What sort of outlet pressure can a sump-pump generate?

[Home Guy]

I've been looking around for a cheap pump that can I can use to move water around from various 55-gallon rain-water collection drums. I'd also like the pump to be able to develop some decent pressure to push water to at least a single sprinkler head.

Spending more than $100 sort-of defeats the purpose of collecting rain water to begin with, so something like a convertable jet-pump (minimum $250 around here) is out of the question.

There are some 1/6 to 1/3 hp sump pumps that I can get for $50 to $75, but I'd have to modify them so I can attach an inlet hose (most of my drums are sealed with only a 2" opening at the top so the sump-pump can't be dropped down into the drum).

So - can a sump pump be modified to be able to draw water from an inlet line - or will priming it be a bitch? And can then generate enough pressure (what - 20 to 40 psi?) to drive water through a 50-foot garden hose and a single sprinker head?

[Art Todesco]

I was looking at the Harbor Freight shallow well pump for a similar use. When on sale, it is about $80. I was thinking of getting it to pump water from my running stream to connect to the house for water when there is a power failure using my generator. My regular water comes from a community well which is not close enough to power from my house. The only reason I haven't done it is because it is not a priority as we rarely have long power outages. Actually during the one 10 hour outage (tree fell on the line feeding my area), I never ran out of water. As there are only 3 houses on that well, with pretty low usage, the piping going up to the well, maybe 75 feet up the mountain, acted like a storage tank.

[paulaner]

I second the suggestion to use a passive system. I use a length of soaker hose to slowly drain the tank. You may need to poke a little hole in the hose at various watering points since there isn't any real pressure, but it works well and is the green thing to do. :)

[Home Guy]

No, because a sprinkler head I can move around beats the time and effort and perceived coverage efficiency and water-delivery-rate of a hose with a bunch of holes punched through it.

Also, I need to move the rain water from the point where it's collected to the area where I want to keep the 1/2 dozen or so drums. Need a pump to do that because it's up hill.

[Home Guy]

I see that the flood-gates have opened and all the trapped google-posts are flooding back to usenet-proper.

Welcome back.

How many different designs are there for your typical fractional-hp sump pump?

Easy - to do what? Add a hose connection to the inlet of a sump pump?

So in other words, you don't know what static pressure a $50 or $75 1/3 to 1/6 hp sump pump can generate, and you've never modified a sump pump to give it a hose inlet so you don't know how much head they could draw.........

[Home Guy]

Can a sump pump be used to drive a single residential sprinkler head through 50-ft of 3/4" garden hose.

Stop pretending that you've answered that question. It makes you look silly.

[jbcundiffjr]

If you have an air compressor attach it to your water storage drums or r ain barrels with a tube that goes to the bottom of the rain barrel and a air fitting that connects to your air compresser hose . The air compressor will give you t he pressure you need to drive the water out of the barrel and up and o ut the water tube hanging in the barrel connected to the sprinkler head . Might need a compressor with a air storage tank ? Again as with water pumps it depends on the capacity of the air pump . And the air pump could be used for lots of other projects.

[realjoeclarke]

I am writing from the future - long after this original post. I similarly wanted to know the approximate psi of an average or any hp sump pump. I arrived at this thread and found no answer but just bunch of guys saying, " We do not have the answer, because we are smarter than you, but here is a reference to a pump engineering guide that will help you calculate something."

[trader_4]

I think what you are asking is what is the max pressure that a given sump pump can generate. If they don't have it in the pump spec, they should have the max lift height of the pump. One foot of lift is .43 PSI. The actual pressure in any application depends on the lift, pipe size, length, etc.

[rachellebrazeau87]

Hi! This is a bit of a long shot as I know this thread is old, but I was just wondering if you ever figured out a solution for your rain barrel?

I'm in a similar situation... My rain barrel just drains so SLOWLY. I'd like to hook up a proper hose and nozzle, or even a sprinkler...

Did a sump pump work?

I was thinking of cutting open the lid of mine to make it removable, that way I could completely submerged the pump.

I'd love to hear from you! Thanks!

[trader_4]

Since you want pressure to run a sprinkler, why are you looking at sump pumps instead of a water pump used for a well?

[Ed Pawlowski]

Probably cost. Sump pumps can be had for $125. Well pumps $1500 and up

[trader_4]

IDK what well pumps you're looking at or where you get your prices, but a basic well pump can be had for $125 too. What well pump costs $1500? Even typical submersible costs less than half that. For something like this, can probably find low cost or used ones on Ebay too.

[dpb]

On 4/17/2019 4:50 PM, trader_4 wrote: ...

Probably the cost of the snubber to fit a barrel... :)

Seems like overkill to me for the purpose, though, too...guess depends on just how big the rain barrel really is--just a 55-gal drum wouldn't go all that far or last long.

A 4" 1/2hp on Amazon for $110+free shipping is still 25 gpm nominal barring the outflow restriction to a 5/8" garden hose or the like...of course it's max 125-ft/85-ft rated head and with no lifting loss would be near 50 psi exit pressure one would guess (presuming numbers aren't grossly overstated).

For half that, could go with a general submersible plastic utility pump (Superior Pump 91250) that's 25-ft head/30 gpm that's probably a lot more suitable to purpose.

[trader_4]

That's a very good point. Especially since they mentioned a sprinkler. One head is typically 2 GPM. If you have 3, the barrel will last less than 10 mins. And if you're trying to water turf, that amount is pointless. Most of that will just get it wet, barely start to penetrate, most will be lost to evaporation as it dries out, unless you can continue with another water source. If you do the math, to put down 0.5" of water over any reasonable area takes a lot of water. It's thousands of gallons to water my front lawn.

[dpb]

...

To beat the horse entirely to death... :)

or almost 18,000 gal.

Of course, when one considers real irrigation of putting down over a growing season an acre-foot over a 127A circle it sorta' pales... :)

--

[Ed Pawlowski]

OK, I see some shallow well pumps cheap. Grundfos deep well high capacity are easily $1500

[Clare Snyder]

I use a "pony pump" tp punp water from my 4 rain barrels.300gph at about 5psi

[Bob F]

Or a sprinkler pump perhaps.

[Dean Hoffman]

What about cutting a hole in the side toward the bottom? You could use a bulkhead tank fitting and a shutoff valve. Then even a drill powered pump would work if you want to generate some pressure. Use one of those sprinkler hoses. There are spray nozzles for center pivots that don't require much pressure to work. Those 55 gallons won't go far anyhow. This is a bulkhead tank fitting:

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