Building your Baja dream home Advice, photos and ideas...

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bob r
 
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Default pila

Baja Gringo,

in reference to your construction pictures, you showed an elevated plastic tank for water and then ;ater a block wall around the same. That is if I am correct. Does this plastic tank have a filtration system of some form? How much does it hold? Does Nacho fill it with his truck? And would that be a partial load? Is it also enough pressure for the low pressure toilets?

Hope this is not a redundant question!!!!
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Bob H
 
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Default Re: pila

Here is what they did at Playa Frambes, just south of Mulege. You might contact Bob there. He goes first class.

http://mulege.org/faqs/faqs.htm
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Default Re: pila

Quote:
Originally Posted by bob r
Baja Gringo,

in reference to your construction pictures, you showed an elevated plastic tank for water and then later a block wall around the same. That is if I am correct. Does this plastic tank have a filtration system of some form? How much does it hold? Does Nacho fill it with his truck? And would that be a partial load? Is it also enough pressure for the low pressure toilets?

Hope this is not a redundant question!!!!
The elevated tank you refer to is what they call a tinaco down here and is fabricated by Rotoplast. It holds 2500 liters and I fill it weekly, pumping water from my larger pila that Nacho fills up each time he brings me water out to the beach. We can fill it about 6 times before we need another load of water from Nacho. The elevation is more than enough to flush toilets, wash dishes and fire up our propane instantaneous water heater...
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  #4
bob r
 
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Default Re: pila

Thank You for the responses. The rotoplast tank is then just for pressurization and has no filtraion and you have seperate water for drinking?
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Default Re: pila

Here's an option for water filtration: http://www.waterfixercompany.com/

We have one of these, but haven't installed it yet. My neighbor uses one, drinks the water it produces and is very happy with it.

I don't think it will work with gravity flow though.

Edit: ...and it draws about 15 watts, so if you're solar, you'll need to account for the extra current draw.
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bob r
 
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Default Re: pila

BigWooo,

Thank you! I am exploring options and accumulating knowledge and all input is greatly appreciated.
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Default Re: pila

Our water is trucked in, probably similar to what you're going to do. We opted for a cement underground storage tank with a pump and pressure tank. Water is drawn from the storage tank then pumped into a pressure tank. A pressure switch turns the pump on when the water pressure drops below 30 lbs, and turns the pump off at 50 lbs. With the size pressure tank we have, we get about 30 gallons of water before the pump turns on to repeat the process.

We had a hard time deciding if we should use a pump or gravity to provide pressure. There are advantages and disadvantages to both. We went with the pump as we have a drip system and will have two buildings that need water pressure. I'm not sure if gravity would have provided enough pressure unless we raised the pila much higher than the roof level.
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Default Re: pila

Many places (ie Home Depot) sell whole-house filter housings and filters. There is a course particulate filter and then a finer filter if you need it. These are placed on the pipe from the tinaco into the house (you can take a branch to any hose bibs or irrigation before the filter). You can also add a 110v UV cartridge for purification if you plan to drink it.
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Default Re: pila

Right now we are using bottled water for drinking. Our plan is to eventually have a well on the property and run it through RO so we can end up make our water system potable. The reason I didn't go with the pressure tank is that I had the opportunity to see a few others out here that had one installed. They do draw a lot of juice when they run but a bigger problem is the elevated pressure IMHO. When you are running your taps / showers on 40 psi average pressure, it is hard to avoid wasting a lot of water in my experience when washing your hands, dishes, brushing your teeth, showering, etc.

We purposely built the water platform about 8 feet higher than what our builder had proposed, following the norm around here. It cost more but the little bit of added pressure works just perfect IMHO.

Our builder (Chava) irrigates his fields at his place on drip - all fed by gravity flow...
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  #10
bob r
 
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Default Re: pila

Baja Gringo,

I thought there was huge problems getting a well in the area that you are at! I thought the agriculture people had this all tied up?
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Default Re: pila

I can't answer that question (honesty) under the advice from legal counsel...

