DNP Posted September 5, 2021 Report Share Posted September 5, 2021 I want to get a generator or solar battery system hooked up that’s enough to run the well, and then additional pumps to run sprinklers around the house. Something that if we have to leave…we can flip on and hope it runs as long as possible. Having the well on the system would keep adding water to the tank and hopefully that thing would just continue to sprinkle until we got home. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magwa Posted September 5, 2021 Author Report Share Posted September 5, 2021 Thanks everyone for the kind words we have fires going again near here so I may have to use it yet this year...I am building a pallet that I can mount the whole thing on so I can use the forks on my tractor to lift it into the pick up if we had to fight our way out of here or make a stand in a open field I could use all the water around us still figuring out ways to use it all my neighbors are getting IBC tanks and filling them at the heads of their driveways that way with it on a pickup you can fill from the extra tanks..I live on a one way in ,one way out road so could be easy to get trapped in here in a high wind event... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Magwa Posted September 5, 2021 Author Report Share Posted September 5, 2021 7 hours ago, DNP said: I want to get a generator or solar battery system hooked up that’s enough to run the well, and then additional pumps to run sprinklers around the house. Something that if we have to leave…we can flip on and hope it runs as long as possible. Having the well on the system would keep adding water to the tank and hopefully that thing would just continue to sprinkle until we got home. that is a good system as long as you have power I have a 10 K gen, and it will keep the well running and all the freezers as well as the kitchen lights we have a gas stove I have friends that put in a 3000 gallon cistern that they fill from rain water during the winter they add copper sulfate to it at the rate of 1 223 case full per 300 gallons that keeps all algae down and it is clear water but only for fire and watering trees etc it is uphill from them they have a solar pump that goes from their catch barrels to the cistern with a float valve works slick and in a emergency they just let gravity work the sprinklers... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
unforgiven Posted September 5, 2021 Report Share Posted September 5, 2021 Genius brother Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
unforgiven Posted September 5, 2021 Report Share Posted September 5, 2021 8 hours ago, DNP said: I want to get a generator or solar battery system hooked up that’s enough to run the well, and then additional pumps to run sprinklers around the house. Something that if we have to leave…we can flip on and hope it runs as long as possible. Having the well on the system would keep adding water to the tank and hopefully that thing would just continue to sprinkle until we got home. What keeps the well from going dry Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DNP Posted September 5, 2021 Report Share Posted September 5, 2021 Wells don’t usually go dry (though they can)….so through the course of a fire it should continue to produce. If it were to go dry during an event like that it would be an amazing coincidence. Having it on a power source not connected to the grid will allow it to keep producing. I’ll have 15,000 gallons in the tanks and hope to add another 10,000 at some point not too far down the road. With the we’ll still running it should continue to put water into the tanks…hopefully at a pace at least close to what we were spraying on the house. I’ve been using a water wagon with a pump similar to what Magwa has set up. They’re great systems, but the gas tank on that motor runs dry relatively quickly. A generator, even a portable one can run 12-24 hours. A bigger gen with 100 gallon fuel cell will go even longer. It would take a hell of a battery system to run the pumps very long. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sisco Posted September 5, 2021 Report Share Posted September 5, 2021 Nice system Mike! Got me thinking I should rig up something similar. By the time we got help it would probably be too late. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DNP Posted September 5, 2021 Report Share Posted September 5, 2021 Any chance of saving the place is worth a little injen-uity. It’s definitely inspired me to be thinking more about it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shepp Posted September 6, 2021 Report Share Posted September 6, 2021 (edited) 22 hours ago, Magwa said: Thanks everyone for the kind words we have fires going again near here so I may have to use it yet this year...I am building a pallet that I can mount the whole thing on so I can use the forks on my tractor to lift it into the pick up if we had to fight our way out of here or make a stand in a open field I could use all the water around us still figuring out ways to use it all my neighbors are getting IBC tanks and filling them at the heads of their driveways that way with it on a pickup you can fill from the extra tanks..I live on a one way in ,one way out road so could be easy to get trapped in here in a high wind event... My buddies have similar for when we burn the CRP on the farm, one is on the 3point and runs off the PTO. The other is a big round 500 gallon tank they run a gas generator and pumps off. hell I ran edge control with my quad and a 100 gal weed sprayer with an electric pump and that knocked down fire a lot better than I thought Edited September 6, 2021 by shepp Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sisco Posted September 6, 2021 Report Share Posted September 6, 2021 Dang! I just gave away the old electric pump from my wood boiler! Might have been too low a capacity though. Could have run that off my portable Honda generator. Have to start scrounging for parts. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shepp Posted September 6, 2021 Report Share Posted September 6, 2021 7 hours ago, Sisco said: Dang! I just gave away the old electric pump from my wood boiler! Might have been too low a capacity though. Could have run that off my portable Honda generator. Have to start scrounging for parts. To bad you live in that cliff, you have the biggest inland water tank of all Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sisco Posted September 7, 2021 Report Share Posted September 7, 2021 2 hours ago, shepp said: To bad you live in that cliff, you have the biggest inland water tank of all That would be back up, but I would need a hell of a pump to pull it up 30 feet and still have the pressure I would need. It is doable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cunuckgaucho Posted September 7, 2021 Report Share Posted September 7, 2021 1 hour ago, Sisco said: That would be back up, but I would need a hell of a pump to pull it up 30 feet and still have the pressure I would need. It is doable. 30 FT no problem, I have pumps moving 120 gallons/min from 360 FT vertical and another 150 FT horizontal., postage might be a bitch. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sisco Posted September 7, 2021 Report Share Posted September 7, 2021 In your job I bet you do. What I would need would be 100 feet vertical and 300 feet horizontal. My best friend is a retired fire captain and another friend is a National Forest fire fighting crew leader. I going to talk to them about their recommendations and sources. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrperkinsmark Posted November 21, 2021 Report Share Posted November 21, 2021 On 9/5/2021 at 12:51 AM, DNP said: I want to get a generator or solar battery system hooked up that’s enough to run the well, and then additional pumps to run sprinklers around the house. Something that if we have to leave…we can flip on and hope it runs as long as possible. Having the well on the system would keep adding water to the tank and hopefully that thing would just continue to sprinkle until we got home. We went whole house Kohler on NG. It's dual fuel so could have installed propane tank(s) and plumbed that up as well in the event we have no NG. We decided that risk wasn't worth insuring against. The only time I remember hearing about NG outages were during Katrina, Sandy and some of the big storms and if those happened near me I'm pretty sure whether or not I had propane backup would be pretty far down the list of worries. You can go as far down the rabbit hole with preparations as you want - NG, backed up by propane, backed up with a battery bank, solar panels and then a gasoline portable or even a redundant primary genset in case the main fails. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
unforgiven Posted November 21, 2021 Report Share Posted November 21, 2021 Tomorrow morning Cummins NG whole house generator goes in w/200 amp switch gear. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DNP Posted November 21, 2021 Report Share Posted November 21, 2021 (edited) I was weighing out the financial aspect of it all. Backup gen would have to be diesel or propane here, no NG available in the back country. It would only run when power was out. Biggest thing to save is the fridge and freezer should it be down while we’re gone. I have a couple gas generators I could run in emergencies when I am home. A battery wall without solar would be the most economical sense for just saving the fridge and freezer. Put a solar system in on top of that and it’s now saving money year round. I’m thinking that’s the way we’ll head once the bank account starts to recover. This build has just about killed me. The backup for fire will have to be an after thought from that system. Edited November 21, 2021 by DNP Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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