Farm irrigation - May2016
I am working with a small farm in Leogane and looking for a supplier for irrigation supplies, agricultural water pump for irrigation, and a company to install the pump and pump house. Any advice? Thanks.
1 Like
Hi,
I’m trying to get people to consider using a low cost 12v pump with a solar panel.
Far cheaper than the usual hand pump installation.
More info if you email biodesigndiy@gmail. com
Graham K
Hey Graham,
Is that the nemo solar pump? http://nemosolar.com/dcsubmersiblepumps/
I installed one a couple years ago on a farm in Haiti and had a bad experience. Maybe it was a mistake on our end, but it kept clogging with clay and only pushed a small amount of water out of the well each day. We ended up aborting and using an electric pump.
If you have had success, I would be interested to know how much water it moves. Maybe you can share some more details here, before we move to emailing, to benefit others.
Thanks,
Roger
Hi Roger,
This nemo solar pump of yours cannot lift water more than a few meters, I suspect?
But more importantly any pump needs a strainer/filter to prevent clogging of the inlet!
The $15, 12v pump I’m pushing is an industrial diaphragm type that will lift water 100m + with a flow of 5l/min.
Perhaps a small flow but it can keep filling a surface tank all day long. And you can afford more than one pump!
I have supplied this pump to two colleagues but so far they have not done tests.
Pdfs available.
Graham K
1 Like
Thanks Graham,
For some reason I was not notified of your response. Just reading now.
As for the nemo, I forget the specs, but the manufacturer felt it should easily draw water from the well I was using, which was over 10 meters deep and send it horizontally 100’s of meters. But the flow would also be limited. I realized even if I got it working, it would not be enough for the land I was irrigating. It did have a basic filter over the inlet, which might not have been enough for the clay soaked water.
Anyways, I felt like that pump held some promise, in certain situations, and that I didn’t get to fully troubleshoot it. We had to move on to other projects.
Also, I recently saw an ad for a company in Kenya that installs solar pumps for farm irrigation for $500. I doubt that includes the cost of the water tank. I forget the exact flow rate, but it was much higher than the nemo. Like 3000 liters/day. It didn’t mention how deep the pump could draw from or other details. Wish I would have saved their info. But I think this is a similar company:
For a price like that, it could be a real solution in Haiti too!