Document Type
Presentation
Publication Date
8-1-2014
Abstract
The automatic hydraulic ram pump (hydram) is a unique device that utilizes energy from a falling quantity of water as the driving power to pump some of the water to a head much higher than the source. The hydraulic ram is structurally simple, consisting of only two moving parts: the waste valve and the delivery (check) valve. There is also an air chamber with an air or snifter valve. With a continuous flow of water, the hydram will operate automatically and continuously with no other external energy. Hydrams are suitable for small-scale water supply schemes supplying farm- houses and isolated settlements as well as in rural situations in developing countries. The authors develop a novel hydram that contains the three innovations. A new structure and shape of hydram is designed to greatly reduce its size and weight, but has the similar hydraulic performance to the conventional hydrams. Based on hard metal seal, the elastic seal is added for the waste valve and the delivery valve, respectively. The hard metal seal primarily bears the impact of the moving valve disc while the elastic seal is responsible for sealing and reducing noise from the impact of the moving valve disc against the hard metal seal. A device, consisting of a valve and a short pipe that connects the air chamber to the lifting pipe, is added to automatically adjust the gas volume upper the air chamber, so as to keep the hydram operating in a state of high efficiency. Finally, the hydraulic performance of the novel hydram is measured by the model tests.
Comments
Session R19, Hydraulic Applications: Numerical and Experimental Devices and Flow Interaction