Attempted Murder at the in ground water tank

[Steve&mem]

 

So there I was enjoying a late afternoon beer, wife comes to tells me that the pump at the in-ground water tank is running and were short of water and it happened few times before she says.

So first check, is there water in the tank. So I move the cable to the float switch so I can open the tank. The shock that I got was the worst I had ever felt. After I had calm down and finished yelling. I went and turned off the power. Here’s a pic of the said murderess cable. Only 2 year old.

 

Ant Job is my first thought, But mustn’t rule out the wife, you can never be too sure.

 

So the repair is going to get expensive, Pump mechanical seal shot, looks like a long time leak. The 80 meter cable run from the house needs uprating (heath Robinson installation) the power was switched on and off by a second float switch in the above ground tank near the house.

I decided to renew all the cable and a new conduit along the garden wall linking both float switches  together to proper new control box and making sure the cable at the in ground thank was also in conduit.

 

 

 

[BritManToo]

Looks like rats have been chewing on it.

[driver52]

20 minutes ago, Steve&mem said:

Ant Job is my first thought

don't think ants are into eating cables like that.......why the tank? do you have a well? not familiar with water shenanigans over there, just trying to learn lol

[tonray]

29 minutes ago, Steve&mem said:

Ant Job is my first thought, But mustn’t rule out the wife, you can never be too sure.

Exactly what I was thinking...sleep with one eye open mate

[Saanim]

Rats

[david555]

2 hours ago, BritManToo said:

Looks like rats have been chewing on it.

most likely , as i replaced once a water heater i thought died , new one did not worked neither when electrician installed , changed it to shop , that also did not worked , further checking ..... yes  rat bite cable above the sealing  .....

[Crossy]

Yeah, my first though was rats too, we've had similar cable damage.

 

Since a cat installed itself we've not seen any rats ???? 

 

[Steve&mem]

The top has a concrete lid that's a good fit and there were a few dead ants around were the cable was laying on top of the plastic lid, no rat droppings, that's why I thought the ants, I'm hopeful that the conduit that I have put in place now will stop the problem again.

The Thai way of not protecting electric cable is commonly used around these part's.

[steven100]

14 hours ago, Steve&mem said:

wife comes to tells me that the pump at the in-ground water tank is running and were short of water

hmmm .......   it don't sound too good.   

[IvorBiggun2]

14 hours ago, driver52 said:

why the tank?

Agreed. Why the underground tank?

[MrJ2U]

14 hours ago, driver52 said:

don't think ants are into eating cables like that.......why the tank? do you have a well? not familiar with water shenanigans over there, just trying to learn lol

Tank to store your water.

 

A pump in-between the tank and house will increase the water pressure.  

[Steve&mem]

The in ground is needed because the incoming water has no pressure (80% of the time). we are luckily if we can get a head of water of more than 1 meter. The water also comes with a lot of sediment from the lake, this we filter out with a deep bed water filter when we pump it to the above ground tank.

[IvorBiggun2]

7 minutes ago, MrJ2U said:

A pump in-between the tank and house will increase the water pressure.  

An inline pump from the mains will do the same thing without the need to have a tank surely?

[Steve&mem]

Tried that, half the village doing the same sucking water with a pump, if your not monitoring it your sucking air most of the time. This method I don't have to keep checking it, but yes I use 2 pumps to get water, the wife uses lots in her organic vegetable garden. The above ground tank is actually 5 tanks totaling 10,000 liter's.

[lopburi3]

3 minutes ago, Steve&mem said:

Tried that, half the village doing the same sucking water with a pump, if your not monitoring it your sucking air most of the time. This method I don't have to keep checking it, but yes I use 2 pumps to get water, the wife uses lots in her organic vegetable garden. The above ground tank is actually 5 tanks totaling 10,000 liter's.

And doing so is both a danger to you and others plus illegal - if a neighbor has an open tap into septic you will also be pumping that into your drinking water as an example - as well as any ground water that can enter system.  Decades ago it was also common even in Bangkok but almost all use tank now and pump from that for higher water pressure.  

[IvorBiggun2]

29 minutes ago, Steve&mem said:

half the village doing the same sucking water with a pump

The water outlets, in my house, are 2m above the mains line. Any break in the mains pipe really knocks the ass out of mains  pressure. It takes half a day for the pressure to build up enough to trigger the inline pump to kick in. Not a problem as we always have a plan B water bin on standby. Part of the joys of living in Thailand. 

[Saanim]

1 hour ago, IvorBiggun2 said:

An inline pump from the mains

Not only Illegal and selfish but dangerous for you and the neighbours... 

[IvorBiggun2]

26 minutes ago, Saanim said:

Not only Illegal and selfish but dangerous for you and the neighbours... 

I'm lost. Are we talking water mains?

[driver52]

i thought it rained quite a lot in Thailand? These garden tanks are quite common in France and the mains pressure is high

Are you folks not tempted to bin the mains water if it's such a PITA? And for the shower use a roof tank that gets heated by the sun?

 

[Crossy]

2 hours ago, IvorBiggun2 said:

An inline pump from the mains will do the same thing without the need to have a tank surely?

