Need info

System

HEllo all,
I need a little information.
Could anyone recomend a setup for these needs.

I need a pump that will push about 60 gpm.
It needs to move the water no more than 20' in elevation.
It needs to be PVC/Battery bank powered.
It will be runing 6 hours a day. So Energy needs shouldnt be too steep. enough to charge a battery bank to do the above over the course of a 24 hour day.
The draw into the pump will be no more than 24" from straight down (Or IN the water) and 20' from the pump straight up.

Any ideas on a solution?

icarus

Re: Need info

60 gpm for 6 hours,,,, 21,600 gpd?

The 60 gpm is a huge pump. Can you do 15 gpm over 24 hours?

I'll do some thinking, Hmmm. I would start here,,,http://store.solar-electric.com/grsqpu.html

http://lib.store.yahoo.net/lib/wind-sun/SQFlex.pdf

This pump will use ~ 900 watts to pump 60 gpm. To size a solar system to pump that, and to keep the batteries up, and to give some reserve,,, this is the way I would look at it: I would count on 900 watts of PV to run the pump during the day when the sun is out, I would then add between 2-4 times that much to give three days reserve. I'm sure others will chime in with better numbers,,, because this is a little out of my scope of experience for size.



T

BB.

Re: Need info

I don't know anything about the vendor or the manufacturer--Solar Guppy put this unit up a day or two ago as an interesting pumping option...

It is a Lorentz swimming pool pump that is designed to run on solar panels... Your requirements are a bit large to use one pump (it looks like)--however, two pumps under a pair 400-600+ watt arrays would seem to be very doable. These are not submersible pumps--but can be mounted above the water level, or in a sump below the water level.

The original thread:

Solar Pool Pumping

Supports battery power too... But I would do almost anything I could to avoid batteries if possible--perhaps looking at more solar panels or a 1/2 axis tracking array instead.

Batteries just add a whole new dimension of costs, efficiency losses, and complexity that would be best avoided--if possible.

-Bill

Ecnerwal

Re: Need info

Batteries are not a good idea for water pumping - pump when the sun shines, and if you need more water than you have stored when the sun does not shine, store more water - it's far more efficient than batteries, which are inefficient and a maintenance headache to boot.

The Grundfos 60 SQF3 would (IMHO) be your pump of choice. With controller box that's around $2000, (considerably cheaper than TWO of the swimming pool pumps mentioned) and then you need about 1000-1200 watts of panel ($3000 and up) to run the thing, depending how far into non-ideal lighting or temperature conditions (panels not making full-rated-power) you want it to run at 60GPM.

BB.

Re: Need info

Ecnerwal's suggestion of the Grundfos pumps is also a good idea--if you can use a submersible unit.

Our host also has "SunPumps"--I have not gone through their specs... But they look like they have a wide variety of pump types for many types of applications.

-Bill