The House Project

The Well

When last I blogged about the house project, the well driller had hit water at 127 feet. It turned out that his initial estimate of five gallons per minute was a little optimistic, so he kept drilling to try and get a better flow rate. At 290 feet, he was still only getting ten gallons a minute. (I'm not sure that the last ninety feet really got us enough of a gain to justify the extra $1700.)

Anyway, we have a well, and ten gallons a minute is 600 gallons per hour--this should be more than enough. The next step is to get a pump installed, and to solve the water tank/pressurization tank question.

You see, a house needs about forty to fifty PSI water pressure to work correctly. Normally, a house with a well solves this problem with a pressurization tank, which holds tens of gallons to as much as 125 gallons. I had hoped to use a large (1000 gallons) water storage tank to accomplish the same ends, because every 2.3 feet of elevation gives you one PSI. Unfortunately, from the house to the top of my property only turned out to be about 37 feet, so the water storage tank wouldn't be enough to provide enough pressure.

It would still be nice to have all that water available in the event that a brush fire came through and we lost electric power, so we are looking into having both a pressurization tank and a large water storage tank as well. We might not go quite as high up the hill for the storage tank, but even being able to run low pressure water down the hillside and across the roof would be comforting if there was a brush fire in the area.

The Foundation

My wife and I met with the contractor yesterday to put stakes in the ground at the corners of the house, so that he can get started with pouring foundations. First, however, he has decided that we need another ten feet excavated into the mountain so that he doesn't have to dig a lot deeper into the ground for the foundation.

Colors, Fixtures, Floor Covering

I can see why building a house often causes divorce! We have been spending time picking out flooring, lighting fixtures, and discussing color schemes. Fortunately, my wife and I do not have strongly differing tastes in this area (and where we do, I don't care enough to argue with her about it).