After doing some design work and spending time creating the first test wheel I have a working model. This one is just the first test and I have already made several changes to the design to make the wheel work better. In this video you can see the wheel working and how fast it spins. I time the RPM’s and find that the wheel goes 8 revolutions in a minute.
The next step it to place the tube on the wheel and get this thing pumping. That update will come soon.
I have now added the tube to the wheel and started to get some pumping results. The wheel base needs some adjusting to make it efficient and allow it to turn with the weight of the water in the tube. check out the update:
I have purchased the needed items to make the double wheel. Here is a picture of the progress:
Hello Seth,
I’ve seen some other videos about the water wheel pump, but i find that yours looks better and more practical. I tried to get your ebook about this pum but in vai. If you could please tell me how i can get more details about building it.
Thanks.
Hello and thank you for your interest in my pump design. Sadly I became distracted with other projects and did not finish building this one. I know that it works but I need to make several changes to make it work better. The ebook is unfinished because I have not finished getting the results that I want and need to make the pump complete. At this point all that I have is the couple videos. My main changes in design would be to lift the front and back of the legs to allow better water flow. Next make the wheel a double sided to allow for longer paddles. I do hope to get this project finished someday but for right now its been pushed back a bit.
Hello again i hope you good luck with your new projects and that you well get back as soon as possible to your pump.
Hi Seth,
Cool design!
Do you use a bearing for the wheel hub?
Is there an easy way to design the hub ?
Thanks.
Thank you! I have not put that much thought into this project actually. A berring would sure help with the friction. I have moved on to much more elaborate projects but I will revisit this one at some point.
I also go back an forth between different pump approaches – ram, spiral, direct lift, low rpm attached pump and sometimes away from thinking about water wheel pumps. At the moment, back on spiral pumps for situations where we have quite a bit of water, but not much head.
Thanks for the last picture of the double sided wheel prototype – I’ve watched the videos several times, but hadn’t noticed the image before.
Is there anyway that those of us currently interested in spiral water wheel pumps at the moment, could communicate with each other? Any good discussion forum topics? Is anyone selling plans, kits or links to products like the coupling and paddles? Perhaps post here if interested.
Dave
I have not thought about this old project in a while. I had plans on making a floating pump that would be made from pvc. One that was easy to make and cheap. Not sure if there are any forums on the spiral pump.
Does anyone have links to good statistic charts for ram, spiral and direct lift water wheel pumps? In someways the pumps do not put out much water per unit of time compared to electric, gasoline and perhaps solar pumps. However, after figuring in that the ram, spiral and direct lift water pumps run 24 hours a day with no fuel cost – that’s a different story.
We are trying to irrigate a large garden from a stream in the bottom of a meadow area. Quite a bit of water, 1 foot head fairly easy, we’ve done 2 foot head for diversion dams, but that is quite a bit more work and at the moment has to be redone each year.
No electricity and a hassle and expensive to fill gasoline pumps for a few hours run time..
Anyone in similar situations?
If you are able to get 2 feet of head you should be able to install a stand pipe with supply line and use a ram pump with the extra head pressure.