electric inline water pump?

[Nate Nagel]

Hi all,

my "new" (to me, anyway, as of a month and a half ago) has two cisterns to collect rainwater runoff from the roof of the house. They're just sitting on concrete pads above grade. The PO's I think only used them for watering plants. Let's say I wanted to wash my car, is there an inexpensive portable electric pump that I could use? (I say portable because I'd like to be able to only buy one pump but use it at either cistern if I so desired.) Both just have a spigot for discharge.

thanks,

nate

[Pete C.]

Put a power cord and handle on it and you're portable. Gives you a pump designed to produce decent pressure at lower flow rates unlike typical portable submersibles which are designed for higher flow at lower pressures. Pressure switch and accumulator tank so you don't have issues with a pump overheating when you have the nozzle shut off.

Pete C.

[Nate Nagel]

That looks perfect! Have you used one, or did you just DAGS? I have to admit I'm a little skeptical of HF products that don't carry major brand labels, but I'm willing to try it for the price.

thanks,

nate

[Pete C.]

Haven't tried it, but I've looked at it in the local HF stores and it looks decent. Certainly if you don't trust HF stuff you can assemble the same thing from name brand parts, but the Wel-X-Trol diaphragm tank alone will cost you the HF price for the whole thing. I'm assuming that you won't be washing the car with rainwater daily so the HF one should last a good amount of time. Since it seems you will be gravity feeding the pump you shouldn't have to worry about keeping it primed either.

As for the name brand thing, contrary to popular belief, HF does carry name brand stuff, in some cases factory refurbs in other cases regular new product. The name brand stuff is usually a few dollars less than most retailers have it for, the HF brand stuff is of course 1/10th of the name brand cost.

For searches I prefer

I always seem to get better search results there.

Pete C.

PS: Don't forget to put it on a GFCI outlet or cordset.

[Goedjn]

Or, if you're serious about "inexpensive", you can get a fitting for an electric drill that regular garden hose attaches to. Search on "drill pump".

[Big Al]

Looks like a real overkill just to wash a car. Look at the other pumps at Harbor Freight.

Al

[Pete C.]

One of those pumps won't develop the pressure that the well pump setup will, so you won't get a good spray from the hose nozzle. It also won't shut off when you shut off the hose nozzle which will quickly lead to it's demise. Also while the pump is pretty cheap, you'll wear out your drill and the pair don't cost a lot less than the well pump, possible more if you use a good drill.

Pete C.

[Pete C.]

It isn't. If you were using the pump to pump water to garden sprinklers one of the other pumps would work ok. Since he want's to wash the car, you have the issue of the hose nozzle shutting off while he soaps the car and the other pumps won't handle this condition well and can overheat. With the well pump setup the pump shuts off when it fills the accumulator tank to pressure and will restart smoothly as the accumulator provides the initial flow when you turn on the nozzle again.

Pete C.