 

Yes, but you run the risk of getting negative pressure on the mains and sucking in all sorts of stuff from the ground water or your neighbour's buffalo bathing pond.

 

It's not actually illegal per-sé (there's a thread somewhere that goes into the legalities) but is actively discouraged.

 

A buffer tank is the normal way to go, we have 2,400L of stored water which keeps us alive for a couple of days if the worst happens.

[IvorBiggun2]

12 minutes ago, Crossy said:

you run the risk of getting negative pressure on the mains and sucking in all sorts of stuff from the ground water or your neighbour's buffalo bathing pond.

No I'm lost on that. I'm pumping water from a sealed mains pipe. How is the buffalo going to contaminate water in a sealed pipe?

[Crossy]

Just now, IvorBiggun2 said:

No I'm lost on that. I'm pumping water from a sealed mains pipe. How is the buffalo going to contaminate water in a sealed pipe?

 

Neighbour has a hose in the pond, doesn't turn off the tap when the supply goes off or just low pressure, water from pond sucked into the mains.

 

Any leak in the mains could become a "negative leak" drawing in whatever "water" is surrounding the pipe, again contaminating the supply.

 

 

[sometimewoodworker]

51 minutes ago, IvorBiggun2 said:

No I'm lost on that. I'm pumping water from a sealed mains pipe. How is the buffalo going to contaminate water in a sealed pipe?

As @Crossy mentioned and you have a completely mistaken idea of the quality of any mains water supply in any country.
 

Thailand is not remotely the worst but certainly not the best. No water supply is ever completely free of leaks. However since there is usually positive pressure the clean (or mostly clean) mains supply keeps the nasty bugs out. Once you start negative pressure with your sucking you start bringing in all the wonderful agrochemicals, bacteria, viruses, and other flora and fauna that you really really really don’t want

[Steve&mem]

Crossy is bang on the money about the pump not just sucking water, When we were building the house we had a pump sucking the water from the main for the builder's, besides water we got mud, leaves, and bits of wood and god knows what else.

The pump didn't last long as it was always sucking air. It was our builder that suggested we put the in ground tank in the garden.

[Steve&mem]

For those that are interested here is a diagram of the float set-up that control the pump.

I bought the control cabinet from lazada and the seller sent me this diagram for setting up. 

The pump may be a bit over kill, 1HP twin impeller's, it moves the water easily the 80 meters down the garden.

[sometimewoodworker]

4 hours ago, Steve&mem said:

For those that are interested here is a diagram of the float set-up that control the pump.

I bought the control cabinet from lazada and the seller sent me this diagram for setting up. 

The pump may be a bit over kill, 1HP twin impeller's, it moves the water easily the 80 meters down the garden.

That’s really pretty.
 

My electrical setup is a little simpler

 

I have 3 x 2,500 tanks at ground level, they have isolator valves, usually 1 is shut off as a reserve, supply is via a ball float valve. The upper tank gets village water via a ball float valve, when the village pressure is low the is a max min switch controlled pump from our ground level tank supply. We have about 20 days before we notice there is no village water and need to switch in the 3rd ground tank.

 

Last time the village water was shut off SWMBO got asked around 8 days after the shutdown how we were doing for water, we hadn’t noticed any change just when we looked, our ground level tanks were down to about 4,000 litres left. 
 

the benefit for us is that the water is always there virtually no thinking required.

[MrJ2U]

15 hours ago, Crossy said:

Yeah, my first though was rats too, we've had similar cable damage.

 

Since a cat installed itself we've not seen any rats ???? 

 

Wouldn't rats be electrocuted?

 

Sometimes rats get in-between the false roof and chew on electrical wiring.  Some of my recessed lights go out and the electrician says "rats".   You'd think there would be a dead smoldering rat by the chewed wires. 

 

[lopburi3]

10 hours ago, MrJ2U said:

Wouldn't rats be electrocuted?

 

Sometimes rats get in-between the false roof and chew on electrical wiring.  Some of my recessed lights go out and the electrician says "rats".   You'd think there would be a dead smoldering rat by the chewed wires. 

 

Suspect, just as with us, if contact is just between same part of the body it is a jolt rather than death (the one finger rule - used to be a standard test for 120v back in the 50's - stick one finger into lamp socket while rest of body insulated from ground - this was before they had easy tester screwdrivers) - it is when current goes through the heart that most deaths occur.  

[MrJ2U]

43 minutes ago, lopburi3 said:

Suspect, just as with us, if contact is just between same part of the body it is a jolt rather than death (the one finger rule - used to be a standard test for 120v back in the 50's - stick one finger into lamp socket while rest of body insulated from ground - this was before they had easy tester screwdrivers) - it is when current goes through the heart that most deaths occur.  

I think I'll stick with the tester.

Electricity, stick with someone knowledgeable.  

Unfortunately thats not me.

[HeijoshinCool]

On 8/16/2021 at 7:48 AM, Steve&mem said:

But mustn’t rule out the wife, you can never be too sure.

.

What makes you think your wife chewed on the wires?