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Now is a good time to prep. Get a few food grade 55 gallon drum - you can usually find them at food/restaurant supply stores or people trying to get rid of them

Now is a good time to prep. Get a few food grade 55 gallon drum - you can usually find them at food/restaurant supply stores or people trying to get rid of them on craigslist/fb market. Get a dolly so you can move them around your garage or basement. Just need a few teaspoons of bleach to keep it good for ~ 6 months. If your washer is in your basement, you can disconnect the cold line to fill up the drums, or you can run a garden hose. They also make kitchen faucet to garden hose attachments. When you need to drain it, a cheap transfer or sump pump will do the job.

mindslight 2y ago
Speaking as someone who has the entirety of my heat for this winter stacked up in totes, prepping by storing bulk materials is not really something to be done lightly. Unless you turn this DIY water buffer into something you use in your every day life (ie thirsty? time to go to the basement to get a glass of water), you will get bored of maintaining it long before the municipal water supply fails. Also 55 gallons of water is ~450lbs, so it's not going to be terribly easy to move with an [appliance] dolly. You probably want pallets and a pallet jack (and a smooth concrete floor). Personally I'd suggest getting an RO filter for your every day drinking water needs, and setting up a rain barrel collection that you can routinely use for outdoor garden/plants. Then if you suddenly need drinking water, you should be good just boiling the rain water. And if there is some large scale catastrophe with some kind of chemical/radiological contaminant in the rain, you can run it through the RO.
- Eumenes 2y ago
  I'm not a strong person and can move around a 55 gallon barrel super easily with these dollys: https://www.amazon.com/Gallon-Heavy-Duty-Plastic-Dolly/dp/B08FSWWBGZ https://www.amazon.com/Gallon-Heavy-Duty-Plastic-Dolly/dp/B0... I can also drain it in < 5 mins with a cheap siphon (I let it drain into a sump basin). So swapping it out every few months is easy. But I agree, a RO filter is great, esp for everyday use. One concern I have with rain water barrel is how its collected. If you have an asphalt roof, there is some nasty stuff in it, and not sure if boiling helps in that situation. Need to do more research there. But its a great idea for watering a garden/yard.

mindslight 2y ago

Speaking as someone who has the entirety of my heat for this winter stacked up in totes, prepping by storing bulk materials is not really something to be done lightly. Unless you turn this DIY water buffer into something you use in your every day life (ie thirsty? time to go to the basement to get a glass of water), you will get bored of maintaining it long before the municipal water supply fails. Also 55 gallons of water is ~450lbs, so it's not going to be terribly easy to move with an [appliance] dolly. You probably want pallets and a pallet jack (and a smooth concrete floor). Personally I'd suggest getting an RO filter for your every day drinking water needs, and setting up a rain barrel collection that you can routinely use for outdoor garden/plants. Then if you suddenly need drinking water, you should be good just boiling the rain water. And if there is some large scale catastrophe with some kind of chemical/radiological contaminant in the rain, you can run it through the RO.

Eumenes 2y ago
I'm not a strong person and can move around a 55 gallon barrel super easily with these dollys: https://www.amazon.com/Gallon-Heavy-Duty-Plastic-Dolly/dp/B08FSWWBGZ https://www.amazon.com/Gallon-Heavy-Duty-Plastic-Dolly/dp/B0... I can also drain it in < 5 mins with a cheap siphon (I let it drain into a sump basin). So swapping it out every few months is easy. But I agree, a RO filter is great, esp for everyday use. One concern I have with rain water barrel is how its collected. If you have an asphalt roof, there is some nasty stuff in it, and not sure if boiling helps in that situation. Need to do more research there. But its a great idea for watering a garden/yard.