Turning a disaster into a water harvesting opportunity.

[Greenbeast]

Nice one

[Andy_WSM]

Great to see it all finished. What an awesome job, virtually unlimited free water, a householders dream

[derekmt]

....

If I had not attempted the repair during the last very dry summer I dread to think how much bigger the hole would have been now and with the current record height of the water table I don't know if it would have even been possible to fix. ...

All good epics need a bit of luck. The story should be worth a few beers down the pub. However, because truth is stranger than fiction anyone hearing it will write it off as a tall tale, until you show the pictures on your phone

[Other-Power]

....

If I had not attempted the repair during the last very dry summer I dread to think how much bigger the hole would have been now and with the current record height of the water table I don't know if it would have even been possible to fix. ...

All good epics need a bit of luck. The story should be worth a few beers down the pub. However, because truth is stranger than fiction anyone hearing it will write it off as a tall tale, until you show the pictures on your phone

Agreed, I know I would be thinking 'no one would be that stupid to use plasterboard props.....' 

Fair play though, its a pucker job.

Jon

[solar_cambridge]

Nowty - It's been a while, so any updates? Have you dared to look into the chamber when there is good rainfall upstream. I still think what you did was fantastic given the circumstances of what you found down there. 

[nowty]

I was not going to post to this thread anymore but as someone asked !, it gave me the incentive to have a look down there in my wellies after a very powerful thunderstorm today.

Whilst the thunderstorm was in progress, probably about as much rain in as little time as I could ever expect. The flow of water through the chamber was quite something and reminded me of Niagra falls. Quite terrifying to watch but it seems to cope with no problem. I would imagine I would not have had any house left it if I had not discovered the problem.

A few hours later after when the flow had subsided I went down there in my wellies with an inpection lamp to take a closer look and see how much gravel had built up inside the catchpit. There was quite a bit of gravel but I reckon it would take the catchpit 10 years to fill up and I cleared out most of it with a small shovel in about 10 mins, shovelling it into the outgoing pipe.

There was absolutely no cracking or settlement whatsoever so I reckon the job will outlive me. One interesting this is that there is water seeping in under some pressure though one of the joins in the concrete walls so shows the water table is higher than the level in the chamber.

My water harvesting system continues to work well and has saved me over 30,000 litres (I fitted a water meter) of water in 9 months.

Earlier in the year I had to redesign the transfer pump, I had installed a submersible pump above ground for ease of access with a double check valve to keep the pump primed. This worked most of the time, but every 3 weeks or so it would somehow lose the priming and eventually failed after repeatedly running dry. I replaced the pump and fitted it under the water and I have never had any problems since.

The cheap 250w Polish pressure pump I bought has worked incredibly well and is powered from my off grid setup. In summer I pumped several thousand litres continuously on the lawn through the hosepipe over several hours without the pump getting hot. The transfer pump kept up with the hosepipe outflow too, so I had unlimited countinous water.

Another surprising thing is that all the main pre-filter into the harvesting tank and finer pressure pump filter dont even need cleaning after 9 months.

[Tiff]

Excellent job and well done, I enjoyed reading about this and its great to get an update.

[biff]

Hi Nowty,
         All is well that ends well. This was indeed a great thread and you succeeded in doing a great job where many others would have given up.
  You did give me the shivers for a while and I was genuinely worried.
         Hats off to you, .
                                    Biff

[desperate]

Yep well done Nowty, I've done a bit of underground works, for an underpinning outfit and even with all the latest equipment professionally installed (by others you understand) it still gives me the heebie jeebies. Your single-handed efforts are magnificent.

Desp

[garethpuk]

A good job well done, I know some of us were a bit concerned about the props but the water coming now under pressure might explain why we were worried for you!

Anyway you've done a fantastic job 

[peterfc]

Hi Nowty

I have not been a member long and today i got round to reading your epic journey. Congratulation on completing such an epic repair.

Peter

[gravyminer]

Fair play Nowty,  that was a nasty problem.

Unstable ground always looks better when covered by a tarp or ply sheets 
and they often do piled foundations because the ground is unstable .......
Clay is kinda friendly though and more likely to fail slowly.

I have occasionally been the wrong side of the saftey box or under a digger bucket in an unsafe trench for brief periods and its not a good feeling.
Always promising myself and guardian angels that I will never do it again and get quite carried away with my 'duty of care' if I see someone else doing it.

Enjoyed the thread. Thanks to all who contributed.