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Bob H
 
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Default Re: pila

Hey, google TINACO and you will see a lot of images and information.
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Default Re: pila

Quote:
Originally Posted by BajaGringo
R When you are running your taps / showers on 40 psi average pressure, it is hard to avoid wasting a lot of water in my experience when washing your hands, dishes, brushing your teeth, showering, etc.
Ah... but one of the few pleasures left in life is a nice long hot shower, even off-grid. Since the water truck is our only monthly bill (well maybe internet and TV) I don't mind calling the water truck a little more often.
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Default Re: pila

Quote:
Originally Posted by ncampion
Ah... but one of the few pleasures left in life is a nice long hot shower, even off-grid. Since the water truck is our only monthly bill (well maybe internet and TV) I don't mind calling the water truck a little more often.

Have to agree with ya on that one... a nice long hot shower is something which is ... well just great !!

Something up north of the border we take for granted a bit.... or let's say some do...

Just turn a knob and it comes out.. pretty nice must say...
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bob r
 
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Default Re: pila

Quote:
Originally Posted by BajaGringo
I can't answer that question (honesty) under the advice from legal counsel...

Dos Equis, Pacifico, Victoria, Margarita at Cielito Lindo
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Default Re: pila

Quote:
Originally Posted by ncampion
Ah... but one of the few pleasures left in life is a nice long hot shower, even off-grid. Since the water truck is our only monthly bill (well maybe internet and TV) I don't mind calling the water truck a little more often.
I enjoy long hot showers too, especially after a long day working on the house. I would bet that I use a lot less water on that same hot shower with a tinaco vs pressure tank was my point...
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Default Re: pila

I used just the gravity flow from the tinaco for the first year and about froze to death in the shower in winter. Maybe I saved water by showering as seldom as possible and really, really fast. But I wasted a lot in both bath and kitchen, letting it run to get hot. Now, while I'm no physics whiz, I do realize that a certain amount of cold water is in the pipes between the heater and the faucet or shower, whether pressurized or not, but it's psychologically unappealing to stand there for five minutes watching it flow down the drain (though I quickly learned not to do that naked).

Another thing was that our water is really hard, so the spray heads kept getting clogged with mineral deposits because of the weak flow. Yet another was that the washing machine intake sounded like an advanced case of emphysema. So I bought a little on-demand tankless pressure pump. It's noiseless, drip-immune, and made no noticeable difference in my electric or water bills. But showers are a lot nicer!
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Default Re: pila

You may want to check out marine water pumps, there are a wide range of types in both 12 and 24 volt. Some have integral presure tanks.They work well for a small demand system.

I went to an AC pump on our boat, with a 12 gallon pressure tank it doesn't cycle very often unless a couple of showers are in use at the same time. The AC pump is MUCH quieter then was the DC pump! And it takes 30 seconds to charge the system where the DC pump took 2 to 3 minutes. It was a drag when someone flushed a head at 0300 and the pump kicked on!

I also built my own RO system using a 3HP 240v motor, a pressure washer pump, two 4" x 40" pressure vessels with FilmTec membranes. There are a wide variety of membranes, and they're graded for the water being processed (brackish, fresh, sea water, etc), and what level of purity you need to produce. Our machine makes 75GPH when running new membranes. Our 12.5KW genset burns about 1 GPH, so that brings the costs down pretty well, especially since we do a load of laundry while we make water.
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Default Re: pila

There is a product on the market that is called the CHILLI PEPPER that retails for about 169.00$ It installs in line and bassicly is temp.controlled and recirculates your water back through the tank or tankless water heater unyil it reaches a preset temp. then directs water tu fawcet or shower. You can find it on Google under Chilli Pepper hot water controll device NO WATER WASTED WHILE YOU WAIT FOR HEATER TO CATCH UP.
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Default Re: pila

If you are concerned about wasting the cold water in the tanks it would be a good idea to split your toilet and household drains with only the toilets going to the septic system. The household drains could be caught in a secondary drain tank that could be used for watering etc.
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