Water Pump

Do you have OCD or what?

Why would the answers be different this time from last time?

Does Guinness have a new category for most stubbornly unarithmetical question?

Sounds like a huge waterpark.

You must have a design budget?

Go onto the WWW and type in "FLYGT" and see your local supplier.

They supply pumps in all manner of sizes and this is easily inside their product range. They provided the pumps for the artificial whitewater course at the Sydney Olympic games.

The only "rider" on this is (and I'm not about to do the calcs) is whether 50kVA is enough energy to lift that amount of water through that height.

By the way, in relation to funding, I'd appreciate a 0.5% spotters fee for providing this information. You can contact me later with your bank account details. (This part is not a joke as some might believe.)

Don't pay it. This guy missed out on the basic arithmetic this time, too.

(Which must be a momentary lapse, because he is usually quite knowledgeable.)

(Please don't take this badly; I've occasionally eaten my foot, too.)

(I have used Flygt pumps before, but I didn't know they went that large.)

We have surplus pumps that can do Imperial Gallons 800m down in a flooded mineshaft.

If you can withstand a PH of 2 - 4 you may have it. (or what is left)

Power consumption = zero at the moment - well within 50 KVA

Can you please calculate how much Energy you need to do this?

Did you ask a pump vendor? What did they say?

Think you need to do more homework!

(ups did I just say that?)

GA, aurizon. This guy is over unity by a factor of 100 or more. Is this some kind of record for CR-4?

Ed Weldon

I laughed when I first seen the original post, and reading the responses I was greatly entertained.

Then I read yours, then I started thinking. you bastard aurizona. and your right about the calculations....they are gross.

Ok, so because of that I'm going to share it with you what you made me start.

I'm adding more grossness to it, and not even calculate material thicknesses, size, valving or the massive foot print.

What if you do not use an electric pump to pump the water. but to prime the system.

And design a Siphon type of process. of course you would have to have it circulate alot more that 20,000 GPM, (30-40 times as much ?, now that is gross) and tap off the 20,000 GPM, of course you would run into problems of water supply and what to do with they water used on the down side........but that was not specified in the scope.....now was it.

And of course priming it would take a veerrry loonnng (coffee break) time.

It will not run for long as you keep tapping off the 20,000 gpm, your downside will ever decrease the effects of the siphon (the up lift), but that also was not specified in the OP scope either, as well as performance.

what else did I miss here......oh yeah, to build it, it will bankrupt your fancier, I mean your financier. I am glad that the budget was unclear.

p911

Everybody is still saying what the text books said…. Can we throw them away for a bit PLEASE?? I received this on another forum…"What if there was a way to create some kind of vacuum at the top of the 100 to 200 metre pipe acting as a suction to draw up the water while at the same time complementing it with a pump at the bottom of the pipe. For argument sake lets say the total allowed power is increased to 100kw. Any ideas?? Comments?? What is the strength of vacuum that can be generated by the extra 50kw?? What if non returning valves were placed at intervals all along the length of the 100 to 200 metre pipe to reduce the weight of water being pumped up? Ideas?? Questions?? Comments??

To what exact height can a 50kw pumping mechanism pump 20,000 gallons per minute of water to?? 1metre? 2 metres??

This is even sillier than than the original question. The most that a vacuum can "suck" water upward is 34 feet (~10.4 m). Check valves in the line do not decrease the weight of water between them. The maximum vacuum is 760 mm Hg ≈ 34 feet ≈ 10.4 m, as mentioned before. Extra kw may allow a more rapid approach to this maximum, but it does not increase the maximum. Vacuum technology is less efficient than simple pumps, anyway, and therefore requires more kw. Throw away the textbooks--are you kidding? And you claim to be a mechanical engineer? Good grief.

I also like to add one thing about check valves is that it adds quite a obstruction to the flow.

throw away the textbook? wtf......I think what you should do is actually open one up.Start with pre-algebra and eventually move up to physics.

Ok I'll talk your language. You can use the transporter prop from the star trek movie. ....you know the one where they transported the whales...Thats not in a text book.......and transport the water to the top....

About 3 meters, depending on the efficiency of the pump.

The use of the word "exact" in your question is weird.

(One more wild guess, and you would have been close.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archimedes'_screw

If this will o' the wisp were true, it would make pumped hydroelectric storage a massively over-unity system. So there is a greater incentive than water parks. I hope the poor OP doesn't waste another 20 years of his life on this wild goose chase.

A basic calculation tells me that you need a minimum 3 MW motor to run this pump. Whereas you can have a motor of this rating, but your second condition of the question cannot be met under any circumstance. Even the no load losses of this motor will more than your specified energy consumption figures. Secondly, you may have to run the motor with a starting gear which will have its own energy consumption.

