Re: Buried Cargo Containers

On Mon, 31 Mar 2008 19:49:40 -0500, "geotek" <y@xxxxx> wrote:


"Terryc" <newsthreespam-spam@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:47f15aeb$0$65771$c30e37c6@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
geotek wrote:
Has anybody buried any shipping containers? I wanted to bury a couple,
and connect them with culvert piping to the basement. Can they be
reliably water tight?

As as thought experiment, I'll throw in 2c.

snip!
Great post Terryc! That's what I needed. You mentioned some things I
hadn't considered, especially the rust-prone roofs. These things look
pretty heavy duty, and they do take some abuse, but they aren't actually
structures, and weren't designed for burial.
I'll keep those ideas in mind,
Thank you!
geotek

I own 2 20' cargo containers. Both have a significant amount of rust
on the roofs, requiring being sealed with roofing tar every 5 or so
years. The heat tends to bubble it up and peel off in the wind.



There are three water sources you are going to have to worry about.

1. Water table; if the place suffers from rising water table, then I'd say
don't bother. Although, it seems containers that fall off ships do a good
job off floating below the surface for sometime. so if the doors are
closed properly with good sealing, short term mightn't be a problem.


2. Rain; AFAIK, most shipping containers suffer from roof rust eventually.
They are designed to stack, not have rainwater run off them and it is easy
for rain water to foorm pools on top. so, if you do bury one, you will
need to put a "roof" over the top. Perhaps something as simple as sheets
of plastic over the top and sides, the a pile of DRY sand to put a shallow
dome over the top, then another layer of plastic over the top. that sand
could even be the side fill,

The idea is rainwater trickling down through the ground, hits the top
layer and just tends to roll sideways off the roof of the container. If
the sidefill is sand, it will drop away quickly and if you have a trench
of sand below the bottom of the container, that will act as a resivoir
(sp?) to hold heavy drainage.

1.B Depending on your location and soil, ground water seepeage might be a
problem. The olds's house is on the sde of a hill on clay soils derived
from sanstone. The initial narrow, small garage under the house was
usually a dry, dusty place. Dad decided to enlarge it and manage to hit a
few seepage lines. Unfortunately, he didn't know much about drainage lines
when he finished off, so now the floor usually has a trickle of water
running across it in all but coasal drought years. May or may not be an
issue, but it is why I've suggested sandside fill and absorption trenches
below container floow level.

3. Barometric variation and humidity in the air. Probably minor and a long
term problem. If you are in a humid area and run a furnace in the
basement, you could probably pump some hot air into the container and vent
it.The idea being that the warmer air will help take away humidty building
up in the container.






"Pax Americana is a philosophy. Hardly an empire.
Making sure other people play nice and dont kill each other (and us)
off in job lots is hardly empire building, particularly when you give
them self determination under "play nice" rules.

Think of it as having your older brother knock the *** out of you
for torturing the cat." Gunner
.