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Post by silverdragon on Dec 6, 2014 10:20:39 GMT
I keep a pond, and as part of that, I need to keep a filter to keep the water clean.
The filter is above water level by about two foot, its doing 1,00 gallons per hour flow rate on a 4,000 gallon plus pond.
Return to pond is through a pipe...
I am wondering, is that enough of a head to consider putting in a water wheel....
If I could use the return flow to generate power, can I increase the flow rate through the filter beds.
And how.
Is it worth generating electricity, or should I just go for a pure mechanical approach....
Thoughts please?....
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Post by the light works on Dec 6, 2014 14:21:40 GMT
I keep a pond, and as part of that, I need to keep a filter to keep the water clean. The filter is above water level by about two foot, its doing 1,00 gallons per hour flow rate on a 4,000 gallon plus pond. Return to pond is through a pipe... I am wondering, is that enough of a head to consider putting in a water wheel.... If I could use the return flow to generate power, can I increase the flow rate through the filter beds. And how. Is it worth generating electricity, or should I just go for a pure mechanical approach.... Thoughts please?.... you are talking about an unpressurized filter where water is pumped into the system and flows out by gravity? (otherwise head is irrelevant, it is pump pressure that matters) you can recover some of the energy of the water. however... your fall is really only enough to fit an undershot wheel; and your flow is probably not going to be enough to develop more than a couple watts of energy. that would mean your best bet would be to direct drive an archimedes screw if you wanted to pull the water up to the filter. you might also make yourself a ram pump (a pump driven by water hammer, we have a thread talking about it somewhere here) fed directly from the pipe. however, anything you do will basically be a curiosity. |
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Post by GTCGreg on Dec 6, 2014 15:09:46 GMT
Did you really mean 100 gallons per hour or 1000 gallons per hour? Assuming 100% efficiency, which you will never get, 100 gallons per hour at a 1 foot head would give you about 0.28 Watts. 1000 gallons per hour would yield about 3 Watts. You can check the calculations here but you have to convert gal/hour to M 3/s The answer is in kW so you have to divide that by 1000 to get Watts. www.engineeringtoolbox.com/hydropower-d_1359.html |
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Post by the light works on Dec 7, 2014 0:15:22 GMT
Did you really mean 100 gallons per hour or 1000 gallons per hour? Assuming 100% efficiency, which you will never get, 100 gallons per hour at a 1 foot head would give you about 0.28 Watts. 1000 gallons per hour would yield about 3 Watts. You can check the calculations here but you have to convert gal/hour to M 3/s The answer is in kW so you have to divide that by 1000 to get Watts. www.engineeringtoolbox.com/hydropower-d_1359.html wow. I was pretty optimistic in my estimate. |
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Post by GTCGreg on Dec 7, 2014 1:31:52 GMT
I was thinking your guesstimate was probably pretty close until I ran the numbers. But when you think about it, 100 gallons per hour isn't much more than a trickle and then at only a 1 foot head. Not much there to work with.
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Post by the light works on Dec 7, 2014 4:14:01 GMT
I was thinking your guesstimate was probably pretty close until I ran the numbers. But when you think about it, 100 gallons per hour isn't much more than a trickle and then at only a 1 foot head. Not much there to work with. yeah, under 2 GPM. I used to could pee faster than that. looking closer, he wrote 1,00; so I'm guessing he had a keystroke not take - which means my 2 watts is close to the 1000 GPH he probably meant. |
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Post by silverdragon on Dec 8, 2014 7:41:14 GMT
Go back to 1,000 gallons per hour.
The main all year pump is a Blagdon Force Hybrid that is capable of over 1,000 gallons per hour, and during summer, I run two pumps, to two separate filters, to get enough filtration to keep the water 'gin clear'.
Yes its expensive... but they are Koi carp.
The main filter is a mechanical filer the size of a decent bath tub and a filter bed.
Thanks for the maths and links, I may take a look at them...
I have a small ultra energy efficient 12 volt pump that I may use if I can.
It does a few hundred gallons per hour....
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Post by wvengineer on Dec 18, 2014 19:28:40 GMT
Basic conservation of energy like we talked about so much on the old board. In this case there is just too little potential energy there to be worth exploiting. I'm getting 6 to 8 watts of power is possible to being generated.
I think you would be better served to install your 12v pump on a solar panel. It is probably cheaper than a dyno would be for that setup.
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Post by silverdragon on Dec 19, 2014 13:14:49 GMT
Just to mention, I am looking at that solar panel idea, but "Direct drive"...
I have no intention of battery backup, more of a let it work during the day and run out at night.
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