A water tank will be installed in the house for drinking water. It will be supplied by a truck. And I like to always know the water level in the tank. The only way so far is to open the tank lid and look inside.

Instead, I like to have a way to just look and see the water level from the outside. There are a few electronic gadgets in the market that have indicator lights for 25%, 50 %, 75%, and 100% full, but I want something with no electronic or electric components. Just caveman technology.

So, here is my question : are there any TRANSPARENT pipes to attach to the tank that can show the water level directly without any gadgeteering.

Thank you

Yes, I remember seeing "water level indicator" of that type sometime ago, but they seem too short for this tank. Maybe they are made for smaller tanks. The tank in my house contains 2000 liters of drinking water. The vertical indicator pipe needs to be around 1.5 meters long.

I hate to breach a tank with a sight glass -- this creates a failure point.

Is this a translucent plastic tank? If so, putting a strong flashlight in direct contact with the tank usually makes the water level visible.

The super low tech method is to tap on the tank. The sound changes when you reach the water level.

No, the idea is to attach a vertical transparent pipe to the horizontal pipe coming out of the tank. Water level in this pipe will indicate the water level inside the tank.

A relative of mine did the same but using a transparent hose. Problem is that the hose was affected by sunlight and colour changed after a while. My problem is that change of colour may indicate change of chemistry. And this may indicate harmful stuff oozing off the hose into the water.

Why not add a small take-off valve to the main water line? You could open this and have thin, clear tubing attached to give you a level indication. Then you would close the valve so the tubing is not in continuous contact with the water stream.

You could add a pressure gage to your plumbing. You can even add some markers for the desired levels to the face.

I thought about adding a pressure gauge also, but if this is a gravity feed it would have to be designed for a very low pressure range -- a few PSI or the equivalent kPa. I'm sure they exist though.

That's what my relative did. Seems like the most probable option I have.

My handyman worker showed me picture of what looks like a clear gardening hose. I may ask him to buy it for me, and use it the way you described.

About an hour ago, I was making a cup of coffee. I looked, and on the side of the electric kettle was a semi-transparent strip with graduations of 2 cups, 4 cups ..etc. I wish water tanks had the same marking on their side.

I have the same issue. Using a 1100 gallon tank for house use and I still unscrew the lid and look down in it. There are a couple of ways to read the level that I haven't gotten around to installing yet, are using clear ridged tubing (polycarbonate is clear and has UV protection) installed into a tee fitting at the bottom of the tank. If you do this be sure to install a valve on top of the tee at the bottom of the tubing. Flip the valve open and read the water level, then close the valve to help eliminate the failure point of the tubing breaking and emptying the tank. The other would be easy to read from quite a distance from the tank. Use a float on the inside attached to a cable run through the top of the tank to a pulley with the other end attached to a weight outside the tank. As you fill the tank the weight will go down and as you use water the float will go down raising the weight. I have seen this done on very large tanks and it works. I hope this makes sense.