In expectation of another blistering summer... I'm thinking of pumping water from a stream in our garden to water the veg beds.
I naively assume I could bodge a hosepipe onto a £50 solar powered pond pump, to fill a water butt.
Would need to lift water about 3 to 4 metres.
Any recommendations? Or advice on what power pump I would need please?
House deeds say that we have the right to take the water. Am not planning on creating a water feature or anything very thirsty. Our part of the country does not exactly suffer droughts regularly.
The previous house owners installed a water meter, and cut it off from the local spring source. Thanks for that.
Cheers
*off piste
What sort of drop do you have in the stream, ie any small waterfalls or lips etc.
If so check out a homemade hydraulic ram pump, using only some copper plumbing fittings, pipe and 2l coke bottle I was able to use a the drop of a 3ft high garden wall to pump water above a 2 storey house using only the water flow from the wall itself. (Invented/discovered by the Montgolfier brothers , as in ballon pioneers)
I just followed a simple diy plan on tinternet, and got all the bits from b&q, can’t find the example I followed many years ago, but an example below
*it seems you need a min drop of a foot to get one to work
https://lackancottage.co.uk/building-and-installing-a-ram-pump/
Thanks Towzer 👍
Ram Pumps are really interesting techbology. I did consider them but thought our gradient was inadequate.
But it sounds like our 'drop' is about the same as yours. So mmaybe I'll give it a try. If I get around to it...
Thanks for the history facts too.
There's probably and obvious answer (like my garden is above the house) but is the 'usual' filling the water but from a drainpipe not simpler? We have them on all corners of the house (and the garage and the greenhouse) and I use a pump and hose to move water to where it is most needed.
Also be aware that in theory taking water from a stream needs a licence. Won't matter for a bit of gardening but if you were setting up a larger irrigation system or household water use it might be required.
You only need a licence for more than 20m3 a day. That's a lot of water - certainly more than OP will need for his veg beds.
Why not something like this. Pumps up to 16ft height.
Well that confused me. Wasn't sure what aspect of a pump track could be solar powered!