Water Tank Types

[mseely]

Can I get some advice on the different types of water tanks that are available at Global, HomeMart etc....?

What is the difference between the Stainless and the Brown/Grey plastic tanks? Also, when I was asking about them, I "think" the salesperson asked me if I was going to place it 'on' or 'in' the ground. I thought the standard placement was on the surface, but when thinking about it - I wouldn't have seen the ones that are sub-surface, hmmmm. I would prefer not looking at a watertank in my backyard if that is a workable option.

Any and all recommendations would be appreciated.

Missouri Mike

[BobHelm]

Mike, I was told (by a Thai builder -so take that as you want to ) that stainless should only be used on the government supplied water. If you have water from your own well then you should not use stainless.
It is possible to place a tank under ground I can't think of anyone that I know that has one. I think that would very much depend on your water supply....If it is your own then you would need two pumps - one to pump out of the ground & into the tank, then another to pump into your house on demand from the tank - as no gravity feed.
The "government" water supply isn't always exactly high pressure but you probably could rely on it to gravity feed an under ground tank & use a pump to supply the house.
The usual set up I have seen here is...
An above ground tank which is pump filled and then water is fed to the house generally by gravity from the tank, but the pump "kicks in" to supply directly from the source if (for any reason) the gravity feed in not sufficient.
There would certainly be an extra cost in placing one under ground & you could run up quite large bills (or waste an awful lot of water) if a leak ever developed.

[Bandung_Dero]

Steer well clear of the shiny SS tanks. They are made of a low 304 grade material and subject to pin hole leaks after a couple of years which are very hard to repair. From what I've seen the corrosion is a result of welding splatter which has not been cleaned off properly.
My 1500 litre Blue Plastic tank is now 7 years old and still like new although I did replace a valve fitting not so long ago, easy. Don't bury it, apart from anything makes cleaning hard. Plant a few small trees for visual effect and maybe a bit of shade. I've put one of these accumulator type bore pumps on mine to maintain a constant water pressure through both levels of our home. We get about a 3 day buffer if the town water is cut off. This is filtered then fed into the tank via a toilet cistin type float valve.

[Geordie]

Correct Bob, the stainless steel tanks are liable to corrode and leak a pal of mine in the next village found this out to his cost, the SS tank only lasted 18 months.

[Pakawala]

Hi Mike,
I've got a 2000 ltr blue plastic tank on the roof of my townhouse which supplies water to my 2nd and 3rd floors and have direct town water going to the 1st floor via a pump when needed (mostly to fill the washing machine). Don't see a reason why the plastic tank couldn't be placed in the ground but you will of course, need to then pump the water to your home. I bought a small SS tank (750 ltrs) when I lived in an apt. just outside the ring-road but only had it for 6 months so no problems, although I agree, I would NOT bury one of them.

Another item to think about is where you are located. I'm inside the ring-road and my water supply is sufficient for the 1st floor use. Also, at night when the pressure is a bit higher, I can fill my tank on the roof of the 3rd floor without use of the pump. Similar to Bandung-Dero, it uses a cistern type float for the cut-off valve.

Had to put 2 & 2 together... Mike + Missouri... hmmm, see you on the golf course.

[rickfarang]

My father in law has had a stainless steel tank for the last 8 years, being pumped from a well, and has not experienced any problems.

The kind of tank that you bury might be a little less expensive (conjecture on my part). If you bury it, then it is out of site. With a buried tank, you are dependent on electricity to power your pump to get the water out. When the power fails, you cannot shower or flush your toilets unless you keep "emergency water" available. We have about 10 liters in each bathroom for such purposes. You could also dip a bucket into your outdoor tank to get water in case of a loss of electricity.

If you bury a tank, make sure that there are no rocks under it. Based on a neighbor's experience, its best to put sand on the bottom of the hole, and then fill mostly with sand, otherwise, you run the risk of rocks pushing their way through the side or bottom of the tank.

Above ground tanks, if high enough, can provide water by gravity to your fixtures in the house. If you need to fill a bucket from an outdoor tank, you can do so by merely opening a valve.

The steel tanks sit on a tower. Maybe only a 30 cm high tower, but if several meters high, they can provide sufficient water pressure to run your fixtures -then you pump water into the tank, no out as with underground tanks. The polyethylene plastic tanks sit on a concrete pad. Some of the polyethylene tanks I've seen look really nice.

There is another approach, one which I wish I had followed. If you want to store a lot of water, you can make an underground cistern of concrete or concrete and other materials. If you put it 30 of 50 cm under the surface of your land (one friend has a basement and just walled off a portion of that) you can grow a garden on top of it. And I think this provides the lowest cost per cubic meter for water storage. One thing to look out for: Make sure you have somebody who really understands concrete and that he uses the best design and materials. Just take a look at concrete work in this part of world, and the reason will be obvious.

[papaguido]

There's specific tank available to place underground, it's square vise the cylindrical type with inlet/outlet on top. The one I saw was only 500L, don't know if larger capacity is available.

