Hot Showers On-Demand

Guests!

With the large number of guests about to arrive, I frantically worked to establish this on-demand water heater for our shower. It would certainly add a level of luxury for the campers and save a great deal of labor for me :-)

I installed the water heater inside the shower and ran water and gas lines. The water line is temporarily fed from a garden hose supplied by plastic barrels up on the hill.

Also, I rented the trencher and jack hammer again and dug the trench for the supply line from the well head to tie into the trench from the cabin (which in turn ties in to the trench from the shop) and runs up the hill to the storage tank.

It was while preparing a temporary store of well water in our former rain barrels that I made an amazing discovery - iron rusts!

I know, I know - everybody knows that! Even I. However, it had really never occurred to me that by simply introducing air into my well water that within a couple of days, the iron would have oxidized and settled to the bottom of the container.

There were a few clues along the way that should have been more obvious at the time. For instance, I had noticed that within a few hours of filling a 5-gallon water bottle, the crystal clear water had become the color of orange Kool Aid. Or while talking to a water treatment specialist on the phone (who was trying to sell me a $4000 water treatment system) he said "Don't let air touch your water!"

Still oblivious, I used a high-pressure nozzle on the line from the well to rinse the rain barrels before filling them with the same nozzle. As you might be able to visualize, a great deal of air was entrained in the water as the barrel was filled.

A couple days later I was checking the level of water in the barrel (which had heretofore been used only for showering) when I was surprised to see the layer of orange on the bottom of the barrel. The water was perfectly clear and had not the faintest odor. When I sampled it, there was not the slightest metallic taste. Eureka! I had discovered the solution to my water treatment dilemma. No costly equipment to purchase, no caustic chemicals to dispose of.

In the Trenches

June 12 - There were several places along the trenches where large rocks prevented me from achieving 24" depth. Between thunderstorms I ran over to Rainsville and rented a 60 pound jack hammer. This tool made quick work of breaking the rock into smaller pieces but did nothing towards helping me get the pieces out of the hole.

In the course of the day, I was able to break up and clear out about 8 or 9 large rocks and axe my way through a few tree roots. I'm ready now to complete the lines to the bath house and the cabin.

I think next time I'll rent the 35 pound hammer and save my back.













To be able to winterize the water lines, I added a shut-off valve to each line. To make them accessible, I added a sleeve of 4" PVC.  The valve handles were a close fit so I cut them down to account for "as built" discrepancies.

To maintain structural integrity in the hollow valve handles, I filled them with epoxy before cutting them down.

The many cloudy days have led to a depletion of my batteries so I decided to spend one rainy afternoon figuring out why the little generator would not start. After some consultation with the generator guru (dot com) and a bit of troubleshooting, I've come to the conclusion that it needs a new magneto. Its on order.

Water, Water...

May 15 - I dug out around the inside of the footer to provide an extra thickness to the tank base to accommodate the tank walls. I also removed the remaining topsoil to ensure there were no roots or other organic matter to later decompose and create voids beneath the tank.

May 16 - I hauled 1.16 tons of crushed limestone from the Vulcan quarry in Ft, Payne to form the base for the water storage tank. This material will provide good drainage and once packed by the weight of the full tank (around 12,000 pounds) will form a solid base that will not further compress.

May 17 - Dry laying the cinder block revealed that the carefully calculated radii of the footer were not so carefully implemented. Twenty cinder block would not fit within the circumference - it would have to be nineteen. The pass-thru (so carefully placed) was then found to be in the wrong place and had to be moved. Another good example of the difference between "as designed" and "as built".

May 20 - The first course of block were set on the footer with mortar taking care to evenly space the joints, maintain the radius, and take out any unevenness in the footer surface.

May 21 - Hauled another 1.81 tons of limestone from the quarry and finished filling in the tank base up to the level of the first course of block. The bed was lightly tamped with my boots and struck off level with the top of the block. The tank was tipped onto its side, rolled into position at the edge of the cinder blocks, and finally tipped back over onto its bottom. A little pushing and shoving got it centered in the circle and aligned with the pass-thru in the footer.

