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Stealthy Water Pumps for the Outdoor Grower

Team Microbe

Team Microbe

Active member
Veteran
I wanted to share this video -

It's an off-the-grid water pump that doesn't need anything but 5'-7' of head - The Ram Pump


It's called a Ram Pump, and doesn't require any motor or electricity so you can use it off the grid. It pumps water up hill, so if your water source is below you can easily bring it up hill with this. Personally, I'm going to put something over the splashing water to muffle the noise, but I still think it'll be pretty quiet compared to some of the other types of pumps used out there. The advantage of this pump is obviously the fact that you only need gravity to operate it, and it's low levels of noise. The disadvantage is it's length of exposure - other pumps (like the Honda Wx-10) can move massive amounts of water in short periods of time, limiting the patch's chances of being compromised. The Ram Pump would be a good idea for someone with a site somewhere that wasn't frequented by hikers/hunters very often I think, because it requires more time to move water. As always of course, different locations call for different requirements... so it all depend on the land layout pretty much.


What do you guys think about this thing? Pretty genius, no?

Does anyone have any other stealthy pumps that can top this one?

If so please share below, I'd like this thread to potentially be a tool for outdoor growers/guerrillas who are in the market for a pump...
 
V

VonBudí

ヾ(⌐■_■)ノ
Veteran
vids broken

never had one but looked in to them, they can be pretty loud, that constant tick tick tick going 24/7 is going to draw some one in eventually. rife river pump and water wheel pumps are quiet and could be put somewhere discretely.
 
Team Microbe

Team Microbe

Active member
Veteran
Yeah I noticed that, I fixed it with a link instead ^


Water wheel pumps sound interesting, do they require anything like electricity?
 
J

Jhhnn

Active member
Veteran
VonBudí said:
vids broken

never had one but looked in to them, they can be pretty loud, that constant tick tick tick going 24/7 is going to draw some one in eventually. rife river pump and water wheel pumps are quiet and could be put somewhere discretely.
Click to expand...

Vid works for me.

Cool gizmo.

There are small fast creeks with a lot of vertical fall here in CO along the front range & on the western slope. They can be pretty noisy w/ falls & strong riffles, depending. A guy might be able to find check valves w/ rubber seats. Hell, it'd probably work to put the whole thing other than the tall standpipe just under water. Use an elbow on the water hammer valve & a short downhill pipe so that the end is in open air. An intake filter would def be required. If it would keep cycling w/o tinkering it'd make a terrific continuous drip system.
 
Team Microbe

Team Microbe

Active member
Veteran
Great advice Jhhnn! I didn't even think about placing it directly in the creek... rubber seats would be ideal for a set up outside of the water though. I bet you can even make something if worse comes to worse that would be similar to a seat for the valve...
 
GEMiNi GENETiCS

GEMiNi GENETiCS

Active member
.http://youtu.be/vaho7JSVS1I

If that link doesn't work search "How to make PVC pump" by king of random ... simple PVC tubes and one way valves .... quiet and efficient .... nice camp paint job and removable lines to keep irrigation lines away from the water source.
 
Team Microbe

Team Microbe

Active member
Veteran
GEMiNi GENETiCS said:
.http://youtu.be/vaho7JSVS1I

If that link doesn't work search "How to make PVC pump" by king of random ... simple PVC tubes and one way valves .... quiet and efficient .... nice camp paint job and removable lines to keep irrigation lines away from the water source.
Click to expand...

That guy is a NERD :laughing: but I love it, what an affordable option. No noise either, that's a big plus for gardens near civilization for sure.

Thanks Gemini :tiphat:
 
W

walkingstick

New member
the ram pump would work, but then again as others have said it can be loud. The little pvc pump is neat but will that actually be able to pump water up hill? That's a whole different ball game. Why not just buy a manually powered metal pump with a hand crank? I think its the same problem. Depending on how long your pipe or hose is plus how much of an incline from where your pumping the water, you end up trying to push gallons uphill, may become difficult.
 
Kygiacomo!!!

Kygiacomo!!!

AppAlachiAn OutLaW
walkingstick said:
the ram pump would work, but then again as others have said it can be loud. The little pvc pump is neat but will that actually be able to pump water up hill? That's a whole different ball game. Why not just buy a manually powered metal pump with a hand crank? I think its the same problem. Depending on how long your pipe or hose is plus how much of an incline from where your pumping the water, you end up trying to push gallons uphill, may become difficult.
Click to expand...

ya i was thinking the same thing..really depends on how far u gotta pump it and if its uphill or down hill is my guess on it..looks like i will just be doing it the ole fashion style 1 gallon milk jugs in hand :laughing:
 
GEMiNi GENETiCS

GEMiNi GENETiCS

Active member
walkingstick said:
the ram pump would work, but then again as others have said it can be loud. The little pvc pump is neat but will that actually be able to pump water up hill? That's a whole different ball game. Why not just buy a manually powered metal pump with a hand crank? I think its the same problem. Depending on how long your pipe or hose is plus how much of an incline from where your pumping the water, you end up trying to push gallons uphill, may become difficult.
Click to expand...
Its not that difficult to pump up hill depending on head height of your reservoir & water source. Distance is irrelevant unless we're talking thousands of feet as the flow of water will remain at a consistent pressure throughout the entire pipe.

In my case I will be using 100m of ½” poly to fill the reseviors with a head height of 20' above my plot...stream is 5-6' lower than my plot.

Hand cranks and foot pumps can work just as good. I like the PVC because its quick and easy to take apart to clean or replace anything. It can also be disassembled during transportation in & out of your plot to fit into a bag or to be more discrete.

I will be doing some in field testing and calculations with my PVC pump to figure out the GPM that is capable. First, how much water is moved per pump, head height limits, distance limitations. Due to the fact I will be using 1"-1¼” PVC feeding ½” poly it will increase the pressure and make it easier to move the water to my resevoirs.

There is also a larger 4" version of the PVC pump that moves 50gpm of water.
 
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