A question about your pump/battery setup. The one you run at 14.4V - do you have trouble tripping the max discharge rate protector on the battery? I have a Rule pump here (1000GPH, model 20A). It claims a 2.9A draw at 12V and a 4.0A draw at 13.6V. The fuse in the pump is 5A. I was worried that if I hooked it up to a 14.4V battery the draw rate would either overload the battery or blow the fuse in the pump. Have you had any issues?
I use the fairly simple method of getting a 14.4V electric drill battery and hooking to a 1250 gph Atwood pump in my Nitro.
The pump works faster than the 12V, 5.3A lead acid battery I originally used, has less weight and last longer.
No problem with tripping the system in the past 18 months.
Pumps are the best open boating invention since the paddle.
I bought an Esquif Nitro with a factory installed bilge pump system (lead battery, I think, I don't know the make of the pump) for my Grand Canyon trip in 2004. The night before we set off I loaded the battery overnight.
13 days through the Canyon, I used the pump a lot (and it is truly one of the great inventions for open boaters!) and loved it! And it's a mobile shower too! On the last day it was still going strong. Grand Canyon bilge pump shower (Pic: Michael Neumann)
I took the boat home with me to Germany and sold it to a friend. He was delighted by the pump (him being a bit a technological wizard himself). We made many tests in winter during our pool sessions with emptying fully filled boats (sucked dry after 2 1/2 minutes...).
Roland, the new owner, paddles a lot and having the wrong plug set on the charger wasn't able to recharge the battery. But after a busy autumn season and many runs in spring it was still pumping.
Finally, after being used nearly a full year, he finally recharged the battery in summer 2005.
I am working on putting togther a 24v system, actually I have all the parts just need to get them in the boat. The biggest advantage of using a 24v system vs a 12v system is the amp draw. With double the voltage the amperage needed will cut in half in theory because the wattage will stay the same.
W=A*V
W=Wattage
A=Amperage
V=Volts
Some quick math will show.
my 1100 rule 28D 24v pump, Amp draw is 1.3 at 24v
W=1.3*24 so W=31.2 watts
The same pump at 12v, 1100 rule 27D, and 3.3 amps
W=3.3*12 so W=39.6 watts
You can actually see that the pump is more efficient at 24 volts vs 12 volts. Also with a lower amperage the battery will have a longer life span compared to a higher amperage draw.
On my setup I have a 1100 rule 28D 24v 1.3amp draw hooked up to a 24v 5AH NiMH battery. The battery costs 80 bucks on batteryspace.com and can push up to 4.5 amps so you could hook up 3 28D pumps up to it in theory or get a larger pump all with a cheaper priced battery.
A side question. I was talking to a fellow paddler that happens to be a mech engineer and he sugested the idea of getting some kind of probe that detects being submerged in water and installing a circut for that probe to turn the pump on and off and still having a manual switch to use if needed. Has anybody thought and/or done this? He sugested starting with a water detector that is used in diesels to detect water in the fuel. Any thoughts?
Hiya Falk
Any chance of some specs from that battery and pump? I'd be mighty interested to know what the battery and pump combo Esquif is using is.
Cheers,
Matt
NZMatt
Hmmm....new country, new rivers...-
Still not enough c-boaters....
Scott R wrote:I am working on putting togther a 24v system, .....snip.......he sugested the idea of getting some kind of probe that detects being submerged in water and installing a circut for that probe to turn the pump on and off and still having a manual switch to use if needed. Has anybody thought and/or done this? He sugested starting with a water detector that is used in diesels to detect water in the fuel. Any thoughts?
You can buy 'float switches' for bilge pumps. They're quite inexpensive. They detect when around 1 or 2 inches of water is in your boat. If you choose that route, do as others on this board have suggested and install a float switch and a manual override in parallel.
I have thought about using a float switch but I am trying to explore other avenues that could possibly work better than a float switch and besides just using a float switch would be too easy.
