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I think I read all instructables on this site about collecting rain water.
Finally I've decided to build my own one with a wine barrel because I didn't want to destroy the look of my future-to-be terrace. I always found rain water collectors super ugly. It's usually an old plastic tank or barrel; handy but not very nice to the eye (and I didn't have the motivation to build something like this to hide it.
Anyway, here's how I did it.
Material
- a wine barrel (found on eBay for 50 EUR) - make sure to get one with a lid and a cork (usually it's a special cork located in the belly part of the barrel)
- a rain water collector to hook up to the gutter (found on eBay for 19 EUR - but otherwise available in nearly all DIY shop) - I choose that model because the collected water would come out via a little tube and not an "open-air" half-pipe
- driller
- flat wood drill heads
- some screws
- an old piece of board about the length of the barrel's lid
- a handle
Finally I've decided to build my own one with a wine barrel because I didn't want to destroy the look of my future-to-be terrace. I always found rain water collectors super ugly. It's usually an old plastic tank or barrel; handy but not very nice to the eye (and I didn't have the motivation to build something like this to hide it.
Anyway, here's how I did it.
Material
- a wine barrel (found on eBay for 50 EUR) - make sure to get one with a lid and a cork (usually it's a special cork located in the belly part of the barrel)
- a rain water collector to hook up to the gutter (found on eBay for 19 EUR - but otherwise available in nearly all DIY shop) - I choose that model because the collected water would come out via a little tube and not an "open-air" half-pipe
- driller
- flat wood drill heads
- some screws
- an old piece of board about the length of the barrel's lid
- a handle
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Signing UpStep 1Prepare the barrel's lid
Usually wine barrel's lids are a bit wobbly.
They are made of some planks inserted in each other, and are supposed to be inserted in a groove at the top, inside the barrel. Because of that I had to make the lid stronger so it would resist to frequent usage.
I found an old piece of wood board in my garage and screwed it tight at the back of the lid. I made sure to use rustproof (inox) screws. In order to be able to close the barrel and properly put the lid back on, (and because the lid is round) I had to saw the 4 corners of the board as you can see on the picture.
Last year we bought a new kitchen and we received two extra handles (don't ask me why), so I've decided to use one of them for my barrel.
The screws that came with the handle weren't long enough to go through the thickness of the lid + the board attached at the back. So I used a flat drill head to make a wider hole and reduce the thickness so I could properly attach the handle.
Make sure to place the handle in the middle of the lid, it's not only more beautiful but also easier to manipulate when you open/close the barrel.
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i'm not a "barrel expert", but as far as I know, i think you'll have to remove or loosen the top metal band in order to be able to push a little bit the planks aside so the top can come off its groove.
the way it works now with my barrel is that the lid is no longer in the groove, but on top of it (see my drawing on imagehsack here). Personally the top came off quick easily, I only had to loosen a bit the metal band (I used a flat screw driver and a hammer to tap the band up)
hope this helps