How do submersible pumps work?

.... Also the flow rate is astounding, enough to create a gash in the lawn directly from the end of the unrestricted 1" hose, much more than mains water pressure from a 1/2" hose.
Indeed. That's why I find it so intuitively difficult to understand how it manages to achieve that when the outlet is only a couple of inches away from a 1" diameter hole into a 'low pressure' environment!

Kind Regards, John
 
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The only 'repairs' a novice can do to these units is to gently clear and debris around the impeller and ensure the inlet/outlet are not clogged with detritus.
Quite - and that is obviously what I was hoping to find, but didn't! Even before I opened it up I was pretty sure that there was no such problem, because I could see and rotate the impeller through the outlet, and could see that both inlet and outlets were totally clean.

Kind Regards, John
 
The ball hits a microswitch, otherwise spot on.
I once had a float switch that got crushed by a sludge gulper, it was simply 3 round cavities, the centre had 2 brass contacts at one end and a brass 'marble' sized ball which bridged between them. I always thought it was very crude but never gave a thought to alternatives. The level switches I've installed in tanks /sumps etc are usually a vertical tube containing a reed relay and a float around the tube which contains a magnet.
 
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Thanks, I never opened one up.


Did you ever come across the level sensing, using fixed metal rods and low voltage ac relays?
Yes installed a number of them. Usually restricted to 8Vac for some reason. and the hardened stainless steel laquered rods which have to be cut with an anglegrinder.
 
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Yes installed a number of them. Usually restricted to 8Vac for some reason.

8Vac for safety in a very wet environment. We used to call them I think 'no floats'. One long tube for the common, a shorter one to stop the pump, the shortest for start - assuming pumping out, rather than in. Tube was galved steel gas pipe I think, suspended from like a bracketed top hat. A very simple system, yet so reliable and effective. Set and forget.

I spent a few years putting in and commissioning control systems, for what were sometimes major pumping schemes, motors so big they would fill a small room. Weir, Sulzer and Hawthorn Davey, before Sulzer swallowed them. Great fun to play with :)
 
I suspect that SUNRAY was asking "why as low as 8V?". A more 'standard' ELV voltage (like 12V) would be essentially just as safe.

Kind Regards, John

A long time ago, so I accepted his 8V, but I half remember them being 24V.
 
Indeed. That's why I find it so intuitively difficult to understand how it manages to achieve that when the outlet is only a couple of inches away from a 1" diameter hole into a 'low pressure' environment!

Kind Regards, John
The impeller vanes will be very close to the plate containing the inlet hole, probably within 1mm.

If you can imagine, for a moment, that there is no gap and the impeller vanes are in perfect contact with the plate. In fact there is sometimes an additional plate added to the impeller.

As the impeller spins any water within the vanes is thrown outwards by centrifugal force and if there is somewhere for it to go - it will. The outlet in its crudest form is a hole in the side of the impeller void. Some air fans are built this way and the impeller may simply be against a division between 2 sections of air duct.

The outlet is usually angled and frequently has a scoop fashioned to reduce drag on the water flow, the curve on the vanes is more for directing the water towards the outlet than for sucking on the inlet.
 
The impeller vanes will be very close to the plate containing the inlet hole, probably within 1mm. If you can imagine, for a moment, that there is no gap and the impeller vanes are in perfect contact with the plate. In fact there is sometimes an additional plate added to the impeller.
If that were the case, then I'd find it much easier to understand. However, the impeller vanes are actually about 50 mm above the plate containing the 'input hole' - in fact, close to the top of the output port



Kind Regards, John
 
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.... something like ....

upload_2020-8-27_0-18-41.png


Kind Regards, John
 
... and 'the vanes' of the impeller are amazingly small for something which produces such an enormous and 'powerful' gush of water ...

upload_2020-8-27_0-28-30.png


Kind Regards, John
 
A long time ago, so I accepted his 8V, but I half remember them being 24V.
The versions I've encountered ran on 24Vac [pretty much the standard in control panels AFAIC] but the level relay contains a 24 to 8V transformer.

One of the problems with higher voltages [higher currents] is the gassing, [one of the easy ways to collect oxygen and hydrogen is to pass a dc current through water and harvest the bubbles].
Historically it could be something to do with it but the more recent versions contain electronics which reduces the current considerably.
8Vac for safety in a very wet environment. We used to call them I think 'no floats'. One long tube for the common, a shorter one to stop the pump, the shortest for start - assuming pumping out, rather than in. Tube was galved steel gas pipe I think, suspended from like a bracketed top hat. A very simple system, yet so reliable and effective. Set and forget.
The systems I'm familiar with consist of 3 laquered stainless steel rods, typically: longest = common, middle = stop pumping, top = start pumping for emptying. Or middle = order stock, top = stop filling etc.
 
One of the problems with higher voltages [higher currents] is the gassing, [one of the easy ways to collect oxygen and hydrogen is to pass a dc current through water and harvest the bubbles].
True, but that won't happen with AC current.

Kind Regards, John
 

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