BBRaina

Let's work out how much energy you need using E = mgh & P = E/time

m = 20000 gallon/min = 1500kg/sec, g = 9.8m/s², h = 200m therefore E ≈ 3MW

Multiply that by some efficiencies and you'll need (guess) a 6MW electrical supply.

Someone has mentioned Flygt.

You could also try flowserve, Weir, KSB or even Caterpillar who do large firepumps but they may only do diesel powered. i do not have their contacts to hand but they are all on the net.

I believe that a peristaltic pump will best suit your needs.

Lol 20,000 gpm at 300 to 600 feet of lift

What is your power source? Maybe you're asking the wrong question. Instead of trying to perform an impossible act, maybe you should be asking for advice on other means of generating enough power to drive this massive pump. With unlimited funds you could set up a sweet array of wind turbines.

The energy consumption is pretty well fixed, it takes a certain amount of energy just to lift the water at the specified flow rate against the specified head, then you can figure losses between the motor and pump (pumps alone have efficienciesrange from the 40s to about 92, typically in the mid 80s is preferred design operating points) such that you might get a total efficiency for pump and motor in the mid 70% to 80% range (depending on operating points on curve). You can not move water without the energy input. You would need a minimum energy input just to move the water, of about 1340 kW with 325 feet of lift and 30 feet of system pressure (this is just the energy that must be imparted to the water, more needed for the system losses in motor and pump). No matter the pump, you will always need that minimum energy just to move that water. So unless you augment the electrical supply somehow, you can not do it.

If you can find the energy, then I would suggest go to any pump supplier, there are many-Gould, Cascade, Flygt, Floway, etc.. the system design requirements such as low flow needs, pressure, peak delivery, etc. would be necessary. Depending on site, you may have other considerations such as pump control, vfds, multiple or specialized pumps (though 20,000 gpm is not very much flow, about 45 cfs), you can go to a engineering firm like AECOM to get those designed. Bosserman and Tchobanoglous, two of the authors of the standard Pump design Text were employee and AECOM (formerly Metcalfe Eddy and Boyle Engineering) publishes their products still. Just going to be a series of centrifugal pumps.

Yes, but the falling water could be harnessed to produce all the energy to run the pump, and then some.

more energy out of moving water up hill than you put in, now that would be a trick. I think you have jsut solved the worlds energy problems.

No No No. You have it backwards. There is more energy in the falling water than it takes to pump it up. The other would be over unity. And we all know that is impossible.

I think you dont need design anything.Did you try any supplier?

A supplier will only supply a pump not the control structures, valves and other ancillary components. Plus they could never pump the water for the energy he is desiring, though they would likely try to sell him a pump system with a limitation on the guarantee.

Everybody is still saying what the text books said…. Can we throw the books away for a bit PLEASE??I received this on another forum…"What if there was a way to create some kind of vacuum at the top of the 100 to 200 metre pipe acting as a suction to draw up the water while at the same time complementing it with a pump at the bottom of the pipe. For argument sake lets say the total allowed power is increased to 100kw. Any ideas?? Comments?? What is the strength of vacuum that can be generated by the extra 50kw?? What if non returning valves were placed at intervals all along the length of the 100 to 200 metre pipe to reduce the weight of water being pumped up? Ideas?? Questions?? Comments??

To what exact height can a 50kw pumping mechanism pump 20,000 gallons per minute of water to?? 1metre? 2 metres??

Okay, so what is this? A locks that doesn't go anywhere, or something else? Price = ??

here is more - I hope the translation is still present: http://www.reisimpressies.eu/belgie-scheepslift.htm enjoy. D

That's the most amazing floating wetdock I have ever seen. Is there hidden behind it a canal that conveys the boats over to yonder hill?

you have a sealed mind. The mind of a man who believes he knows it all, BECAUSE he has read it all. great ideas need minds of people who wish to write the books for guys like you to read. You would be great to keep things running as you obviously are horrible at starting it running. No offence meant, just how I've percieved your comments

That might have been sort of relevant as a reply to my post 28. But it has nothing whatsoever to do with post 35. Either way, your post is both false and stupid. Your idea violates some really simple facts of physics, and therefore you will never get it to start running, nor to keep it running. But if you want to waste another 20 years on it, far be it from me to stop you.

Dedayomi: We all have dreams, some can be fulfilled, some not yet. Your idea will need to wait until the earth loses some gravity. Pumping the quantities within your proposed budget is not achievable. But don't give up. Maybe there are other opportunities if we get to know all the details.

We all have dreams, some can be fulfilled, some not yet.

just be aware.....some dreams are not all good. some dreams turn out to be nightmares.

