DIY: Solar Water Heater

As the weather constantly cools down, every home is going to increase its consumption of hot water. However, with electricity prices having recently gone up 24.8%, it is going to be a little steep for most of our pockets.

We all know heating water takes a lot of electricity so why not build a solar hot water system for your home, especially when it’s so cheap and easy to build yourself?

Yes I Want To Make One, But How?

First identify a place where you can position a tank that you will be using as the solar water heater. That particular place need to have the most exposure to the sun’s heating rays and the roof is usually the best place.

Paint the water tank with mat black colour so that it will retain heat from the sun.

Make a plywood (layered board) box to enclose your water tank and ensure that the box is secure, strong & the right size.

Line the inside of the box with fibreglass for maximum heat retention and then place the box inside glass panels which will help trap the heat inside.

Now, secure the water tank in the plywood box and then connect the plumbing fittings and pipes.
The incoming cold water pipes should be connected to the bottom of the tank and the outgoing pipes connected from the top of the tank to the home’s regular water heating system.

NB: If you don’t want to go through the trouble of making your own from scratch, the tools and material that you will need to construct the whole system are readily available at your local hardware store in South Africa and globally.

You can use this solar heating system to heat water inside your house or for heating pools and Jacuzzi and there are no size limits. Above that not only is it easy to make, it is also relatively inexpensive so what are you waiting for?