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 Cute Little Imp
Posts: 2747
   
Location: N Texas | TrailGirl - 2015-01-09 12:58 PM
Has anyone here tried the geothermal heating method? What you want to do is dig a hole 5-6 feet deep. you need a big round pipe of some sort to put in the hole (say a 12" PVC), so it will be flush with the ground. Put it straight up and down, fill the area around it with dirt and put some kind of heavy metal grate over it, then put the water tank on top. If you then cover part of the tank it shouldn't freeze, down to about 5 or 10 below freezing. The colder your area the deeper you need. The larger the trough you may need more than one pipe sunk. Banking up around the trough with sand helps insulate it a bit as well.
We use a deicer now but we are thinking about trying this method. With an auger on the tractor it wouldn't be hard to do. And...we don't get down below 20 for any length of time generally.
I had not heard of this and was very intrigued, so I did some research and found this helpful article:
http://gardeninflipflops.blogspot.com/2013/02/low-tech-geo-thermal-...
Seems pretty neat! |
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 Accident Prone
Posts: 22277
Location: 100 miles from Nowhere, AR | TessBelle - 2015-01-09 12:57 PM Not trying to steal OPs post but what about us that's getting abnormally cold weather? I've been breaking ice the last 2 days and all my faucets are froze in the mornings and shortly after dark. It's really not worth spending the money on heated buckets because they would never get used except on rare occasions. So is there anything I can do to help them not freeze? I have one horse that is having to stay in a stall 24/7 and his water freezes during the night. I tried to leave his faucet dripping last night but that didn't work.
We're in south Arkansas and don't typically have many days when we have to worry about stuff freezing up, but those heated tubs are TOTALLY WORTH IT. They don't just keep the water from icing, they make it warm and the horses drink more. Even on non-freezing days, they are nice to have. |
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 Expert
Posts: 2457
| TrailGirl - 2015-01-09 12:58 PM Has anyone here tried the geothermal heating method? What you want to do is dig a hole 5-6 feet deep. you need a big round pipe of some sort to put in the hole (say a 12" PVC), so it will be flush with the ground. Put it straight up and down, fill the area around it with dirt and put some kind of heavy metal grate over it, then put the water tank on top. If you then cover part of the tank it shouldn't freeze, down to about 5 or 10 below freezing. The colder your area the deeper you need. The larger the trough you may need more than one pipe sunk. Banking up around the trough with sand helps insulate it a bit as well. We use a deicer now but we are thinking about trying this method. With an auger on the tractor it wouldn't be hard to do. And...we don't get down below 20 for any length of time generally.
The old auto waterers we had in the runs were geo-thermal heated.
They were fine until the wind chill hit them ... then I was still out there chopping ice 2x a day. At one point we actually ran pvc pipe to them with extension cords and the little donut heaters because we couldn't keep them from freezing up.
However, that being said, if you can keep them covered, they work better. For instance, in SD, we had cattle waterers that were a large tire with a sealed bottom. The auto water float bit was in the middle. The pipe that fed the tank came up from under the tank and had a large "air" part to let the ground heat come up. The top of the tank was a thick rubber piece with flaps cut. The flaps allowed the cow to move the flap, drink, and the flap would drop back in place to keep the wind off the water. |
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 Butter my Biscuits
Posts: 2948
Location: MI | We just moved to this new place. All the pastures have tractor tires encased in cement with a water spigot along side of a center drain tube. In summer we put a automatic float on it and water is maintained about 3/4 of the way full of the tractor tire. In winter we take the float off and turn the water on to a med slow trickle. The overflow goes down the center drain tube and out a underground pipe to the river below. Each tractor tire services 3 paddocks or pastures in the corners where they all intersect. It is really a neat design as I have not had to break ice out of the tanks, run any extra electricity, or do any maintenance. Even in this -20 windchills we are experiencing right now. |
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 Veteran
Posts: 164
| Do you guys use floating or sinking water trough heaters? |
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  Damn Yankee
Posts: 12390
Location: Somewhere between raising hell and Amazing Grace | I would much rather take my chances with heaters then a colicky horse, that's for sure :)
We have stock tank heaters in every pasture and keep heated buckets in case we need to stall one. |
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Location: Georgia | For outside horses that do not have access to electricity, I built a solar heated insulated enclosure for my stock tanks. Temp has been 15-20 degrees last few nights. The solar tanks had 1/8" ice which melted by noon each day. The non solar tanks had 3 inches of ice that is still there. Very easy to build. You can find directions on internet. They need to be situated facing south/south west to get the solar benefit. Inside the barn I use the insulated bucket holders and fill with warm water morning & night. |
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Extreme Veteran
Posts: 467
Location: A roping pen near you!! |
We use these and I love them. Our horses drink really well out them. They also have a heater in their outside water tank. But they will drink all of their water at night out of these. Yes they will freeze when it's -20 windchill but at least it's not frozen solid. We live in Ohio and today they had a thin ice covering on the top. But if a horse would push on it it would have broken thru. They were a life saver for us last winter and so far this winter. PLUS they keep the water cooler in the summer because they are insulated. |
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Veteran
Posts: 270
| BRcwgrl81 - 2015-01-09 2:12 PM
Herbie - 2015-01-09 2:04 PM So for those that are using heated buckets and tank heaters, if you don't have electricity right at the location of the bucket, do you run extension cords? My horses stay turned out unless there is moisture coming and there is no outlet near my pastures. I'd have to run about 100 feet of extension cords. Is this what you all do? I do have a couple of outlets in the barn, but they aren't right at my stalls either.
