Lowe’s is having a sale on waterpumps (1/6 HP WaterAce). Price is $65. I called WaterAce to ask about the characteristics of it. Quiet. Yes. Pumps 10 gpm and can raise the water 10 feet. Pretty good.
Regulator?
No.
That presents a problem. 10 gpm is at least twice the action I need. I want water flowing down my desert stream, not a deluge in my basement? The lady I spoke with said she knows of no way to regulate it and has never heard of a water pump with a regulator on it (isn’t it fun talking to “knowledgeable” people?).
I’m gonna surf the web today to try & find what I need but I was wondering if there can’t be some way to regulate the flow coming out of the pump. That $65 is a nice price.
dav
Won’t just a valve on the output end restrict the flow and allow you to adjust it to only what you want?
Or, get a pump (no motor) and hook it up to a motor with a pulley arrangement. By changing pulleys, you can adjust the flow.
Another way. Have a small reservoir at the head (hidden), adjust gravity flow from the reservoir to the stream bed. The pump fills the reservoir and is controlled (on/off) by a fill switch. Maybe the layout needs a lake; use it for the reservoir.
10 GPM seems like a lot. Maybe a smaller one.
Make a large reservoir at the top. Normally, there is just a trickle flow, but every now and then there is a flash flood, just like in a real western stream bed.
Actually, having a changing flow rate might be a good idea; adds a little more interest to the stream.
It might also be useful to plumb some valves and a drain connection. Then the pump could be used to drain the whole thing. The water is going to get really foul after a while.
A little bleach will help, but stink.
John Kerklo
TCA 94-38455
www.Three-Rail.com
I suspect that this is a centrifugal pump. I wouldn’t be surprised if you can reduce the flow simply by putting a restriction, like a partially closed valve, in the pipe. I have never tried such a thing with a water pump; but I know that centrifugal air blowers are not at all harmed by doing that. In fact, the motor is unloaded. You can see an illustration of this with an ordinary vacuum cleaner: If you block the airflow with your hand, the motor speeds up noticeably. If you can get a demonstration of the pump, you can do the same test with it. Or just ask WaterAce.
OK Dave, you got me on this one, I have no experience here. So here is my totally off the wall idea, how about a dimmer switch??? I’m just not sure if it would harm the pump motor, but I don’t see why it would.
I’m still searching the web; lots of choices but none made specifically for my purpose. I even found a “free energy pump” for 3rd world countries. I believe it operates on a solar panel and pumps ground water up for irrigation. I also found a yin-yang pump, with the cool yin-yang symbol on it (like the Northern Pacific logo). They were sold out.
Problem w/pump is need to raise the water up about 8 feet but not produce a lot of volume; 2 seemingly contradictory things.
If I don’t find the pump I need, I’ll explore the valve options and try to speak to someone more knowledgeable than the person I spoke with. I will, once I get the pump, be sure to let you all know the results.
BTW, the dimmer switch is an interesting idea. Or, perhaps, some well-placed resistors.
Thanks
dav
The pump probably uses an induction motor, which doesn’t respond to a dimmer switch kind of control.
John Kerklo
TCA 94-38455
www.Three-Rail.com
The NP logo is called a MONAD.
OK so the dimmer idea is out. How about one of those hand crank fuel transfer pumps, and a pulley and motor arrangement like John suggested.
Elliot,
Sorry, but I was laughing when you mentioned hand crank. I conjured up this image of farmers drawing water with an Archimedes screw device.
John has some very interesting ideas worthy of experimentation!
dav
BTW, John’s reservoir idea is great! I’m going to be a little less than serious for just a moment. Directly above the layout is the bathtub. I visualize a Rube Goldberg-type system of piping from the tub to the layout. After taking a bath, the water flows down the pipes and into the layout and then exits the layout thru pipes in the house, going out to the tomato patch. From there, it gets filtered thru the soil and a solar-powered groundpump than rehoists it up to the tub again for fresh bathwater.
If you are going to go to all the trouble of having water, why not some fi***oo. Some minnows, to scale, would be a nice catch.
With some training, they could be made to jump over obstacles going upstream, just like salmon.
