pair of large rings with a small ring using a pair of pliers.
Remove your downspout. Shape the 1-inch piece of tubing, and then place it in the gap as shown. Secure the chain to the tubing using the top ring.
Place a container (such as a rain barrel or large earthenware jar) underneath the chain to catch rainwater, and use the collected water to irrigate your garden.
Given the uncertainty of droughts and your garden, or municipal water plants failing in a grid down situation, it just makes good sense to build yourself a rain barrel to save some of that free water for possible dry days ahead.
A rain barrel is useless when there is no rain—or is it? Fill it up just like your bathtub with water if you get warning of a impending disaster. Bucket brigade filling from a creek or nearby water source is also effective to have water readily available for your garden or household.
Technically, a rain barrel acts as a small cistern – a reservoir or tank for holding rainwater for later use. Regardless of impending drought conditions, saving rainwater can make sense for any gardener. Plants like rainwater, which is naturally soft and chemical-free to help them grow.
