[OP]
Contributor
I need to run a water line to an out building approximately eighty feet from the house. It's all down hill (steep) to get to the out building and incredibly rocky. Digging below the frost line won't present an option in this case. Do any of you have ideas on how to run a water line without going all the way down to the frost line depth? Thanks.
Contributor
For a little while I lived in an apartment building. It had a water heater in the basement, and it circulated hot water throughout the building 24/7, so somebody on the sixth floor would have hot water as soon as he turned on the tap. You could do something like that, but outdoors. There'd be two pipes running from building to building, inside a serious insulation jacket. Hot water would go down one pipe, and return up the other. It'd be cooling down through the entire trip, so it'd have to be hot enough at the start of the journey to not freeze by the end. Let's see... if you got really clever, you could measure the return water temperature, and adjust the temperature of the outgoing water so that the return temperature never drops below freezing. That way, you'd only be heating the water in the cold months.
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You live in Kentucky. It will freeze in the winter. I am in Iowa, needed the same thing for my detached workshop. Simple solution- a dedicated garden hose. Ran it to a recycled laundry tub, rolled it up at the first frost.
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Rich,
Electric pipe wrap tape. Google it.
Contributor
Bury it as deep as you can, have a shutoff in the supply house where it will not freeze with an extra spigot after the shutoff (for venting) ... at the outside building, have a spigot to totally drain the pipe after using the shutoff in the supply house and opening the vent spigot in the supply house...
That way you can use water when you need it, then drain pipe to keep it from freezing...
Also, if there is a dealer nearby that sells the woodburning stoves that run hot water underneath the ground to heat a house, get a piece of the insulated pipe they use to provide extra protection...
One caveat... when you turn the water on, make sure you keep it running (dripping) so it does not freeze while you are needing it...
Good Luck...
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Get a polypropylene tank and hook it up so that the downspouts( if you have any) on the outbuilding drain into it. Then you can use a gravity feed, or electric pump, for water pressure. This method is used all over the world.
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I agree with Ed comment, will the water temperature be hot or cold ?
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What is the significance of Grammar at the top of your post?Originally Posted by Ed Aumiller
[OP]
Contributor
To answer a few question you asked I offer the following information.
1. The water will be cold.
2. The outbuilding is a greenhouse so she wants water out there in the winter as well.
3. It's incredibly rocky so I doubt digging much more than a foot or 18" will occur. Frost level here is 30".
4. I like the gravity feed from the downspout suggestion but it likely won't shed much water with a 10' x 12' roof. Still worth some effort though.
5. Turning on the water when she wants to go down there and turning it back off when she ascends the hill presents a good option if one can convince her to remember the steps in the process.
Question, isn't the a new kind of pipe that acts more forgiving of cold? I thought there was one that could flex. I don't want to count on that option but just wonder if it's possible.
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Put the pipe in a tile with both ends exposed inside the heated buildings. If you can get it to two ft. it probably won't freeze. We have some installed at 18" (in tile) here in Iowa and have pretty good luck with them not freezing. 2" styrofoam on top to keep ground heat in the tile, to top it all off.
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If you can figure out what the average rainfall in your area is and then find a formula to translate that into gallons on a 120 sq. ft. roof I think you'll see its more than enough for your greenhouse. However it will only work if you have a tank large enough for the rainwater. I live in farm country so finding used 1000-2000 gallon poly tanks is not that difficult. They seem to average about $1 per gallon.
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If you or your wife turn the water on at the house then it will run freely until someone walk to the greenhouse then the valve at the greenhouse will need to be open then walk uphill again to turn the valve off, I doubt that this will be fun walk, can you buy a valve that can be control by electric , MAYBE HIRE A CARETAKER TO SLEEP in the greenhouse
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I assume you won't be doing it to code. I would bury it as far as you can, then run a heat cable next to it.
I do that with 2 of our downspouts, and turn them on about January.
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One of the systems for moderating the temperature in a cold-climate greenhouse is to store LOTS of water in the greenhouse. Warm spells warm the water up, which gives off its heat during the cold periods so that the minimum temperatures are eliminated. It's typical to use 55 gal plastic drums as the support for shelves. Doing this allows you to correct the PH of the water to your desired PH for your plants and mix in fertilizers to the correct dose. If you are cold enough that you need to use this system, then you might need to feed water to the greenhouse less often.
I can't help with the trench problem. It seems to me that if you are digging a trench for water and the soil is really rocky, you just rent a bigger excavator or buy more dynamite as required.
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Just use a back flow preventer hose bib. It will let the water drain when you shut the valve off at the house
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