I build a water tank 2 month ago from concrete rings.

I believe this is the method for the highest cubic meter storage volume per bath and its simple. Concrete rings are 40 cm high and have diameters from 80, 100 and 120 cm. One 120 cm ring can store 450 liter. You start with a ring that has a concrete bottom, for example 120 cm diameter, then add 4-6 rings on top. You can extend the storage capacity later. Cost for a tank with 120 cm diameter: First ring with bottom: 350 bath; concrete ring 120 cm 250 bath; lid 150 bath. Delivery including putting the rings on each other 20bath/ring. Inlet, outlet pipes, some valves about 400 bath. Concrete to connect rings and make tank water tight 200 bath. Total cost for 2200 liter storage tank about 2200 bath; 1 bath/liter. To make the tank totally water tight was not so easy. Check out quality of concrete rings; I found big differences. Hope this helps. Mangofarmer I run a business based in Naklua "WET" Water Engineered Technologies (Thailand) Ltd (wtquestions@hotmail.com) and I do alsorts with water. Domestic & Commercial. The above solution is a very good and effective/cheap way of doing it. May I suggest you get your hands on the Davco brand of adhesive and Davco elastic which you use together to render and water proof the inside and outside if above ground. The adhesive looks like a concrete mix and the elastic is a rubber liquid that you mix 50/50 with water. Let it go off/set for about 15/20 minutes before you render.

Keep in mind that there are different types of plastic tanks. The better ones are two ply, the inner ply being black and the outer normally blue. The cheaper tanks are single ply and are translucent. Algae grows VERY well in those translucent tanks and would be a nightmare if you were using drip irrigation.

We live about 85 kilometers from Chum Pae. There is a dealer there who has hundreds of plastic tanks and also steel towers. He is located about 8 kilometers west of the city on highway 12. He has many other products made of the same plastic, coolers and even boats. He was showing us some of the typical blue color tanks that were more expensive than the others. He explained that the higher priced ones were two ply. The first layer was made of black plastic and the outer layer was the typical blue plastic. A look inside the tank made it obvious. No light coming through the sides thus no algae. One issue not mentioned so far is that of safety. The Granite looking ones are guaranteed to be food safe as is SS. Are the Blue ones safe - I guess you cant filter out the toxic effect's of many plastics. ie the plastic bottles we use for water, cola etc etc are made from different layer of plastic, the inner-most layer is food safe. One layer gives strength, another gas retention. So not all plastic is suitable for drinking water. I use a blue one to collect water from the roof which I then water the garden with. 1000L - 3000Bht my 1600L SS tank is for the house 12000Bht.

Chownah, you beat me to it. Those concrete rings certainly seem to be a cheaper option, I've heard large ones are only 100+ Baht each. They usually join them with concrete, but I've seen this leak. I was wondering about silicone? Ours doesn't leak...the rings have mortar in the joints and the mortar has a waterproofing agent in it. The same waterproofing agent was mixed some cement powder (and maybe some water too but didn't watch) and applied on the inside as a slurry.....works fine. Chownah
The building system is called Ferro Cement, even though it is incorrectly named as such (blame Joseph Monier for that), it's not really concrete either is it as it does not contain coarse aggregate, just sand and cement more like steel reinforced mortar. You use aggregate in foundations and supports and the stuff that holds your bricks together is mortar which is made up of washed sand and cement polished waterproof cement on the interior of the tank Ferrocement is fine sand and cement WITH a ingredient called POT ASH....Thats what make it watertight and lightweight for making boats. You will need POT ASH to do a good seal. Talk to the suppliers to the Oil Rigs etc etc, they supply this to the field for drilling....Put epoxy resin over the surface on the inside, after the cement has cured....it will outlast you and your kids.

I'm tired of having to use city water when I'm trying to grow organic vegetables and also tired of wondering how much flouride, etc. is in the drinking water I buy off the truck every week, so I'm going to to start using rain water. I'm going to keep it simple. I don't need a roof washer (a pipe that catches the first, dirtiest water of a rain event before letting the rest go into the tank) because I'm usually home so I can just use my own arm to direct the downspout into the tank when I feel the rain has cleaned the roof enough. What I do need is some kind of leaf catcher below the gutter but above the tank. Here is an example that looks very nice. http://www.gutterdoc.ca/gutter-downspouts/ Such a device will mean no or very few trips way up to the gutter because theoretically all the debris will be washed down to the leaf catcher. Gutters - Copper is too expensive. Galvanized steel is strong but would eventually rust? Vinyl would get destroyed by the sun? So I'm thinking painted aluminum. Aluminum isn't very strong so it can be bent by falling branches or unpadded ladders, but it doesn't rust. The people who are going to replace our windows also do gutters, or know someone who does. They have a truck that comes out and presses the metal from a coil. I wonder if they then paint the gutter on site or use metal that had the paint oven baked at the factory. Any thoughts on what's better? Tanks - I love the price of those cement rings but they are an ugly site to behold says the wife. Instead, I'm going to buy a HDPE tank, the ones that look like granite.