Drain pipe water butt identification

[wedge69]

Can any one help identify this type of drain pipe that connects to our water butts? It's in a house we bought so didn't install ourselves.

Butts are filing really slowly so just want to check the installation instructions to check they are not at the wrong height or anything.

Thanks!

 

[stem]

Not sure what make it is but because of the design, they tend to collect moss, leaves etc that wash down from the roof and it become trapped in this area and the hose connected to it....

....which slows or stops the water flowing into the barrel, and so it goes this way instead.

Removing it and cleaning it out will restore functionality. It probably needs to be done annually, or maybe more frequently, depending upon what the roof and guttering collect and deposit in it.

I normally remove the hose to the barrel and put a hose connected to a tap on it and blow it back into the device to wash it out. Also flush the connecting pipe between the diverter and barrel.

 

[Old Salt]

Surely water is being forced uphill into that water butt?

Not seen one like that before.

 

[Mike13]

Surely water is being forced uphill into that water butt?

Not seen one like that before.

It is to stop the water butt from overfilling, it siphons out when too full.

 

[stem]

Once the water in the 'catchment part' of the diverter gets to this level water will enter the barrel.

The top of the barrel is positioned above the point indicated below which is the point where the water by-passes the 'catchment part' of the diverter and runs down the by-pass on the left. This stops the barrel overflowing.

 

[Why Not Indeed]

This design also means that you have some latitude on the height of the barrel.

 

[Bosswhite]

IMO the diverter is too low . water does not go uphill,

 

[stem]

Correct, it doesn't go uphill, just finds its own level.

It might fill the barrel a bit faster if the pipe wasn't quite so inclined, but it will still work, provided the diverter and hose are clear of internal debris. The final filling level would be determined as above.

 

[wedge69]

Thanks for all the responses. I've cleaned out the drain pipe part, and the hose. There was a bit of gunk in there, so hopefully that has improved things.

I don't like taking them apart, because as you can see by the plumbers tape, the seals are terrible and they tend to leak in heavy rain.

One good thing about the drain pipe diverter is even though it gets gunk stuck in it, it stops the gunk actually going further down onto the drainage system and causing problems later.

 

[conny]

Put a domed cage over the outlet in the gutter and you will get minimal gunk/leaves/moss coming down off the roof altogether.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/QWORK-Aluminum-Gutter-Expandable-Blockages/dp/B0B49LFYXV/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1MALQL50MHHO7&keywords=Downspout+cage&qid=1691527799&sprefix=downspout+cage%2Caps%2C87&sr=8-1

 

[Bear2Biker]

replace the hosepipe with something bigger, Std hosepipe is 15mm outside diameter, 10/11mm inside, even that short length will present significant resistance to water flow as its not presurised-resulting in long fill periods, ive got 5 water butts feeding two IBC's all connected, had to change to 22mm(3/4") hose for the water butts & 25mm MDPE for the IBC's and i'm using a pump!

 

[StephenOak]

Put a domed cage over the outlet in the gutter and you will get minimal gunk/leaves/moss coming down off the roof altogether.

Depends on how much material there is, when it falls in the gutter it has to go somewhere.

I had plastic ones of those in the top of a couple of downpipes but there are lots of trees here, and ones with large leaves. Quite soon the gutter outlet had accumulated enough mass to push the gutter balloons down into the pipes and there was a pretty solid mass in that location. Resulting in the gutter overflowing.

There are old metal ones in an area that has less material falling on it, but the outlet area eventually accumulated enough crud to seal the balloon, again leading to the gutters overflowing.