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Jason C 18-09-2012 01:52 PM

Water turbine on a pond and waterfall
 
I have a small pond, roughly 8' x 12', 3' deep. It's about 1 1/2 years old
now, stocked with a few goldfish and koi, and I have a waterfall built out
of boulders and river rock.

I also have a bit of land behind the pond that I'm thinking about clearing
off, then building a larger 20' x 30' pond about 2-3' higher than the small
pond. Then, I would use more boulders and flat rocks to have the large pon
d overflow in to the small pond, with a free-falling waterfall.

Then, of course, I would pump from the small pond back to a waterfall built
behind the larger pond.

I'm still in the planning stages now, and wouldn't really begin working unt
il the Spring. In planning, though, I realize that with the option of a fre
e-falling waterfall, I could potentially have a small turbine behind the wa
terfall, and use it to generate the electricity for the pumps, and maybe th
e landscape lighting.

Have any of you done such a thing? I would like to keep the turbine behind
the waterfall so that it's not seen, and with enough rock I'm pretty sure i
t could be completely hidden. Is it inexpensive and practical enough, thoug
h, to generate enough electricity for this purpose? Or more?

Any other suggestions on what I might expect from this project, good or bad
?


JB[_6_] 19-09-2012 02:21 AM

Water turbine on a pond and waterfall
 
On 9/18/2012 6:52 AM, Jason C wrote:

Sounds like a science fair project to me!

No, I've not tried this method of generating electricity myself. What
were you thinking you might run off the power generated in this manner?
It definitely wouldn't be enough to power the pump that's running the
falls. If so, then it would appear that you're thinking of a variation
on a perpetual motion machine. ;-)

Lastly, I don't know why but having a larger body of water spill into a
smaller one seems like it may be problematic but I can't explain.
Perhaps it's because I don't recall seeing this configuration before.

Good luck and report back on your experiences.

JB





Jason C 19-09-2012 04:04 PM

Water turbine on a pond and waterfall
 
On Tuesday, September 18, 2012 8:21:49 PM UTC-4, JB wrote:

Sounds like a science fair project to me!

No, I've not tried this method of generating electricity myself. What
were you thinking you might run off the power generated in this manner?


It definitely wouldn't be enough to power the pump that's running the
falls. If so, then it would appear that you're thinking of a variation
on a perpetual motion machine. ;-)


FWIW, I actually did major in electrical engineering in college, but that w
as about 16 years ago and I haven't done jack squat in that field ever sinc
e.

I did do a project in school, though, that used two magnets, a weight, and
a pipe to create a spinning wheel, which was then able to generate electric
ity. I think that it would generate just under 1V, but it would definitely
light up an LED. Technically, it wasn't perpetual motion because it drew en
ergy from an external source that would eventually be finite, but for my pu
rpose, it was close enough. For all I know, it might still be working at th
e college lab! LOL

I was thinking about putting this in practice to a somewhat larger scale. I
know that my landscape lights run off of a 6V transformer, so my original
thought was to just create 6V for that. But then, I started thinking about
the pump, too.

I found several 6V and 12V pump options, but the biggest one I could find o
nly says that it pumps 44gph. I'd need to pump about 10 times that, so that
's become less practical. But still, I thought maybe you guys had already t
ried it and had an idea I could use :-)


Lastly, I don't know why but having a larger body of water spill into a


smaller one seems like it may be problematic but I can't explain.

Perhaps it's because I don't recall seeing this configuration before.


Are you thinking of the big pond spilling too heavily in to the smaller pon
d, making it overflow?

That was my concern, too. But if it works out like I'm thinking, then both
ponds would basically be stand-alone ponds, and the only overflow from the
big one would come from the water pumped from the smaller one. So, if I pum
p 500gph out, then it would bring 500gph back in.

In theory, anyway! I haven't started the project yet, though, so I'm very m
uch open to discussion on that.


~ jan[_3_] 27-01-2013 04:53 PM

Water turbine on a pond and waterfall
 
On Wed, 19 Sep 2012 10:04:09 EDT, Jason C wrote:

Are you thinking of the big pond spilling too heavily in to the smaller pon
d, making it overflow?

That was my concern, too. But if it works out like I'm thinking, then both
ponds would basically be stand-alone ponds, and the only overflow from the
big one would come from the water pumped from the smaller one. So, if I pum
p 500gph out, then it would bring 500gph back in.

In theory, anyway! I haven't started the project yet, though, so I'm very m
uch open to discussion on that.


One needs to take into account the spill over water, at what point,
gallon-wise, does it stop spilling over when the pump is off? Can the
smaller pond handle the extra water? If not, you'd want to make plans for
it to flow over somewhere without carrying soil/plants away, etc.

Best is usually small pond, large pond for those of us that don't want
spill over when the power goes out or during maintenance.

My top pond is ~ 500 gallons, bottom pond ~ 800, and that flows into a
bio-filter of ~ 200 gallons. The biofilter lip was made a tad higher than
the lower pond edge so flow over is out of the lower pond, though I do have
a flow over I can use out of the filter. Usually cap that during the season
and use it during the winter for water changes. HTHs, ~ jan

------------
Zone 7a, SE Washington State
Ponds: www.jjspond.us


Phyllis and Jim 30-01-2013 04:34 AM

Water turbine on a pond and waterfall
 
Wetoo run from small to large. As long as the pipe from the lower pond to the upper cannot siphon water back from the top pond, you should be OK if power goes off. If there were a siphon, your top pond would empty to the lower.

Will you have a veggie filter somewhere? That would be a third pond.





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