John Kerklo
TCA 94-38455
www.Three-Rail.com
Why not just put a drain in the floor under the layout, then put a valve on a fresh water source, and forget recirculation. [swg] If you wanted to you could just fill the tub, and tap into the drain. Just watch out for the building inspector, he WILL get you on this one.[:P][:O]
David,
It sounds like a sump pump (single-stage centrifugal) to me. 10 gpm is way too big for your application; typical flow out of a faucet is 2 gpm or less.
Throttling the flow with a valve on the outlet is possible, but the water that does not go to your stream will be recirculated internally in the pump. The energy used to recirculate the water will cause it to heat up, potentially to the point where a pump component will fail. If you go this route, don’t run the pump too long!
John’s idea of pumping to a reservoir and shutting off the pump with a float switch is excellent. I’d add a second float switch and overflow plumbing as backups. Maybe a water alarm, too!
Hi all, Try checking a pet store for a pond filter pump. They make several difffernet sizes. As I recall, it less than $65.00
tom
Chris, I don’t think in this application overflow is an issue, as it is a closed system. And just as I was typing that, I had a new idea. FI***ANK CIRCULATION FILTER AND PUMP. Quiet, inexpensive, good volume, and self filtering. Maybe we have been looking in the wrong direction.[:P] One possible problem here lift height. [:(]
Dang Tom, you snuck that in while I was still typing.[;)]
Chris,
Thxx for suggestions.
John’s reservoir idea wins! I just got off the phone with an Oxide water pump expert. If you purchase a 2gpm pump and try to pump the water up to the top of the layout, you actually will get just a trickle and it will place strain on the pump over time. GPMs are rated for horizontal flow.
He liked John’s idea of the reservoir at the top. He said the WaterAce at Lowe’s for $65 is a good deal. Well, I’ll be making a trip over there to pick one up and will let you know what happens.
I may get 2 usages out of that pump as well, because in the future, I’d like to build a pond outside with waterfalls and a G-scale train going around it.
thx all
dave
The fi***ank filter pumps I am familiar with don’t pump water, but air. The air moving through the plastic part in the tank carries water up to the filter. I don’t think it would work for eight feet.
I have seen pumps used for salt fi***anks, but they were expensive.
I would suggest evaporative cooler pumps, but in your neck of the woods, you probably never heard of them. They sit in the bottom of the cooler in a reservoir of water and pump up to the cooler pads. I don’t know about the eight feet, but they might work. More than one could be used. They are cheap, like $15.
But back to the fish.
A dump car on the train could be used to feed the fish. As they grow and get too large … dinner!
John Kerklo
TCA 94-38455
www.Three-Rail.com
John, there are actually two kinds of pumps for fi***anks. The kind that use air to run an under gravel filter, and for larger tanks a purification filter which does pump water.
Tom’s idea of the pond circulating pump may be the best so far. This may even be able to do the height you need. Back to Lowe’s or Home Depot, but look in the gardening section, not the plumbing.
The decorative pond pumps made by Beckett, Little Giant, and others are available in very small sizes with a flow that can be adjusted down quite low. These pumps are available at Lowe’s and Home Depot for a lot less than $65. I don’t know what kind of a head they can operate against. The “gotcha” with a lot of these pumps, and perhaps the Water Ace pump as well, is that they must operate submerged in order to cool the motor. I don’t know anything about your layout; if configuring your pump that way would be a problem, you will need a different solution.
Personal note: I had a very bad experience with the Water Ace pumps. I bought a 1/3 HP model for my basement sump. The impeller came off the first night and forced me to rush back to Lowe’s at 8:45pm or deal with a flooded basement. The second one lasted a few weeks before it did the same thing. This is not the kind of reliability I can live with in such a critical application! Hopefully the particular model you’re investigating would be more reliable. They look well-built enough.
Big_Boy_4005, some induction motors will run OK on a dimmer (aka solid-state speed control) especially if it’s made for the purpose, like the variable-speed controls that are available for bath and kitchen exhaust fans. Other induction motors may refuse to run at any speed other than zero or full, or may overheat. In my personal experience, it’s a trial-and-error thing.
I chkd on some aquarium pumps and they may not have the lift I need.
4 kitties,
I’m going to submerse the pump in a 5 gallon drywall mud container (if it fits). Sorry to hear your experience. Reliability, obviously, is important. Perhaps turning it on and off again and again might wear it out as the tank fills/empties?