[laphanphon]

Lots of variables to consider, first, main purpose of tank, to hold and provide all water, from drinking water, to everything else. I used the stainless tank, think 10k liters, rings a bell. Was also told depending on water, won’t last.............bollocks. My well water came out much cleaner than city water, without the corrosive chlorine. What I did use, was the bottom outlet, as apposed to the side outlet, thus letting residue to sit in bottom until flushed out. Since no sediment to sit, ran it straight thru house. Actually the tank was supply for kitchen sink, and outdoor shower. Acted as a back up, in case loss of electric, as you can see in pic, in case of no electric, pressure due to gravity, and it had plenty of pressure just being 3 meters off ground. This is the method I would recommend. Or, you will need a pump to fill tank, then 2nd pump to supply house, if on ground level. This was out of the city, so pump supplied house, with plenty of pressure. Water was from deep well, 25 meters and drinkable, though I ran thru a filter as a precaution. Probably not necessary. Tank is 6 years old approximately with no signs of wear or rust. Top fed via pvc from well pump, new owners installed a auto fill/shut off. I preferred the manual, oops, forgot every once in a while. But didn’t have to worry about a malfunction when out and about.

Not a fan of anything plastic, as if drinking, guessing a plastic flavor, thus chemical leaching of plastic into water, along with all things tortured in the sun, just a matter of time before failure.

Also not a fan of burying things, if a problem, dig it back up.

Just my thoughts.

[Aardvark]

As a matter of interest, nobody so far has mentioned price........Blue Plastic I bought about two years ago was Bt 10.000 for 2000 Ltr, if memory serves correct

[parrot]

Best decision we made when we built our home was to have the contractor build a 2000l brick/cement tank just under the raised porch. It's not in the ground, but it's in shade all day. Makes for very pleasant cool showers in the summertime. When we lived in town previously, our water tank was sitting in full sun all day. No chance of taking a cool shower!

[laphanphon]

mine was approx 10 K baht, give or take 1K baht, over 6 yrs ago. shop around, prices do vary, easily 10 % can be saved. will verify, if more than 2 k either way, will repost.

[tigerryan]

I was watching a home improvement show “this old house” or something to that effect and learned about a really ingenious concept for water storage. Instead of using a buried plastic or stainless water tank a void was created using square plastic milk crates.

Envision digging a large hole and neatly stacking a pile of milk crates about the size of a car then wrapping the crates in a layer of heavy gauge rubber or modified poly sheeting and then just wrapping it up like a gift. A pump with controller is then inserted into the void. If you wanted to make the water potable I assume it would need to be filtered both in and out.

I never consider building a void then wrapping it and after considering that the top of the tank does not really need to be sealed at all on top. A single sheet on the top of would act as a lid for groundwater infiltration (assuming you have the top of the “package” above ground water level.

This project would only be fun for seriously bored handy guys and you would need to be completely involved in it to make sure that the liner was not compromised during installation but it could be good fun and the storage potential could be massive and as a plus you could drive over it when finished.

[Aardvark]

LA, that sounds very cheap for stainless, even if it is on the thin side.....

[laphanphon]

sounds very cheap

won't be back home for couple months, sure i have receipt somewhere, doubt if paid more that 12 k for it, that was 6 or more yrs ago.

[rufus]

I was watching a home improvement show “this old house” or something to that effect and learned about a really ingenious concept for water storage. Instead of using a buried plastic or stainless water tank a void was created using square plastic milk crates.

With all due respects, you can't creat a "void". A void is nothingness. I am not sure what you mean by this.

[laphanphon]

strongely suggest keeping any system/storage/pipes sealed tight as can be, as anything can enter/fall/slither in and die............yummy................and takes up to a month to decay away............trust me........i know, it's gross.

[Pakawala]

Correction rufus, The term void has several meanings: if you'd ever spent any time in the Navy, you'd know there on many voids aboard ships. They are simply 'empty spaces' within the ships hull but sometimes are used for storage which kinda defeats the purpose.

While I'm trying to think of another use of the word, I think I'll go to the 'head' and void my bladder.

[laphanphon]

I think I'll go to the 'head' and void my bladder

excellent use of a 'transitive and intransitive verb'

[glalt]

We use one of the fiberglass brown colored tanks (1,500 liter) for our drinking water. One caution is to be careful when buying plastic tanks. The better tanks are two ply, normally black on the inside and blue on the outside. The reason for that is if the tank in translucent, algae will grow inside. Take a flashlight with you and shine it on the outside of the tank. Look inside the tank and if you can see any light, look for another tank.

A friend of mine has a 10,000 liter fiberglass tank that he buried. He was warned to attach it to a substantial concrete foundation or it would pop out of the ground during a heavy rain. If the tank was full all the time that wouldn't be a problem but the tank doesn't always stay full. He catches rain water off his roof whenever possible. During the dry season, he fills the tank from his bore hole.

[tigerryan]

Rufus, all soil and rocks have void space its where gas, oil and and water hang out in the subsurface, it can also be called porosity. A tank in the ground is just a contained giant pore or void. The water in a tank just hangs out in the tank given equal hydrostatic pressure, and it cant escape because it dosnt know any better... have your pick.