I run a double pump in the Vertige X. Pretty simple - two attwood 1250's and a single 12V 5A sealed lead acid battery, wired in parallel. Voltage stays at 12 amperage goes up. The Attwoods are rated 2.6A at 13.6.
One thing to note is batteries are rated in amp hours, thus the 5A battery is a 5 amp hour battery. It is rated to discharge in one hour with a 5 amp draw. It can support higher draws, BUT it will discarge much faster as adding amperage to the draw increases the discharge in a non linear fashion. For an extreme example the 5A battery I have is rated to supply a 75A rate for 5 seconds.
Adding a second pump simply drains the battery quicker. I figure it also drains the boat quicker so I get a lighter boat quicker in exchange for a shorter battery life. So in terms of gallons pumped per charge - less than one pump, but gets you back to empty faster. NOTE all of the above is related to lead acid, I have not looked at lithium etc as the cost is pretty steep. I really only notice the wieght penalty when on the portage trail
I am thinking about upgrading my Ocoee to a double sytem, heck the pumps are light its the battery which adds all the weight.
Although I have no idea how to attach a photo on these posts, I'm figuring anyone that is a judge and don't know how to spell "skart"--not skert--might not also. But it would be cool to see a pic of your setup in either boat. Description would be fine too. I don't want to be diggin a hole into our saddles in caption.
I wonder how this would work mounted behind tandem pedestal---setup with seats real close together. Saw Wendy's post on setup describing floor mount by the way.
I have my Outrage set up with two Atwood 1250 pumps powered by one 12V lead-acid battery. I wasn't happy with the speed that the boat emptied with one pump while creeking so I added the second pump. I've done over three days of creeking without a recharge and I haven't run a battery down yet. Creeking sure makes you use the pump a lot.
I just returned from a Grand Canyon trip last night. I took one of my pumps with me and three lead-acid batteries. I installed the battery on the floor of my canoe without any sort of waterproof housing and the system worked just fine the whole 18 days. I did have the switch waterproofed though. One battery lasted the whole trip (226 miles) so I never had to break out either of the two spare batteries. I did recharge the battery for an hour at Phantom Ranch though but it wasn't enough time to reach full charge.
Taniwha: I never thought of using the pump for a shower. What a great idea! I have another Grand Canyon trip coming up this September so I'll surely be trying out the shower technique.
This pump idea sounds pretty good. Any "bilge pump for dummies" type summaries on what you have to do, what you have to buy, to put one in? How much does everything cost with a lithium battery? What's it weigh? What about information sources on the Internet?
post a picture. But, in Larry Horne's post above he gives the web address for Rapid Runner. In the kit I bought from them there is a small plastic basket, the technical name of which is a thingamajig. It attaches to the saddle or to the boat and the pump fit into it. You can either leave the pump in all the time or, by just twisting it, take it out when you transport the boat or to move the pump from boat to boat. At first I was afraid the pump would fall out but I left it in all during my recent Idaho trip. I drove out there and back and all over long gravel putin roads and it stayed just fine.
In one boat I glued a thin alum plate to the back of my saddle and screwed the pump holder into the plate. In the other boat I ran a piece to plastic pipe through the saddle and used some of those plastic tie strips go through the saddle and around the pump holder. Both systems work fine.
In the installation pictures on the RapidRunner site they run th eplastic pipe out the stern. I did that in one boat (Rival) but had to flatten the stern a bit to get a good fit. In my Spark I added an elbow joint (available at the hardware store) to the pipe and ran it out the side of the boat as far to the stern as I could get it without messing my my bag attachment. The elbow is a good idea because it allows the pipe to turn the corner without reducing the amount to flow out of the boat.
I am happy with both the equipment and the service from RapidRunner. Chris Kelly
I am very happy with the whole Rapid Runner system.
Just wanted to add my $0.02 and echo all the props going out to RapidRunnerBilge. Both the Nickle Metal Hydride (sp?) and the Lithium Polymer batteries have worked really well for me. I currently have their top of the line system and it is definitely the shiz-nit!
