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Step 6The Pump
The RP90P Polypropylene rotary hand pump (sometimes called a barrel pump) delivers 6 gallons per minute - plenty of Sploosh for your buck! Being made entirely of plastic it doesn't rust, is lightweight and can be operated by a three year old. This model is also easy to open up to replace the pump vanes in case sand gets in there and to remove any small Lego parts that get past the intake grille. Places to get one include:
http://www.pumpbiz.com/ US$80
http://www.ba-industrial.com
http://www.hartleige.com/rotary-plastic.htm (UK)
http://www.bergerclosures.com/ (no price listed)
www.tonson-motor.com (Taiwan manufacturer) called HC25P in their current catalogue
The only problem we had with this model was the nut on the handle, which was not designed for the wild abandon employed by children and tended to unscrew itself during play. We replaced it with a locking nut on each side of the arm (wwe had to replace the bolt with a slightly longer one to fit the extra nut) and have not had any trouble since.
Remove six bolts from the pump casing (three front and three back) as shown. The remaining bolts are perfectly adequate to keep the pump watertight and removing these bolts provides ideal three fixing points for attaching the pump to the frame.
The pump comes with three sections of 32mm intake pipe and an intake grille which screws into the bottom of this pipe. You also need to but a non-return or "clack" valve to fit onto the bottom of the intake. These come in many shapes and sizes and will prevent the water draining out of the pump during pauses in play. Keeping the pump filled (primed) means that it will immediately pump water again when the handle is turned and doesn't require kids to pump like mad to get water back up into the pump body. Some valves use a spring to keep the water from returning down the pipe and others use gravity and the weight of the water itself. We found that the spring type could make pumping harder for younger children but removing the spring solved this problem and the valve did a perfectly good job with just gravity to seal it. If you are lucky your local hardware store of garden center will have one with a screw thread that fits into the bottom of the pumps intake pipe. We had to resort to duct tape for ours but it still works fine. Fit the intake grille into the bottom of the valve if it didn't come with one of its own and cut the pipes to fit. The frame dimensions shown have been calculated to fit the length of intake pipes from this model with minimum wastage for both the upper and lower pump positions.
Use the 25mm PVC pipe and fittings to make the out pipe and 180 degree bend at the top to shoot water into the top chute.
http://www.pumpbiz.com/ US$80
http://www.ba-industrial.com
http://www.hartleige.com/rotary-plastic.htm (UK)
http://www.bergerclosures.com/ (no price listed)
www.tonson-motor.com (Taiwan manufacturer) called HC25P in their current catalogue
The only problem we had with this model was the nut on the handle, which was not designed for the wild abandon employed by children and tended to unscrew itself during play. We replaced it with a locking nut on each side of the arm (wwe had to replace the bolt with a slightly longer one to fit the extra nut) and have not had any trouble since.
Remove six bolts from the pump casing (three front and three back) as shown. The remaining bolts are perfectly adequate to keep the pump watertight and removing these bolts provides ideal three fixing points for attaching the pump to the frame.
The pump comes with three sections of 32mm intake pipe and an intake grille which screws into the bottom of this pipe. You also need to but a non-return or "clack" valve to fit onto the bottom of the intake. These come in many shapes and sizes and will prevent the water draining out of the pump during pauses in play. Keeping the pump filled (primed) means that it will immediately pump water again when the handle is turned and doesn't require kids to pump like mad to get water back up into the pump body. Some valves use a spring to keep the water from returning down the pipe and others use gravity and the weight of the water itself. We found that the spring type could make pumping harder for younger children but removing the spring solved this problem and the valve did a perfectly good job with just gravity to seal it. If you are lucky your local hardware store of garden center will have one with a screw thread that fits into the bottom of the pumps intake pipe. We had to resort to duct tape for ours but it still works fine. Fit the intake grille into the bottom of the valve if it didn't come with one of its own and cut the pipes to fit. The frame dimensions shown have been calculated to fit the length of intake pipes from this model with minimum wastage for both the upper and lower pump positions.
Use the 25mm PVC pipe and fittings to make the out pipe and 180 degree bend at the top to shoot water into the top chute.
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