May 22 - I dry stacked a few blocks around the drain opening/pass-thru area to see how the access opening would look. The rest of the block had to be moved to make way for the Ditch Witch.

May 24 - 27 Trenching! Even if there had been not one rock or root, this machine would have worn me slap out! As it is, though, there were rocks and roots galore. When the obstruction was not too much for the machine, it would eventually cut through the root or turn up the rock. This action would sometimes result in violent lurching of the trencher which in turn would attempt to jerk my shoulders out of their sockets.

Where the root or rock was simply too large, the trencher would have to be repositioned until it was clear of the immoveable object. This left a number of obstacles for me to overcome manually. Tree roots can be handled with my sacrificial "dirt axe". This is an old axe which has seen better days but which still can be sharpened and used in the dirt where it will quickly be dulled and filled with nicks. Rocks are a different story. Sometimes they can be dug out using a 6-foot pry bar. Sometimes not. I will probably have to rent a jack-hammer for those. In all of these cases, when the obstacle is removed, there still remains trench to be dug by hand down to 24 inches. Folks this is work for young people.

May 28 - Its Laundry Day! Yes, all that dirt digging has created a great mound of dirty clothes. I have  not much electricity and zero washing machines but I do have plenty of well water and a couple of wash tubs left over from some long ago beer party, so...

May 29 - Tunnelling! I brought the trencher as close to the footer of the cabin as I dared. I finished the trench for the kitchen sink with post hole diggers up to the footer then switched to the pry bar for tunnelling under the footer. I used a saw horse to support the pry bar while swinging it horizontally - battering ram style. A small level kept my digging true. Occasionally I would use a pipe wrench to give the bar a little twist when it was well stuck in the dirt. This would break out a nice hunk. From the crawl space side, I used a WWII trenching tool to dig down and intersect the horizontal hole.

May 30 - The first yard hydrant is installed. This required digging down another foot below the location of the hydrant to form a drainage well. The valve on these hydrants is located at the bottom of the vertical pipe so they are below the frost line. To prevent freezing of water that would otherwise remain in the pipe, a drain opening is located just above the valve. Each time the valve is opened and closed, a quart or so of water is released from the drain. The drainage well is filled with gravel thus providing space for that water until it is absorbed into the earth. I made little collars out of scrap 4" PVC to hold the gravel up around the drain hole till fill dirt was packed around to hold the hydrant in place.

June 1 - Laid the first few 20' sticks of 1" PVC pipe and quickly encountered two major obstacles. The first was a large root at just over a foot in the ground. I decided it would be easier to tunnel under it. The second was an even larger rock. I still have not decided whether to try the jack-hammer or bring in fill dirt. I moved on to the second supply line.

June 2 - Yard Hydrant #2. Followed by a couple 20' sticks of PVC.

June 3 - Trade Day.  Carolyn thought we might head over to Trade Day in Summerville to see if we could scare up a new burner for one of our oil lamps. The ones we got at Walmart last year wont fit :(

We didn't have any luck but we had a good time looking at all the stuff for sale.

June 4 - Water Heater. I spent the day first testing and then installing a small on-demand water heater in out little bath house. The test was prompted by some information in the manual that said the unit required 25 psi (minimum) in order to work. This information was not in any of the literature used to sell the thing. I was worried because I had measured only about 10 psi at that location. I set up a ladder to approximate the height of installation, connected the water and the gas, and let 'er rip. It worked like a charm. By dusk that evening, I had a nice hot shower without having to heat water on a stove or pump up a garden sprayer. Luxury!

June 5 - Woke up to a nice thunderstorm. I had a phone interview so I decided on breakfast in town. I spent some more time shopping for groceries and plumbing supplies. I got back in time for another round of thunder storms. While it was raining, I installed the supply line valves under the kitchen sink. the rest of the evening, I spent on this blog update.