Development and installation of the hand pump

the folowing images show the development and installation of the hand pump.

Hand Pump and Bike Pump Experiment for Water Feature, Instillation.

Mike Gale(site Manager) and I arranged to meet in the car park at Mancetter Quarry, to set up the hand pump experiment. I wanted to see how much water pressure was needed and how high the water would flow for the instillation to work. As the water feature is going to be approximately 3 meters tall,  as I wanted to know if the hand pump would be efficient enough to work alone.

 My original idea is to use a bicyle coupled up to a water pump, to generate and produce the energy required to lift the water up and around the feature and backto its source the pond.

At the moment the Hand pump seems to do the job effectively, but I am still going to work further to develop the cycle pump idea. I would also like to incorporate both the hand and cycle pump together to improve the flow of water up to instillation, for futher interaction with the general public, (see diagrams and vidio clips enclosed,)

HAND AND BIKE PUMP EXPEREMENTAL NOTES

EXPEREMENT ONE the Hand Pump

1a           Mike Gale, Zone Manager of Tarmac, and I arranged to meet up at the quarry car park to set up the hand pump experiment by setting the ‘in and out’ flow pipes to the appropriate places on the hand pump, then a water hose was connected to the ‘in let’ hose and another one was placed into a bucket then pumping began, the ‘out let’ hose was attached to a high post set at approx. 3meters (the approximate height of the installation) to see if the hand pump would lift the water. It proved to work efficiently.

1b           The hand pump was taken to the installation site and tested. Unfortunately the hand pump ceased after a while, as the metal bearings inside the pump had rusted and it was discovered that the wrong pump had been ordered by Mike, so it was replaced with a plastic one.

1c            Once the new hand pump had been replaced testing began again on the Jubilee site , It took various attempts to position where the hand pump was to be placed, It was decided that a concrete slab be set into the ground so that the hand and bike pump could be attached to it for safety reasons.

 1d          A tripod frame made from recycled metal from a scraped road sign was fitted to the Hand pump, It was then installed on site by fixing it to the concrete slab with bolt screws.

1e          Overall the hand pump works realy well and I am pleased with the end result of the installation
EXPEREMENT TWO the Bike Pump

2a           I obtained a bicycle that was going to be thrown away, with a friend’s help we developed and adapted the bike and water pump to work via peddling to generate the energy required to lift the water up and over the Water Feature.

2b           The front and back wheels were removed and two frames were made using recycled metal from old road signs to the bike frame, then painted to stop rust from building up around the welds on the frames.

2c            A small hole had to be drilled into the pump shaft, and a pivot screw fitted to the spindle to enable it to be fitted to the gear sprocket on the bike. This was achieved by turning it on a lathe.

2d           After the water pump had been reassembled it was attached to the bike and tested by fitting the in- let and out -let hoses to the pump and the bike was then taken on site where further testing took place.

2e           Unfortunately the pump failed to work after a while, this was due to a split in the plastic casing, and the plastic ball bearings that kept the float working had ceased, which prevented the water being sucked up from the pond.  A non-return valve was fitted to the in-let hose, which allows the water to remain inside the hose which solved the problem of flow back.

 EXPEREMENT THREE (mark 2)

3a           The bike was taken back to the work shop where my friend replaced and adapted the new pump to fit the bike, again a hole and screw had to be fitted to the spindle to allow fixture to the gear linkage system of the bike.

3b           Having replaced the original plastic pump with one made from non-erodible metal which has been previously coated with a rust-resistant paint. The inside of the pump differs from the old one, as the new pump uses a float system instead of ball bearing, which has proved to have a better suction rate than the previous pump.            

3c            The bike was then taken back to the installation site, tested, which took a couple of attempts, but once primed the bike pump worked really well, it was then installed by screwing bolts into the concrete slab for safety reasons and stability.

Over all I am pleased with the results and I think the whole concept works well and I think the public will enjoy the interaction with the Water Feature, so far the reaction I have had regarding the Installation have been positive  and encouraging , the comments have been taken into consideration when installing the feature.

EXPEREMENT ONE, using hand pump.

1a   Mike set up the hand pump experiment, by attaching the in and out flow pipes.(see fig 1a.) Using a black plastic bucket full of water, that imitated the main water source. We then tested the hand pump (freely,which worked fine.)

1b   The outlet water pipe was then attached onto the lamp post, using plastic tie clips. Mike then started to hand pump, after a few adjustments to alter the height and position of the water pip, it began to flow out, at quite an impressive rate.( see vidio clip 2a)

1c   Mike then again hand pumped the water, which rose up to an effective height of approximately 3 meters, which generated enough power and pressure required for the water feature to work. It also looked appealing for the general public, as the flow out was really impressive. (See fig 1b.)

EXPEREMENT TWO. testing drillpump

 

2a   Mike coupled the cycle pump to the in and out flow pips, and then attached a cordless powered eclectric drill to the moater of the cycle pump. (See fig 1c.)

2b   After a few attempts, the cycle pump still refused to work. It decided that the cordless drill wasn't powerful enough to generate the power and pressure required to lift the water up the outlet pipe. (See fig 1d also video clip 2b.)

2c   This idea for adapting and using an electrical powered pump would not be adequate to lift the water required for the instalation to work properly, as the pump proved to be troublesome due to it having plastic parts which broke whist testing on site, so I asked Mike to order a new water pump which arrived and adapted to fit the bike, tested and works well (see Blog for further details)

CONCLUSION

After completing both experiments, I have decided that the Hand Pump works really efficiently, and then it was decided that a new bike pump was to be ordered and adapted, which was completed in June 2012. The second bike pump has proved to be more successful.

Both bike and hand pumps were installed on the Jubilee site at Mancetter Quarry, Atherstone, where they were both tested and work efficiently. The following images shows both pumps being adapted and fitted and installed on site. Though these experiments I found that certain stages proved difficult and had to keep priming the pumps until satisfactory results were obtained, which have now been resolved.