I appreciate your response. The fact is that I know all the basic physics theories but I just cant help the feeling that we're all missing something....... Its like just out of touch... there...somewhere... somehow.. You see its not about the number of pumps used, or the particular method used, its about keeping the power consumption to the barest minimum

You say that you "know all the basic physics theories." Then please share your knowledge by showing your calculations of how 20,000 gpm can be pumped 100-200 m vertically upward with 20-50 kw. Hidden calculations are not honest unless you furnish them later.

how I honestly wished that question deserved an answer...! How I wish!!! Isn'tthat why you've been writing for the past week or so?? If it was part of any basic theory even a @**skull like you would know it!

Actually, barest minimum is an incorrect statement, you are asking for power consumption substantially below the minimum necessary just to lift the water (not a question of efficiency).

... Sure!..so maybe the question is what is the barest minimum as we know it now and how can we beat that?? by that I mean reduce it even if by 1 watt, if someone can think of a way to reduce this "barest minimum" by 1 watt then maybe it would open other minds as to ways of reducing it further....

Forget about the work rate (i.e. power) for a while just consider the quantity of work. The barest minimum is = mgh
you cannot do it with less. With improvements in efficiency you can get close to that quantity, but, you cannot do any better.

Wouldn't it make more sense to put a booster pump in line, around the 1/2 to 2/3 mark instead of making one pump do all the work. The second pump would surely take some work load off of the first pump......of course the pumps would have to be sized properly...my 2 cents

You might look into some of the pumps that are feeding irrigation systems off of the Snake and Columbia rivers in the Pacific Northwest.

I don't know if they match your specs, but they push a lot of water over the hills to farmland all over eastern oregon, washington, and idaho.

Here is another problem for you if you solve the OP one.

Gold from sea-water. There is a large amount of gold dissolved in the oceans.

The problem is the dilution.

The energy cost required to pump the water up 1 meter exceeds the value of this gold, yet the amount of gold is enormous.

from wiki

The world's oceans contain gold. Measured concentrations of gold in the Atlantic and Northeast Pacific are 50–150 fmol/L or 10-30 parts per quadrillion. In general, Au concentrations for Atlantic and Pacific samples are the same (~50 fmol/L) but less certain. Mediterranean deep waters contain higher concentrations of Au (100–150 fmol/L) attributed to wind-blown dust and/or rivers. At 10 parts per quadrillion the Earth's oceans would hold 15,000 tons of gold^[43]. These figures are three orders of magnitude less than reported in the literature prior to 1988, indicating contamination problems with the earlier data.

A number of people have claimed to be able to economically recover gold from sea water, but so far they have all been either mistaken or crooks. A so-called reverend, Prescott Jernegan ran a gold-from-seawater swindle in the United States in the 1890s. A British fraudster ran the same scam in England in the early 1900s.^[44] Fritz Haber (the German inventor of the Haber process) did research on the extraction of gold from sea water in an effort to help pay Germany's reparations following World War I.^[45] Based on the published values of 2 to 64 ppb of gold in seawater a commercially successful extraction seemed possible. After analysis of 4000 water samples yielding an average of 0.004 ppb it became clear that the extraction would not be possible and he stopped the project.^[46] No commercially viable mechanism for performing gold extraction from sea water has yet been identified. Gold synthesis is not economically viable and is unlikely to become so in the foreseeable future

Are there any areas that have heavier concentrations of gold? The thought of plating comes to mind. Would it be possible to use localized electric probes (low voltage) to transfer the gold to cathodes?

I think the comments/ comparison to gold in the ocean is trivialising the whole exercise. The fact is I feel maybe we're missing something somewhere, maybe a combination of all these factors (vacuum pumping, peristaltic pumps, multiple pumps usage, etc etc can lead to a situation whereby the total energy used in pumping up water reduced to a minor fraction of what is used as we all know it now....

..... is there anything that could be done to the water to make it lighter so the pump's work load is reduced? Of course this needs to be done with as little poweras possible...

Boiling it would make it less dense, but the weight would still be the same. The power required to do this would be much greater than the pumping power, which is already adverse. Sorry, no joy in that approach, either.

Can a solar powered pump do this work? using solar energy?? What would be the constraintsis there any solar power /pump company that may be recommended??

Sure if you have the land available to develop a sufficiently large enough solar array, and depending on the configuration can operate the pumps during day light hours and provide storage for the non-daylight periods plus overcast and low energy days.

You'd need about 12,000 square m² of solar panels at a cost of about $20,000,000.

