My latest invention - now what?

[murilo]

Jon,
if I find something that may be helpful, I'll send you la informacion, ok?
Would you sell this project? (it's already an working stuff!)
Best!
M

[Jon J Hutton]

Murilo,

What a compliment, but no it is not for sale, and at this stage i am not accepting investors. Just wise input from this forum.

gracias

Jon

[Jon J Hutton]

Had a spare moment, here is another video where we were in the first testing stages of this pump. Here it is turning around 400 rpm the square pipe is 17 by 10 inches using a 1/2 drill. We later discovered that we could cut the weight in half with the same output.

http://youtu.be/1qshaHCsJ-I

[murilo]

Jon,
as you know I have some experience deep in the country affairs.

Many times was amazing to see what guys would do far away in forest and under other rough emergency conditions.

As you said to have problems with plastic supply, I remembered that old truck tires are huge, cheap and strong material to some works, mainly in replacements.

They are very easy to detail technical 'sculptures' with sharp or heated tools!
With some more means rubber can be glued and joined.

Just 2 cents!
Best!
M

[Jon J Hutton]

Murilo, thanks for your 2 cents....really not a bad idea. I have looked on the internet on that idea and also using home made plastics. Probably what I will end up doing is having the heart of the pump which is very light weight molded out of durable plastic in the states and then shipping it down here. I recently found a crate company that will ship boxes to my door here in Guatemala at a decent price. I am doing another project to raise money for our school here. I am making old fashioned clothes wringers, and instead of clamps I am using rubber from tire innertubes. I really want to get this pump up and turning a profit because it shows the most potential.

Just received word from the machinist that the pump is all together. All they need is a v-belt. The v-belt is to slow it down to about 1200 rpm's from 3630. I am using a 2hp motor rated at 80%. That cuts down the max gpm at 6 feet down to (2 x 33000 x .8 = 52800 pounds per min. divided by 8.33704 (weight of 1 gal of water) =6333 at 0 head, but I will be pumping up 6 feet so that would be divided by 6 = 1055 max gpm, Minus pump eff. minus loss from pipe flow. To be honest I do not understand how in the world other pump manufacturers do their rating. They show a horrible gpm flow and yet rate their pumps with eff ratings in the 80 - 90 percentile. This does not make sense to me. At a specific amp draw take that number times volts gives you watts used to pump so much water-then take watts divided by 745.69 for hp which is pounds per foot per minute. I must be missing something.

I am looking for the v-belt today. I am going to build the tank out of wood and a plastic liner for the test, I am going this route because there are some cattle ranchers in the area that are interested in this pump, most can not read let alone cipher using the v-weir method. The tank will measure 8'x 8'x12-16" deep of water. That will give me about 500 gallons of water. I will float a large tank on the water and turn on the pump for 30 seconds then divert the water into the floating tank for 1 minute and take a measurement. As the floating tank fills it will displace the water being used by the pump keeping the water at the same level at the pump intake. We are going to be using the lot next door to the machine shop. Hopefully I will have news for you soon on gpm/amp draw. For height the test will be a bit more complicated but not difficult. For exact measurements and constant flow I will probably be using the v-weir method. But, I can get very close by using radius squared times pi times depth of water in the tank.

More later.

Jon

[murilo]

Jon,
if I can be of any help, pls just tell!
Best wishes!
M

[Jon J Hutton]

Thanks Murilo, hopefully everything will go smoothly. Can't wait to actually start with production. So far it has been a life long research project....or so it seems.

Jon

[Jon J Hutton]

Just an update nothing earth shattering. Finally found the v belt style b seems everyone has a's here. Took me several days to find the bondo putty to plug the leaks in the metal case. I am a bit concerned about the resistance of the heart of the project because the machinist didn't use reset bolts to attache the shaft, he used 6 - 3/8 bolts with hex heads. It will be spinning at 1200 - 3600 rpm's. I will see. It is not a big thing to take the pump apart to replace them with recessed bolt heads but it means another trip to the city which means another day. We are doing a pretest in a 55 gallon drum. I will show pictures and video. Just bought a nice rpm meter, but it is the type that you have to touch to the actual shaft not the fancy optical. We are 50 years behind here in many aspects. I also have a kilowatt meter that I will be doing for the test. Looking forward to next week to start getting wet.

Jon

[jim_mich]

Jon,

Bolts come in different grades. Some bolts are cheap and weak. Others are heat treated and strong. I trust you will use bolts that are strong enough for the job. The stronger bolts are usually more expensive and have symbols on their heads which indicates their ratings.

[rlortie]

bolt grades and how to identify:

http://www.engineershandbook.com/Tables/boltgrades.htm

http://www.ehow.com/how_8753764_grade-bolt.html

Jon, if the head is smooth with no markings then it is a grade #2 bolt, and the cheapest. For proto-type builds I buy them by the pound.

For a water environment and shear strength I suggest grade 5 stainless.

I favor using 3/8" bolts in most of my builds. Always have a stock on hand in 1/4" increment lengths. For a semi smooth rounded head I use "carriage" bolts. For recessed or flush to surface I use Allen wrench head cap screws.

For "stay" bolts such as holding a drum together I buy 3/8" all-thread in 10' lengths.

Ralph

[murilo]

Jon,
pls take a look at this plastic parts supplier:
http://www.sdp-si.com/Plastic/index.htm
They may have ready stuffs that you'll need.
Best!
M

[Jon J Hutton]

Wow, Murilo that is a great company. Can not bielieve I have not run across that place before. Everything you could ever need to build your progects. That place is definately going into my favorites folder for production runs.

It will definately help me with parts definition. How many times has a member here mentioned, "O all you need is a" and I have no idea what they mean. This site has a great search parts tool.

Imagine what Bessler could of done if he had access to some of these places on the internet.

Thanks

Jon

[murilo]

Jon,
I'm glad you appreciated this!
One thing one can do is to adjust existing parts to main project, what makes the novella shorter and with much more laugh. 8))
Best!
M

[Jon J Hutton]

Very few people will appreciate this but wanted to give an update. Took me 3 days to find a switch that can handle 20 amps, finally found an old frankenstien style knife switch that I will use to start the pump. After searching for 1 week daily I found a person who will sell me a 55 gallon drum in a town not far from where I live. Finally all this is coming to an end this week. Now get the person to weld the pump to the side of the drum for a pre test. On a good note, the mayor of the town where I live is taking an interest in this project and so when it comes time for the exhibition of the pump I can pull on him to invite the upper class here in Guatemala. Hopefully I will post a video soon. Sorry it is taking so long. Welcome to Guatemala. I remember standing in line once at immigration for over 2 hours. When I finally got to the end they politly told me I needed to be in the other line. Just to let you know how frustrating things can be here at times.

More later

[murilo]

Keep walking, Jon!
For very easy stuffs, none talent is needed!
Maybe the mayor would appreciate a special demo... a great 45º jet fountain in some open place!
Help him!
'They' love the spectacle of fountains, specially with color lights (lasers), epic musics and laughing people! 8D
Best!
M