Pushing Water Uphill: PTO pump or HF Predator?

[YardBikeBob]

I built a water tower to tend the wife's garden. Now that it is up, I need to make a decision on how to fill it with water.

The pump must handle 20' of head lift. I've got a couple of questions:

#1 is what to use for a pump. I can haul 250 gallons out to the tower on my tractor. At the start of my over-thinking I was sure a PTO powered pump should do the job. But when looking at what is on the shelf at TSC and Orchelin's, the pumps with good specs are based on 1,000 RPM PTO drives. My tractor offers only 540. To use these pumps I'd have to have the tractor at full RPM to get half the stated performance? Has anyone found a source and good success with a 540 RPM rated pump?

The alternative is a $170 pump offered by our comrades at Harbor Freight: 1 in. 79cc Gasoline Engine Clear Water Pump - 35 GPM. I've got a tiller with a Predator motor so I have some confidence in this brand. Anyone using one?

Other recommendations?

#2 is how to plumb for the water tower. I will bring 2" PVC over head and down to the garden fence. Then I'll run piping along the fence to a couple of hose bibs. If I provide an inlet for the pump at the fence line with proper diameter, will that prove effective? That is, it will be pushing water up through 2" PVC to fill the tank from the bottom.

The alternative, of course, is to run a separate fill pipe that runs up and fills the tank from the top. Can't figure out if the physics of pumping water uphill is different either way.

Appreciate all ideas and guidance.

~Bob

 

[LouNY]

Either type of pump will work if you are only lifting 20 ft. total.
20 feet of head is almost 9 PSI
25 feet of head is just under 11 PSI
As far as a pump there is this;
77-C Hypro 7 Roller Pump Cast Iron | Hypro | Brands | www.surpluscenter.com

Many PTO driven small pumps will use pulleys to get the speed up to work well
such as this;
Robot Check

You can use the single line to fill and use, I think you would find a separate fill line to the top with an air gap easier to use.

 

[Stimw]

Go up to the HF 2" pump at $199.
I have one and it works great.
I also found that it pumps just as much at about 1/2 throttle as full.
You might need more throttle with that head but I was discharging flat.

 

[YardBikeBob]

Go up to the HF 2" pump at $199.

Looking at that, too. But the added expense of larger hoses, connectors, and valves might not be cost effective for the task at hand. BTW, does your pump have a fuel cutoff? I've heard the little pump does not.

Time to spend some time scratching my head in the aisles of HF!

~Bob

 

[leonz]

You could use a simple 110 volt 2 pipe one inch jet pump and bladder tank combo from Lowes to fill it with little difficulty other than priming it which is very easy to do.
you can pump water a great distance with a simple jet pump with one inch black poly pipe.
Are you going to have a an overflow pipe to tell ypu when to stop pumping? Otherwise your going to lose a lot of water.

 

[YardBikeBob]

You could use a simple 110 volt 2 pipe one inch jet pump.

Water & power are a couple hundred yards and a creek crossing away. Thus the water tower and pump project.

~Bob

 

[Jimbrown]

I would run the couple hundred yards of pipe before going to all the trouble you are. It is always going to empty just when the wife wants to use it. Be warned!

 

[YardBikeBob]

I would run the couple hundred yards of pipe before going to all the trouble you are. It is always going to empty just when the wife wants to use it. Be warned!

I looked long an hard from the well. 40' down to rocky occasional creek, 60' up to hardwood & cedar forest, 50yds out to beginning of the meadow. And every foot is rocky Ozark clay. Nope, laying pipe wasn't feasible. Besides, a water tower is an interesting challenge!

And, yes, I'm sure she'll need much more water. It'll be like switching to tall boys when six-packs don't last!

~Bob

 

[leonz]

It will be simpler and less costly for you to use a jet pump and direct burial cable.

UNLESS you invest in a force pump you will be in a losing battle with HEAD LOSS AND RESISTANCE.

Catalogs are nice, they know how to sell things, they don't know how to pump water nor do the people on the end of the phone line care as all they want is their hourly wage and commission sales income.

If you get a roll of 12 gauge pump wire to feed 110 volt single phase to the jet pump and its twin pipe sitting in a deep pool
on a float or a 1/2 horse submersible suspended on the float you will be much better off as you will have very little
line drop in voltage to worry about.

The jet pump will be simpler as it uses water to drive water where the submersible uses huge amounts of and amperage and torque to generate the power needed to pump water for you.

Black poly for a 3/4" jet system will not be very expensive per foot as long as you buy a 500 foot roll and you will be able to use it all for what you want with less work than a 1" submersible pump as there is no torsion to worry about.
A floating fire pump and the pressure hose is going to run you a lot of money but less than a PTO pump and pipe but still much more than a jet pump with 3/4 twin pipe.

 

[countrybumpkin]

So basically your going to haul 250 gallons of water from one location over to the tower and need a pump to transfer it from the tote up to the tower? If so a 2” trash pump with 1” outlet hose will do that for you.