Equalizing water level and pressure in my two reservoir tanks
Hello Rob here from the Flanagan Homestead today I've got a little Project to do uh my water system is Gravity fed uh this my tanks are up on The hill I had this 330 gallon tank and Then I bought a 270 gallon tank and I Just leveled off the ground you can't See on the camera right now but I Leveled off the ground in the same spot Don't know what I was thinking think Real but they aren't going to be the Same height so when I have water up to The top of this one when I connect the Two tanks together and they equalize Water will come running out the top of This because water runs to the same Level and the top of this one isn't Higher I should have kept this one up Higher in the air so that the tops Matched up so what I'm going to do today Is I hope that the ceiling on the cap is Good enough but I put I created a cap That I'm going to screw on to the top of The lower tank and it has a riser and The water from the higher tank is going To push down and level out and it's Going to come up into this pipe but this Pipe and when it sits on the smaller Tank will be higher than the water level There and it won't will not overflow and Then I can fill up that entire tank on This side if I drop This the top of this tank the bigger Tank down to the lower tank I'm going to
Lose about 50 gallons probably a little Bit less than that and I want to be able To keep all of it so that there's a Large supply of water ready to come down And use down on the lower property I pre-built this already down below Here's the video on how I put this Together In trying to create my venting and Leveling cap I have the cap that goes to The IBC Tote and it's a pretty thick Strong plastic and the nice thing about This one it's nice and flat on the top So if I drill a hole I can put this some People call it a bulkhead they're Calling it a cooler drain but what this Is is you drill a hole you stick it in There's a gasket that seals on the Inside and then there is a garden hose Thread on one side and there's a half Inch pipe thread or three quarter inch Pipe thread on the other side so you can Go to connect to regular piping and the Garden hose in my situation we're going To go ahead and thread in some PVC pipe To make it work They make several different sizes of These and styles I have another one that I'm using up there that is much wider in Plastic I would prefer a much wider one But this is what they had at the store So we're gonna use this one I'm going to Take the nut off right now and I'm going To find a drill bit that is just barely
Larger than the hole in the threads and So I'm going to drill the hole it'll fit In but yet it'll the gasket will be Fitting tight against the plastic It's like a piece of wood under here Just to protect the drill bit and my uh Truck tailgate Nice clean hole we'll probably Some of the Plastics here will scrape Out with our utility knife So that Nothing's sticky on the top so this Seals up and when this side is probably More important because this is the side I'm going to have the gasket on Get this nice and smooth Stick it in the hole here I probably could have gone an eighth Inch smaller drill bit but it's still Going to have plenty of room to uh seal Down but I do have a little bit of Movement I was hoping this would be a Lot tighter I'm gonna put a little bit of Teflon Tape on my threads Not worried about getting too much on Here again this is not going to be Pressurized There is going to be some water pressure But It's not a pressurized system at this Point So this is a pressurized system but at This point time it's not pressurized I'm
Creating Gravity by being up on the hill And then this is the very top of this Where 100 feet in elevation above where The water is coming out so that should Create 43 pounds pressure 43 pounds for Every 100 feet so this is going to be Rising up a foot in here or less and so That should be 0.43 pounds per square Inch pressure so that's very little Pressure I don't think I'll be losing a Whole lot I I was thinking about putting More compound in here this is a rubber There is a rubber gasket in there but I Was thinking about putting some pipe Dope in there and putting it but right Now I want to see if I could just seal This down tight enough because again There's going to be very little pressure To hold all the water in We'll be placing this elbow on top so That nothing's coming in I I have Another elbow I left it at the house but I want to turn this so it's down and Then no rain water or anything falling Is going to come into this system it's Just going to be there the other Beautiful thing about doing this is uh When I have a closed tanks up there and Then they'll they try to run water down Here it pulls down and it creates a Vacuum in the tank and then it slow we Lose pressure because it's coming down But by doing this and having this Opening this airflow opening uh when the
Water needs to flow out air can flow in And then that allows for the water to Travel freely and keep the pressure that It needs So I'm just going to screw this cap on Tight hope that the gasket that's on the Inside of it seals really well we'll Find out here in a minute So I have the valves closed on each tank And was able to fill them up but you can See the water level is up right near the Top here on this one and it's also the Top here so when I open the valves here In just a second This should come down here And Hopefully not Go down too far because there's not a Lot of water that's going to fit in here And but it's going to Rise up to the that level in the pipe And go I don't want to open the valves Too fast because the weight of this Might create a little momentum and then Shoot it out but if there's no momentum It should not run out the top of the Other one The water level here Should match I heard actually the water Level in this pipe should very quickly Because this is already full match this And this should not drop down a Noticeable amount In theory
Okay You hear a little burping and it goes uh Whatnot because there was water line uh Air in the water lines and that's being Taken out This water level If you look closely It's going up ever so slowly Because we're creating pressure in this Up into this tank See it right on the end of this Leaf Right now is Kind of keep track of that So the water level is rising up in here The Burping Some pushing water up into that The water level over here is down about An inch It looks like from where it was uh some Of it probably Filled the line going down to the Landing and some of it is pushing up Into this This tank here The cap that came with the tank seemed To seal up really well it doesn't look Like there's any water coming out it There may be there is a little bit of Water right here there's at least a Teaspoon of water that's been filling For a couple minutes that's leaked out Here so that's not a lot of water loss But I don't want any water loss I mean I
I don't have my rinse with me I'll try To tighten this up a little bit more But uh we should still you could see it Still holding the other tank at Definitely higher than the top of this Tank so since the water level is right Here on this tank It should be the exact same thing here In the pipe Now I can work on running more water Into the big tank and filling it to the Top Which is what another three inches up And that'll push water another three Inches up into this pipe Well that was a quick little job I was Hoping that you'd find it interesting And show what we're doing to equalize The tanks we now have 600 gallons of Reservoir for my low flow water system And uh so hopefully that'll keep us Supplied nice and well and thanks for Joining me on the Flanigan Homestead Where Christmas trees are my business Teaching including Horticulture is my Job and outdoor projects are my passion Hope to see you again soon everyone be Blessed the days are getting shorter and I do have another job to work so I'm not Getting out here as much except on Weekends
