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Very cool! Are you filtering the Grey water before use? Would love to see pics

Jay

No filtering. I capture only the bath and the shower of the one bathroom (which is not used by the wife, so no long hair issues), and no basin water where all the gunky stuff from brushing teeth comes from. The pump is rated for dirty water and will pump larger items up to 30mm in diameter, so it simply throws the water onto the lawn as is.

If it becomes a problem, I already have a plan for that: Apparently a baby bottle brush pushed into the pipe makes a perfect filter, and cleaning it is simple enough.

Hi plonkster

Can you share info on the pump please? I'm going to start with something similar soon and I like the look of your pump.

C

It's a Tallas D-DW (DW == Dirty Water, there is also a cheaper CW model). After I bought it I noticed the specs on their website says "Temporary use", but if you compare with the DWP (Permanent use) it seems identical except for the bottom part of the pump, perhaps so it requires cleaning less often. It's not a big pump at all, 400W, can do 140liters/minute if you have a big pipe on it, but only 0.7kpa pressure so if you use a hose pipe for "last mile delivery", use a thick one.

Is that a recycled drum or a new one? I want to get between 2 and 4 drums similar to that one to use for the pool's backwash water. 

There is a place in Parow which sells recycled drums of all shapes and sizes, but they do not respond to emails although you have to contact them via email for all inquiries.  I'm going that way on Friday, so I'll maybe just visit them...

It's new, from "Plastics for Africa". I can already see one issue with that part of the plan: It's not very sturdy. It works okay, but I would have done better to buy something a bit more solid for burying in the ground like that.

I think I know that place in Parow. It's called BG Servers if I recall.

2 hours ago, plonkster said:

It's new, from "Plastics for Africa". I can already see one issue with that part of the plan: It's not very sturdy. It works okay, but I would have done better to buy something a bit more solid for burying in the ground like that.

Larger flowbins have a metal cage around them which help in the ground as well. You could easily build a small support frame from  alumunium rods

4 hours ago, plonkster said:

I think I know that place in Parow. It's called BG Servers if I recall.

Yep, that's the place.

"Underground" tanks and containers are usually reinforced and "above ground" containers usually can't handle the soil's pressure below ground.

Take that one out of the hole, make the hole about 50 mm larger all around, put the drum back into the hole, fill it with water and pour concrete into the area around the drum - do not empty the water from it before the concrete has properly set...

2 hours ago, SilverNodashi said:

Larger flowbins have a metal cage around them which help in the ground as well. You could easily build a small support frame from  alumunium rods

I doubt that the cage around a flowbin will help with forces from outside e.g. the soil around it, unless the cage was on the inside of the bin. 

4 minutes ago, superdiy said:

can't handle the soil's pressure below ground

It's only 700mm under ground. It's a R200 plastic container, hardly a train smash if it doesn't survive. I'll wing it and see how it goes :-)