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Step 3First thing's first: the gutters.
Gutters? yep. You're going to want gutters. It works like this: The misting system comes on, it rains on your chameleons. The water falls down to the floor of the free range, where it is diverted into gutters and carried to one end of the room by good old Newtonian gravity. The gutters lead to some plumbing and we're going to plumb the water path right through an outside wall and out of your house...and outside of our house the chameleon sewage waters and feeds our vegetable garden. (and it works- we get tomatoes the size of grapefruit!)
Start with the gutters- they are the lowest part of the whole project. For ease of installation and peace of mind, we used modular vinyl gutter materials commonly available at the Big Box home improvement stores. The vinyl gutter parts snap together very solidly and have built-in rubber gaskets to make a leak proof system. Metal gutters are a pain to cut and seal properly.
All the guttering is mounted right on the wall with standard hardware just as one would attach it to the outside of a house and then sealed on with gaffing tape. I avoided caulking them for the sake of reversability.
What you'll need:
TOOLS:
A stud finder.
A hammer & nails
A drill/screwgun & screws
A level,
Optional: a ping pong ball.
MATERIALS: (you're going to need to tailor this list for your own design!)
Enough Vinyl gutter to run the length of your free range.
two gutter connectors
two gutter endcaps.
One gutter downspout adapter.
If you're going around a corner like we did, you'll need a corner adapter.
one 4" 90 deg PVC pipe.
one 4" to 1.5" pipe adapter.
The gutters need to slope slightly to ensure drainage. Start at the end you want to water to drain to. This is where you'll install the downspout adapter. This end of the gutter should be just a hair higher than your electrical outlets. The other end of the gutter should be just high enough so that a ping pong ball will roll unhindered from one end to the other.
In these pictures, you'll notice that we hadn't done the decorative paint yet, but the seafoam green base protection coat has been applied. We also mounted the standards first. Trust me: mount the gutter first.
Start with the gutters- they are the lowest part of the whole project. For ease of installation and peace of mind, we used modular vinyl gutter materials commonly available at the Big Box home improvement stores. The vinyl gutter parts snap together very solidly and have built-in rubber gaskets to make a leak proof system. Metal gutters are a pain to cut and seal properly.
All the guttering is mounted right on the wall with standard hardware just as one would attach it to the outside of a house and then sealed on with gaffing tape. I avoided caulking them for the sake of reversability.
What you'll need:
TOOLS:
A stud finder.
A hammer & nails
A drill/screwgun & screws
A level,
Optional: a ping pong ball.
MATERIALS: (you're going to need to tailor this list for your own design!)
Enough Vinyl gutter to run the length of your free range.
two gutter connectors
two gutter endcaps.
One gutter downspout adapter.
If you're going around a corner like we did, you'll need a corner adapter.
one 4" 90 deg PVC pipe.
one 4" to 1.5" pipe adapter.
The gutters need to slope slightly to ensure drainage. Start at the end you want to water to drain to. This is where you'll install the downspout adapter. This end of the gutter should be just a hair higher than your electrical outlets. The other end of the gutter should be just high enough so that a ping pong ball will roll unhindered from one end to the other.
In these pictures, you'll notice that we hadn't done the decorative paint yet, but the seafoam green base protection coat has been applied. We also mounted the standards first. Trust me: mount the gutter first.
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