Could you please give more details about your estimation and costs??is it based on facts/experience. Could you kindly expantiate further?? and could you recommend a REPUTABLE firm/company that I can talk to on developing the solar alternative or at least examine this option further??.The funding is not really an issue if we're assured of desired results. Thanks

20,000 US gallons per minute = 1262 litres per second = ~1262 Kg per second

energy required = mgh = 1262 x 9.81 x 200 = 2,476,044 joules per second

which is 2,476,044 Watts

solar panels are at best 20% efficient so you need 5x 2,476,044 watts of insolation

= 12,380,220 watts of insolation

You'll be very lucky to get 1KWatt of insolation per square metre so that's

12,380 m² of solar panel

It turns out that the above estimate is probably an underestimate: solarbuzz reckons you will pay about $4 per watt

So that's about $50 million.

I haven't factored in the efficiency or cost of the pumps.

There is also the efficiency for solar radiation received, even just in the western US this varies widely from a place like Pheonix to someplace like Seattle. The difference in latitude, the days of overcast, etc. all impact efficiency. Let alone extending this to some place like India. Then there are efficiencies of power transmission, control and storage, temporary storage to provide supply relative to demands, etc. that effect sizing of systems and cost. Best I think you can really estimate is the magnitude of the cost between $10 million and $100 million.

Hello dedayomi,

A novel and very simple positive action pump designed for large volume and high head was developed some years ago.

This pump involves having gas pressure force liquid.

The extremely high pressure forces of some gasses at very little heat is long been researched, plus heat may be sourched from electric element.

Should you know of the bar pressure needed to raise one litre of water to a 300 meter head figures can be supplied much quicker.

Most interesting post.

Off to do research.

Cheers

Peter

Hello dedayomi,

Your thread does have me captivated.

Research, it takes one pound pressure to raise a collum of water 2.304 feet.

200 meters is 650 feet. 650 pound pressure is required to raise water from bottom to top.

650 pound is 45.77 Bar.

Reactive gasses can easily supply that pressure for very little heat.

Gas flow volume would need be 333.3r gallons per second. Cooling the gas to start temperature also needs take place in that time.

A temperature difference of 6 degrees in Carbon Dioxide gas supplies all pressure needed.

The power draw on an electric element to acheive the heating is unknown.

Cheers

Peter

No matter what it always takes at a minimum, minus the efficiencies losses (and gas systems have huge efficiency losses), γQH divide by some conversion factor for units (E.G. 550 for Horsepower) of power to move the water. If H is 650 feet, Q is the flow rate in cfs, γ is 62.4 pcf the unit weight of water, then the minimum power to move the water can be calculated. This minimum can not be circumvented.

Hello RCE

Thank you for your reply. Sorry I not understand your figures.

My work is in supplying gas pressure to pump water.

333.33r gallons of water per second are required at a head of 200 meters.

This would require a working gas pressure of 45 bar.

I gallon of recyling gas per second is needed to raise one gallon of water per second to a 200 a meter head.

The elecrtrical wattage needed to raise the temperature of 333.33r gallons of gas 5 degrees Celsius in one second, I am hoping to find out.

Should such be under 50 megawatts then we are laughing.

Cheers

Peter

The equations I presented are just the base power demand to lift water, without efficiency losses. this doesn't count losses in electrical systems, energy transfer to mechanical systems and frictional losses in the mechanical systems themselves (i.e. gas lift systems are mechanical lifting also).

Hello RCE

Fully agree with you.

My interest in the post come from having gas force a hydro turbine to generate electricity.

Conventionaly heat for the boiler comes natural or by fuel.

I be absolutely lost to know how much electricity is required by a heating elelement to increase by 5 degrees the temperature of 1 litre Carbon Dioxide every second.

Base temperature of 30* C raising to 35* C.

Once that is known the Kwa of the water pumping is easily calculated.

Cheers

Peter

Well the C_P,m for CO₂ is 36.94 J/mol-K, and the C_V,m for CO₂ is 28.46 J/mol-K. You will need the operating pressures to calculate the energy required to raise the temperature 5 K. Because energy transfer efficiencies are better into more highly pressurized gases, i would assume you would want the pressure as high as possible for your system to absorb the heat as fast as possible thus requiring the heating element use less electricity per mole of CO₂ heated. Knowing the molar flow rate and the temperature change you can estimate the joule energy required, which is an easy conversion to kW. As for the rate of transfer of energy, CO2 is well defined in chemical engineering literature, research it as a coolant and that should provide some curves on the energy transfer rates relative to pressures and elements used.

Hello RCE,

My sincere thank you for the information, I see you are quite well learned. However I personaly have no understanding to matters of which you speak.

It may be that you be of greater assistance than I to the poster. The attached possitive action pump operating on two one way valve and a floating sphere is Open Technology free to copy.

This we get into operation by heating the Co2. Cooling is acheived by Co2 depressurisation at exhaust.

The attached is working example. The pressure data supplied is not one however that we have yet had it working at, and figures are entirely the pressure to heat value so obtained from the Internet. The electricity production is by California University school of hydro electric power generation using an 80% efficient turbine.

Thank you again.

Cheers

Peter