by RainSaucers Inc. on May 15th, 2012
It's finally ready for prime time! The 59 inch version of our product. It's 50% bigger than the 48 inch version and has better wind resistance and rain flow. For one unit implementations, its the best thing especially in places where it rains throughout the growing season. It fills a 32 gallon barrel (see picture) with just 3 inches of rain (fill rate is 10 gallons per inch of rain)Please read our press release for more details.
by RainSaucers Inc. on May 10th, 2012
RainSaucers™ often come to you rolled up in a tube to enable them to be shipped efficiently. Since they are made from flexible plastic, they take on the curled shape, but only temporarily. If you try to install them in the curled shape they will look more like a Sombrero than a Saucer. So we highly recommend you remove the curl by laying the disc flat for at least 24 hours or until all of the curl is removed. If you don't have 24 hours, just lay the disc flat in direct sunlight. The sun and heat will accelerate the process.by RainSaucers Inc. on May 8th, 2012
We love our Distributors, especially the ones who get creative with their Marketing of our product. Waterworks, our partner in Hawaii, recently launched the following print and ad campaign. Helena who runs Sales over there says the feedback has been great!
by RainSaucers Inc. on May 1st, 2012
We finally have distribution in NYC. This was a personal goal of ours given I grew up there. Specialty Deck was introduced to us by our friends over at Rainwater Hog who also sells their product through Rob Ryan the proprietor over there. Specialty Deck makes beautiful custom decks for urban rooftops and balconies. Rob sees the RainSaucer as an elegant way to bring rain catchment into his solutions. We look forward to seeing his implementations!
by RainSaucers Inc. on April 23rd, 2012
What a day of contrasts! I started the day off with a polite email from a rain barrel veteran in the South who said she didn't see a need for standalone rainwater harvesting because in her area, everyone has roofs and downspouts. Reminds me of when Bill Gates apparently said some years back, "640K is more memory than anyone will ever need." Some people just don't see the future.Fortunately in the afternoon a sustainable gardener wrote from the Midwest with some nice praise and some great questions which really showed an understanding of our concept. Actually, she sounded like the ideal customer wanting to harvest rainwater for her vegetable garden with the added benefit of having a source of clean water in the event of a disaster.
Her email inspired us to briefly summarize the difference between roof runoff and rainwater collected straight from the sky:
- The RainSaucer™ has a food safe surface. The roof does not. The roof adds chemicals like zinc and chromated copper arsenate that kill plants and generous amounts of accumulated atmospheric pollution and bird scat. The RainSaucer™ meanwhile is in arm's reach and can be kept as clean as the user desires through maintenance and storage in the off-season. Furthermore, birds and other animals are not generally attracted to the shiny white material which would not support their weight anyway.
- The RainSaucer™ takes 10 minutes to set up with no tools required. Accessing a downspout may take as long but almost always involves a hole saw or hacksaw. Many people are not comfortable with this level of tooling, not to mention the permanency of such changes.
- A free standing rain barrel can collect rain anywhere on a user's property. A traditional rain barrel can only be placed near a downspout. In suburban or rural areas, where lots can be quite large, a vegetable garden is not necessarily near the house. Even in urban areas, there is need for an alternative because downspouts are sometimes not accesible (in wrong area or made of tough to cut galvanized steel).
by RainSaucers Inc. on April 18th, 2012
When we first got into the rainwater harvesting business, our trusted advisor Vishwanath Srikantaiah of India's Rainwater Club told us that cheap water storage is the key to making rainwater collection pervasive. After all, he emphasized, if you cannot store the collected water at a reasonable cost, you run into issues with capital availability especially in developing countries. But even here in the US, we see price sensitivity amongst consumers who are increasingly likely to make their own rain barrel rather than buy one. Or in cities where rain barrels are provided free or subsidized, demand is almost always greater than program supply.Since RWH is so dependent on water storage, it's worth asking then "is it possible to store water for free"? In the United States, the answer happily is yes. Here is a list of ways we've stored water for free with a little effort to find and clean the container:
- 55 gallon food safe plastic drums- we got ours from a Microbrewery. Other sources include bottling plants and food manufacturers. Just make sure to get one with a 2" NPS fine thread hole if you want to make it a free standing rain collector using our system.
- 5 gallon buckets- from local restaurants. Soy Sauce for example is often sold in such containers.Most proprietors are happy to help in the name of recycling.
- 1 gallon jugs- like you see every week when you buy milk. A great way to use these is by offloading water from a full rain barrel so that storage is freed up. Then with a few pin holes in the cap you have a watering can.
by RainSaucers Inc. on April 9th, 2012
As you might imagine, free standing rainwater collectors are much more susceptible to tipping because there is nothing shielding them from the wind. This is especially true for those long thin pickle barrels which have a high center of gravity. However, in the year that the RainSaucer has been on the market, we've seen our customers secure their systems in a variety of succesful ways. In this post we'll share with you what seems to work:
1. Securing the barrel to the stand itself is good as long as the stand is heavy. Cinder blocks are often used as a stand because of their weight and because they have holes which permit a rope or cord to go through. The below video is an example of this from our partner DC Greenworks.