This is exactly what I do. At the house we just sold, the outlet was about 200 ft from pasture. We strung 3 heavy duty extension cords together for our tank de-icer.
At our new house, its about 110 ft...and we have 2 heavy duty extension cords together. Never had an issue.
Last year was the first year I used a de-icer because I always thought the pasture was too far from the outlet (200 ft)...man, I wish I would have asked people sooner if it was feasible!! I'll NEVER go another winter without a de-icer!!!! Best $20 winter investment I've made!
I have also been running a heavy duty drop cord from the back of the house to the pasture (about 100 ft) for the past couple of years and never had a problem with it. Thankfully we just had water/power put out by the pasture so it's closer now but I'm still using a short drop cord, so far it's still been fine. I agree that the tank de-icer was the best $20 I've spent! |
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Veteran
Posts: 270
| HannahRodeoCowgirl - 2015-01-09 7:00 PM
Do you guys use floating or sinking water trough heaters?
I didn't know which one to go with but I went with the sinking. I wasn't sure if they'd try to play with the floating one. |
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 Elite Veteran
Posts: 1119
| KCT82 - 2015-01-09 7:40 PM HannahRodeoCowgirl - 2015-01-09 7:00 PM Do you guys use floating or sinking water trough heaters? I didn't know which one to go with but I went with the sinking. I wasn't sure if they'd try to play with the floating one.
I get the sinking ones for that reason. My horses are way too playful to go with the floating option. |
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 Expert
Posts: 2276
Location: ohio-in my own little world with pretty ponies :) | turnum - 2015-01-09 8:33 PM We use these and I love them. Our horses drink really well out them. They also have a heater in their outside water tank. But they will drink all of their water at night out of these. Yes they will freeze when it's -20 windchill but at least it's not frozen solid. We live in Ohio and today they had a thin ice covering on the top. But if a horse would push on it it would have broken thru. They were a life saver for us last winter and so far this winter. PLUS they keep the water cooler in the summer because they are insulated.
where are you located? we're in ohio as well. all of mine are stalled the majority of the time in the winter so i need a solution for 5 gal water buckets. i seriously have the worst luck and the most playful, mischivious horses. |
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Expert
Posts: 2276
Location: ohio-in my own little world with pretty ponies :) | question for those that do have heated buckets inside..do you just run a bunch of extension cords? only a couple stalls have an outlet close enough. |
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 Elite Veteran
Posts: 600
Location: Oklahoma & Texas | I use the heated deicer for the big tanks on the pastures and just run extension cords...inside i make sure to put 2 buckets of fresh warm water morning and night and they love it they usually drink before i can even hang them back up...i dont find that it freezes faster than the normal water..actually i have tested it and every time the warm water will stay unfrozen much longer than the regular water usually hours longer. I have bought the 5 gallon heated buckets for inside the barn but i havent needed to use them yet just doing the warm water for now as it stays unfrozen in the barn even with temps in the teens and single digit wind chills... |
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 Warrior Mom
Posts: 4400
| I invested in heated water buckets. My barn has electric outlets on the ceiling so we just ran extension cords and used zip ties. Best thing ever. My ponies are drinking bucket after bucket of water in this freezing weather.
Edited by want2chase3 2015-01-09 10:09 PM
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 Elite Veteran
Posts: 927
Location: Iowa | Dumb question on heated buckets: If a horse drinks all his water, does the bucket have a sensor and turns off or just keep heating.
Also for my tank heater, I use my rv cord as my extension cord so I know its heavy enough for that current. |
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Expert
Posts: 1409
Location: Oklahoma | memory --- I haven't run out of water for very long but mine kept working It doesn't get very hot at all. Love mine this is the first winter with them I go the biggest bucket you can get for the stall. I worried bout my horse chewing on the cord but he hasn't even gave a second look my bucket has like a aluminum covering over the cords for protection. It came this way. |
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 Certified Snake Wrangler
Posts: 1672
Location: North MS | In Mississippi and we just had (having) a few of those rare cold spells. After one cold spell about two years ago I invested in two tank de-icers. One for standby in case the other failed. I have the hubby check it thoroughly with voltmeter before using each season. LOVE LOVE LOVE it! I just bought the 16 gallon heated tub and have it outside my barn and hooked up to an auto waterer. A wonderful lasting investment in my opinion |
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 762
Location: NC | If we could use electric at the barn im boarding,mine would have at least inside water buckets heated. Unfortunately we have no plugs by us. |
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Extreme Veteran
Posts: 467
Location: A roping pen near you!! | lexyy12 - 2015-01-09 10:19 PM turnum - 2015-01-09 8:33 PM We use these and I love them. Our horses drink really well out them. They also have a heater in their outside water tank. But they will drink all of their water at night out of these. Yes they will freeze when it's -20 windchill but at least it's not frozen solid. We live in Ohio and today they had a thin ice covering on the top. But if a horse would push on it it would have broken thru. They were a life saver for us last winter and so far this winter. PLUS they keep the water cooler in the summer because they are insulated.
We are 40 mins east of Columbus. |
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