using a creek for domestic water

I live on top of a mountian and I drilled a well 5 years ago when I built my house. I have a VERY high Iron content that my wife is sick of. I also have a very nice creek that originates just off my property in a state forest. I want to use this creek water for home use and once it gets to my house I will be running it through the whole house filtering system i already have. This water is in no way contaminated and the small town that is 4 miles down stream used this water for years as household water that ran into their resevior.

I was thinking of building a small dam up stream on my property line and piping water to a buried septic tank ( new of course. lol ) that would be about 300 ft. down stream. allowing for the overflow to run back into the stream. Then putting a pump inside the tank and piping that water up to the house and tying that into my home filter system that is already in place to eliminate contaminates ( hopefully)

any thoughts, ideas, comments on how you would do this any differently????

That sounds like a great idea to me KTM. A small town near me has bad well water but everyone in town filled there containers from a rusty old pipe that was spring fed. Jim

At our summer cottage we have a spring fed water system with a resevoir and the whole nine yards. Your plan will probably work but if the steam fall under the category of primitive trout stream just don't get caught . DEP has regulations about taping into such water ways and you will probably need toget a usage permit of some sort. Also since you will be getting water from an open water way you will need to either boil your water or add a UV light to remove the microbes from the water. These light range from about $500 on up depending on the flow you require. They can be obtained at a good plumbing shop. We run our sysytem on gravity feed with a line pressure of about 50 -60 psi at the faucet. This obtained by staring with a large dia. pipe like 6" and gradually stepping it down to 1 1/2" well pipe. I don't know the exact elevation change ratio but I would guess it has a drop of about 30' in about 500- 600 yds.

Take a look at the following link on small water systems:

http://www.usace.army.mil/publications/ ... 03/toc.htm

What it describes is much larger than you need but it will be a good reference for the design principles and water quality issues.

jpen1,

Yep, I am going use a UV filter for sure. Not much worry about getting caught. The stream originates on my property and i live in the middle of nowhere anyway. My nearest neighbor is about 3 miles away.
I plan on using this same stream to power my house in the near future so I am going to be using this stream plenty. But, all the stream water will be going back into the stream anyway.

Ktm,
Sounds like your situation is just about like ours. We have about five or six very productive springs which for a eigh to ten foot wide steam by the time it leaves our acerage. We just put a dam in the stream about 50 yds. from the springs and return the unused water back into the stream.

what happens in the winter?

e.alleg wrote:what happens in the winter?

This whole project will be buried. The tank, lines, etc..

What if it gets so cold the creek freezes?

NEPAForum Admin wrote:What if it gets so cold the creek freezes?

You will be Sh-t out of luck.

I have never seen a creek freeze solid. There is always water running under the ice.

Niagara falls froze over.

http://www.niagarafallslive.com/Facts_a ... _Falls.htm

Apprently not completely froze over but caused by a ice jam.

I asked KTM about freezing. He will retain his well system as a backup water source if the weather gets cold enough to freeze the burried pipes.

I suffered with really rusty water for years at my previous house, filters, filters and more filters. Softeners and reverse-osmosis systems and they all had very limited life with the high iron content..

Greg L

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LsFarm wrote:I suffered with really rusty water for years at my previous house, filters, filters and more filters. Softeners and reverse-osmosis systems and they all had very limited life with the high iron content..

Did you try a Manganese filter?

As Greg said, I will be retaining my current well system also. But, I have yet to see the creek freeze completely over. It usually just gets a ice sheet on the top.
I have tried all kinds of filters and filtering systems, Manganese included along with a salt system and now the Pyrolox system. They all seem to work well for a few months then they just start to loose their effectiveness...

You may want to get the stream water tested for the same minerals that are in your well before comitting any major $$$ to the project.