2. Tying the barrel off to the ground with stakes is another option. Just run two lines from opposite points on the barrel to stakes in the ground. If your barrel has handles, they make excellent end points.
3. Surround the barrel with a few fence posts. In high winds the barrel will bump up against the posts but not tip over.
4. Surrouding the barrel with ad-hoc objects. In San Ramon, we used patio chairs temporarily until the barrel had enough water weight in it to prevent tipping. 5 gallons of rain= 40 pounds of weight, which should be enough ballast support.
5. #1,2 above via holes in the edge of the RainSaucer. If for some reason holes cannot be made in the barrel, the holes at the edge of the RainSaucer have enough extra room to accomodate a string or cord. This allows them to be be used as end points for tying around a stand or staking into the ground.
1. Securing the barrel to the stand itself is good as long as the stand is heavy. Cinder blocks are often used as a stand because of their weight and because they have holes which permit a rope or cord to go through. The below video is an example of this from our partner DC Greenworks.
2. Tying the barrel off to the ground with stakes is another option. Just run two lines from opposite points on the barrel to stakes in the ground. If your barrel has handles, they make excellent end points.
3. Surround the barrel with a few fence posts. In high winds the barrel will bump up against the posts but not tip over.
4. Surrouding the barrel with ad-hoc objects. In San Ramon, we used patio chairs temporarily until the barrel had enough water weight in it to prevent tipping. 5 gallons of rain= 40 pounds of weight, which should be enough ballast support.
5. #1,2 above via holes in the edge of the RainSaucer. If for some reason holes cannot be made in the barrel, the holes at the edge of the RainSaucer have enough extra room to accomodate a string or cord. This allows them to be be used as end points for tying around a stand or staking into the ground.
by RainSaucers Inc. on April 4th, 2012
Our 48" RainSaucer comes with a 2" NPS (Nominal Pipe Size, a US standard) male fitting. This not only allows it to be screwed into barrels which already have such holes, it also enables the user to scale their system with compatible fittings and piping available at your local hardware store.2 RainSaucers per barrel is easy if you have one of these ubiquitous blue or white barrels (see picture). These barrels have 2" holes as part of the mold and since these barrels are so thick, they can easily support the weight. To implement, it's just 2 x 24" sections of 2" PVC with a Tee used in the middle and at the ends if you want clean-outs or elbows if you don't. Female/male adapters are also used with the tees to connect each RainSaucer, cap (optional) and the barrel itself.
If you don't have one of these barrels or you want to deploy more than two RainSaucers, the best strategy is to make an arm. All you need is 2" PVC piping, the appropriate amount of tee connectors, elbows to begin/end the arm, and a either fence post or other structure (as shown below) to support the "arm".
by RainSaucers Inc. on April 2nd, 2012
Like most common installs there are a number of approaches. Here is what has worked for us and costs just $5-$6:- a Faucet ($2-$3), we like King Brothers SFT-0750-T Faucet Sink Celcon 3/4" (pictured here)
- a #19 O ring 1.25" outer diameter ($.10)
- a reducer bushing with 3/4" threads ($1.25)
- a 15/16" spade bit ($2-$3)
Installation is simple:
Use the spade bit to drill a hole 2-4 inches from the bottom of the barrel, depending on desired dispensing height. Then thread in the faucet and place O ring on side coming through (inside barrel). Thread on reducer bushing after O ring making sure everything is tight. If there are leaks, keep tightening until a seal develops. You may still get a little leakage from time to time but that should be minor.
The above only work for open top barrels. If your barrel is completely closed, use the O ring on the outside of the barrel and a long arm tool to hold reducer bushing on the inside.
by RainSaucers Inc. on March 28th, 2012
"Prepping" has gotten a lot of attention lately thanks to the approaching Mayan Apocalypse date and shows like Doomsday Preppers. Its probably no coincidence that the Walking Dead TV show is also so popular. But prepper or not, we all know that we need to be prepared in the event of disaster by having food, shelter, and an adequate supply of water.FEMA recommends having a 3 day supply on hand, but preppers often have much more than that plus their own water treatment mechanisms. The rationale for water treatment is that in the event of a disaster, water will be available, but not clean.
We agree this might be true for certain disasters like floods where water might be everywhere. But there are plenty of disasters where your access to water might be restricted because your freedom of movement is restricted. For example, in the event of civil unrest your best chance of survival might be to "bug-in" and stay under the radar. In that case, where will your water come from when your supplies have run out?
This is where rainwater harvesting comes in, especially for people who are currently dependent on municipal water. By collecting rainwater you are actually increasing your chances of survival in the event of disaster because rain barrels are an independent and renewable source of water.
