One of the biggest questions asked by skip renters is: do skips fill up with water? If yes, how to keep the water weight out of your skip? And what to do if water enters the skip?
Skips are open containers used for collecting domestic and commercial waste. They are mostly placed outside, without a cover so they can collect water. When you hire a skip for residential or commercial waste, you will be paying extra for heavy-weight garbage. In these instances, water-filled in skips ends up accounting for most of the extra weight.
So if you are wondering: do skips fill up with water, the answer is yes, they do. Water accounts for most of the weight in the skip but there are ways through which you can ensure that doesn’t happen. In this article, you will learn five tips to keep the water weight out of your skip and five things to do if your skip fills up with unwanted water.
Poole Skip Hire
Five Tips to Keep the Water Weight Out of Your Skip
If you have hired a skip in Poole, there are a few things that you can do to keep the water weight out of your skip, such as:
Don’t Throw Out Liquid Waste
One of the most obvious ways of keeping the water out of your skip is to avoid throwing in liquid waste. Many skips hire companies don’t allow most kinds of liquid waste to be put into skips. These liquids include battery acids, paints, chemicals, hazardous liquids like petrol, oil, and other toxic chemicals. Make sure all of your waste is dry and your skip is covered at all times, even when placed outside.
Dry Your Waterlogged Rubbish Before Putting It in The Skip
A less obvious way that water sneaks into the skip is via other items. For example, paper, cardboard, drywall, and other material waste that is put into the skips can often become waterlogged due to heavy rains and moisture. To prevent this from happening, dry your waterlogged garbage before putting it into your skips.
Other ways that material may be waterlogged is if you are cleaning up after a heavy storm, or if your house has been flooded and you need to get rid of the carpets and sodden gypsum. One way to make sure your skip remains free of water weight is by laying out these items in the sun to dry before you put them into the skip for disposal.
Cover the Skip to Prevent Rain from Getting in
The most common way that water sneaks into your skips is during heavy rain spells. Rain can come down quite quickly, and the majority of our skips are new so they don’t have any holes in them. We suggest covering it with a tarpaulin to prevent this from happening. Moreover, the skips can be placed in a covered area like a garage to ensure no water gets into the skip.
Know Where the Drain is
The reason the question of whether skips fill up with water is so common among skip renters is that most skips come with a drain at the bottom. When people hire skips, they tend to ask the company if the skips fill up with water and how to work the drains, in case it does. Knowing where the drain is located in the skip comes very handy when you are trying to get rid of accumulated water in the skip, instead of having to remove the water manually.
Be Careful About Releasing Toxins
If you keep the drain on your skip open to release the access water, be mindful of the other waste in your skips. When the excess water from the skip is released, it also takes many other toxins present in the waste along with it. You don’t want this toxic water to leak into your local waterways, therefore, make sure no toxic chemicals are interacting with the water when you drain it out. Another way to ensure no toxic water is released is by collecting the water from the skip in a bucket and using a wet-dry vacuum to remove any excess water from inside and around the skip.
Five Ways to Remove Water from Your Skip
If your skip has filled with water and you want to avoid paying for the extra weight on your skip, here are five tips to remove water from your skip without the help of a professional. [1]
Uncap the Drain
The easiest, fastest, and most convenient way for you to get rid of all the unwanted excess water from the skip is by locating and then uncapping the drain. The drain is usually located at the bottom of the skip and is easily accessible from the side of it. You can also ask your skip hire company for details on the drain and how to work it when you hire the skip.
Remove Debris from Under the Skip
Some old skips might not come with an inbuilt drain at the bottom but they might have a series of small holes or slots at the base of it. If your skip is unable to remove water from these slots, make sure that these holes aren’t blocked by any debris. Remove the debris using a stiff-bristled brush from above and below the slots, to allow for the water to pass out naturally.
Drill a Hole at the Bottom of the Skip
If you have bought a skip for yourself and it doesn’t have a drain installed within it, one way to make way for excess water to pass is by drilling small holes at the base of the skip. To increase the flow of water, you can play with the size and number of these holes. Remember that you cannot drill any holes in rented skips; only in the ones, you have bought.
Siphon Out the Water
If none of these steps works in your favour, the only option you are left with is to siphon the water using a hose. To do that, take a long piece of hose and fill it partly with water. Cover the hole of the hose with your thumb and release it in the rainwater in the skip. This way, the air pressure in the hose sucks the water out of the skip naturally.
Bail Out the Water
The last option is for you to manually remove water from the skip using a ladder and a bucket. This option requires a lot of elbow grease and can be dangerous, as the waste in the skip may contain sharp and hazardous objects.
In Conclusion
Guidance on Skip and container safety in waste management and recycling has been produced in consultation with the Waste Industry Safety and Health Forum (WISH). It does not aim to be comprehensive but gives examples of good practices within the industry. This guidance is for designers/ manufacturers, buyers, users and maintenance staff who work with skips and containers used with skip loader and hook loader vehicles. [2]
References
- Cleaning Up: Garbage Bin Ideas to Keep You Organised http://bluepackinc.com/2016/09/16/what-to-do-if-your-skip-fills-with-rainwater/
- Skip hire and waste transfer https://www.hse.gov.uk/waste/skiphire.htm