I am a beginner with a small orchard in a very dry and warm part of
France. The water supply is about 70 m away in a stream and 7 meters
lower.

I need advice on pumps, diesel I understand would be better as there is
no electricity supply anywhere near the orchard? Can pump head mean
two things, the depth from which the pump can pump, and the distance it
can supply? How much could I expect to pay for a pump? I also would
need to be able to either carry it, or load it into the back of a van...

Any comments or advice gratefully received



Pat

"pat" wrote in message
...
I am a beginner with a small orchard in a very dry and warm part of
France. The water supply is about 70 m away in a stream and 7 meters
lower.

I need advice on pumps, diesel I understand would be better as there is
no electricity supply anywhere near the orchard? Can pump head mean
two things, the depth from which the pump can pump, and the distance it
can supply?

Pump head means height it will pump to, no normal pump will pump from a
greater depth than about 30 feet although "deep well" non submersible
pumps use a venturi type system at the bottom of a well to do so.
Distance from pump to delivery point horizontally has little effect in
most installations.


--

Chris Thomas
West Cork
Ireland

pat wrote:
I am a beginner with a small orchard in a very dry and warm part of
France. The water supply is about 70 m away in a stream and 7 meters
lower.

I need advice on pumps, diesel I understand would be better as there
is no electricity supply anywhere near the orchard? Can pump head
mean two things, the depth from which the pump can pump, and the
distance it can supply? How much could I expect to pay for a pump?
I also would need to be able to either carry it, or load it into the
back of a van...

Hello Pat,

I don't have any direct experience with these but I do know a bit about
the physics!

When you think about it, you can't suck water up out of a hole to a height
of greater than 30 feet. That is because it is the air pressure which
pushes
the water up into the pump inlet and thence to the outlet. So the pump
needs to be located at the stream end. It would be best to arrange it so
that it will be easy to prime (fill the pump with water before starting
the
motor) to get the flow of water started.

You haven't said how much water volume you need so it will be difficult
to advise you about internal combustion engine driven or electric. I know
you said that there is no electricity near but those Honda (and others)
petrol-electric generator sets are affordable these days.

HTH
--
Graham W http://www.gcw.org.uk/ PGM-FI page updated, Graphics Tutorial
WIMBORNE http://www.wessex-astro-society.freeserve.co.uk/ Wessex
Dorset UK Astro Society's Web pages, Info, Meeting Dates, Sites & Maps
Change 'news' to 'sewn' in my Reply address to avoid my spam filter.

Graham W wrote:
pat wrote:

I am a beginner with a small orchard in a very dry and warm part of
France. The water supply is about 70 m away in a stream and 7 meters
lower.

I need advice on pumps, diesel I understand would be better as there
is no electricity supply anywhere near the orchard? Can pump head
mean two things, the depth from which the pump can pump, and the
distance it can supply? How much could I expect to pay for a pump?
I also would need to be able to either carry it, or load it into the
back of a van...


Hello Pat,

I don't have any direct experience with these but I do know a bit about
the physics!

When you think about it, you can't suck water up out of a hole to a height
of greater than 30 feet. That is because it is the air pressure which
pushes
the water up into the pump inlet and thence to the outlet. So the pump
needs to be located at the stream end. It would be best to arrange it so
that it will be easy to prime (fill the pump with water before starting
the
motor) to get the flow of water started.

You haven't said how much water volume you need so it will be difficult
to advise you about internal combustion engine driven or electric. I know
you said that there is no electricity near but those Honda (and others)
petrol-electric generator sets are affordable these days.

HTH
--
Graham W http://www.gcw.org.uk/ PGM-FI page updated, Graphics Tutorial
WIMBORNE http://www.wessex-astro-society.freeserve.co.uk/ Wessex
Dorset UK Astro Society's Web pages, Info, Meeting Dates, Sites & Maps
Change 'news' to 'sewn' in my Reply address to avoid my spam filter.

Thank you Graham.
So publ blurb that says a pump has a head of 7 m, that means the hight
difference between the surface of the water and the pump is max 7
meters? I have 10 fruit trees for the moment, and will possibly grow
small amount vegetables if I can sort out water supply, so I cant
imagine that I would need huge amounts o water, A thorough watering
once a week for the trees would be enough.
Pat

So if the catalogue says : total head 35 meters, thats the total hight
difference between the surface of the water and the pump, or between the
surface of the water and the water outlet from the pump at the other
end? And suction head would then mean the hight difference between
surface of the water and the pump?
This is fascinating

Pat

"pat" wrote in message
...
I am a beginner with a small orchard in a very dry and warm part of
France. The water supply is about 70 m away in a stream and 7 meters
lower.

I need advice on pumps, diesel I understand would be better as there is
no electricity supply anywhere near the orchard? Can pump head mean
two things, the depth from which the pump can pump, and the distance it
can supply? How much could I expect to pay for a pump? I also would
need to be able to either carry it, or load it into the back of a van...

Any comments or advice gratefully received



Pat

Lots of people I am sure will point out that pumps are better at building
pressure rather than sucking due to atmospheric pressure.
We use a pump for all our water, it is electric and maintains pressure in
the system all the time so that turning on a tap is just like a normal mains
supply. no use to you! with a diesel I would think the best option would be
some form of header tank raised above ground in the orchard so that the pump
does not have to cut in and out all the time. Use large bore pipes (32mm) as
thin ones cut the flow rates due to internal friction and turbulence. You
presumably will need some sort of small pump house near the water (keep the
pump as near the source as possible)
There is an alternative and that is to run the pipe up the stream bed until
it is higher than your orchard, water will then syphon out of the pipe
continuously without the need for a pump (you may need several hundred
metres of pipe though, a valve on the orchard end and a filter on the stream
end)
good luck

--
Charlie, gardening in Cornwall.
http://www.roselandhouse.co.uk
Holders of National Plant Collection of Clematis viticella (cvs)

Thanks to all of you. I am beginning to get the picture. Diesel pump,
next to the stream, pump up about 4 meters and fill a holding tank / and
or water the trees once a week... To get syphon effect, I have talked
to our neighbours, and it would mean a disctance of about 400 meters.
its all great fun anyway.

As to my email address.. hehe, I chose it as reference to my living in
the NorthEast ( no pun intended ) But i get the dutch meaning now

Patrick

On Tue, 12 Apr 2005 15:25:49 GMT, pat wrote:

I am a beginner with a small orchard in a very dry and warm part of
France. The water supply is about 70 m away in a stream and 7 meters
lower.

I need advice on pumps, diesel I understand would be better as there is
no electricity supply anywhere near the orchard? Can pump head mean
two things, the depth from which the pump can pump, and the distance it
can supply? How much could I expect to pay for a pump? I also would
need to be able to either carry it, or load it into the back of a van...

Any comments or advice gratefully received

Others have covered most things. Just one thing to add is to ensure
from the specification that whatever pump you use for delivery to your
irrigation system is specified to deliver the at the rate (litres/min)
and pressure required by the sprinklers etc that you plan to use (see
the sprinkler specs) and do as Charlie says bear in mind the friction
and turbulence losses that occur in small bore pipes - it will be very
noticable if you're moving water over any appreciable distance.

=================================================

Rod

Weed my email address to reply.
http://website.lineone.net/~rodcraddock/index.html