IBC's as water butts

**Mr Bones** · 05-02-2018, 01:37 PM

Nice one Nick. Being made of white plastic the water inside an IBC can easily turn green with algae which in turn blocks watering can roses etc. Some on our site are wrapped in light-proof membrane to keep the water clear.

**nickdub** · 05-02-2018, 02:06 PM

good tip thanks - I've got one white and one dark brown. I'll have a think about painting the white one - or I may make an enclosure for them and put a lid over the whole lot.

Do you know if the plastic these are made of deteriorates through exposure to sunlight ?

**4Shoes** · 05-02-2018, 02:37 PM

Originally posted by nickdub View Post

good tip thanks - I've got one white and one dark brown. I'll have a think about painting the white one - or I may make an enclosure for them and put a lid over the whole lot.

Do you know if the plastic these are made of deteriorates through exposure to sunlight ?

IBC tend to be made of food grade plastic and are very robust.

Horse people around here use them for water storage. Some adverts in smallholder magazines for Water Butt specific trailers so shouldn't think UV is a problem.

**lottieguy** · 07-02-2018, 08:53 AM

Hi Ya. I had two for about 7 years and they are good but with drawbacks. The build up algae as mentioned was one as even covered there is still a biuld up I found. To try and clean them out was a nightmare. I found also the the tap on mine, if your have them, was a broken after it froze and started leaking to were I could not seal it and use the tap. I used a caravan water pump run from a 12 volt battery to transfer the water to smaller butts up the plot. I have since invested in 45 gallon butts mainly as they came free. I find them much more practical. How ever you got them at a snip at �10. I also had a problem when trying to get rid of them as the council said they did not do and the private company wanted to charge �75 each. I was lucky in talking to some one who was a member of a clay pigeon shoot took them cut the bottoms out and used them to cover the traps against the weather. Lucky me. anyway you will get a few years out of them and good luck

**nickdub** · 07-02-2018, 09:09 AM

Some interesting info - thanks.

I'm planning on putting the IBC's outside, but permanently connecting them to a small tank inside which I can use to fill a watering can.

**Aberdeenplotter** · 07-02-2018, 09:59 AM

Various options on fleabay for taps as well so that hoses can be attached.

**lottieguy** · 07-02-2018, 10:09 AM

Hi Ya, Mine had a metal frame around them and came with an extension tube fitted with a black screw on cap. I used that and fitted a water butt tap to the cap onto the tube. Put on top of pallets to raise it up to get a watering can under the tap. It worked well for years. I could also attach a hose to it and let it ran up the plot using gravity. As I say it worked well for 6 years but being in full sun during the summer took it's toll.

**Nicos** · 07-02-2018, 11:24 AM

We have had 3white ones for about 4years or more now.
We wrapped heather weave flexible fencing around them after painting them with dark brown Cuprinol.
Only one joint connection has failed so far. Maybe we have been lucky?

Not had too much of a build up of algae so far.....

**nickdub** · 07-02-2018, 12:12 PM

Sounds like a reasonable scheme - I'm a bit of a "bodgit and see" merchant when it comes to stuff like plumbing for rainwater - might resort to a length of hose to form a permanent siphon between my two for example, if I can't get proper plumbing joints cheaply enough.

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IBC's as water butts

IBC's as water butts

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