On Fri, 13 Apr 2018 10:36:47 +0100, tony sayer wrote:

.

I'll be phoning the water company tomorrow to report the problem as
well
as getting hold of a suitable water pump to keep the flooding under
control whilst I wait for the water company to respond (I'm expecting
some resistance to acknowledging their responsibility in this matter).

Do! There're usually very helpful and its in their own interest to
clear up any leaks!

You'd think so but after describing my problem and suspicions to the
United Utilities "Report a Leak" customer services chap early this
afternoon, the earliest appointment I could get for an engineering visit
was the 25th of April.

I mentioned our lead service pipe but was told that all pipework within
the boundary of the property was the property owner's responsibility,
including the issue of replacing the old lead service pipe. Long gone are
the days of a caring nationalised water industry thanks to M. Thatcher
and co. :-(

If they want me to take responsibility for all the pipework from their
street stopcock onwards, then they'll jolly well have to make sure that I
have a key and access to a working stopcock before I accept such
responsibility. It'll be interesting to see what their engineers have to
say on the matter.

Anyhow, with that in mind, I took another look at the Clarke Hippo pump
recommended by Terry he

https://www.machinemart.co.uk/p/hippo-2-1in-submersible-water-pump/

followed by looking at the "CUSTOMERS WHO BOUGHT THIS ALSO BOUGHT"
section below which lead me to this gem:

https://www.machinemart.co.uk/p/051011800/ and then onto this:

https://www.machinemart.co.uk/p/clarke-bip1000-1-electric-water-pump/

followed by this:

https://www.machinemart.co.uk/p/clarke-fvf10-plastic-foot-valve/

before I eventually landed up looking at this:

https://www.machinemart.co.uk/p/cl-msp12-pump-kit12v/?instore=Liverpool

Since it was so much cheaper, could fit into my sump standpipe and
didn't need extra optional accessories (other than for a 10m coil of 1
inch garden hose to stretch the supplied 3m outlet hose from the sump
pipe location out to the back door), I decided to purchase that instead
of the Clarke Hippo pump. At a mere £20.39, I thought it was well worth a
punt.

I know I initially decried such a pump on the grounds of the cost of an
additional 12vdc supply but since Clarke claim a modest current draw of
just 4.5A and I already have a 13.5v 10A smpsu to hand anyway (as well as
a 12AH SLA bought 2nd hand from a local flea market 4 or 5 years ago for
the princely sum of 5 quid), I decided it was well worth a punt at less
than a third the price of the Hippo pump.

When I got my 'bargain pump' back home, I tested it out with the 12AH SLA
battery on the modest pool of water that awaited, extending the outlet
hose over the backdoor threshold with about 6 metre's worth of garden
hose off cuts I had to hand. I was able to just reach the puddles with
this setup but it was enough to prove its efficacy at lifting the unasked
for water out of the coal hole.

I've now got a choice of drilling through 18 inches of brick to directly
route the outlet hose onto the drive by the front door or else buy
another 10m coil of garden hose to replace my 6 metre's worth of joined
up hoses so I can drop the pump into the sump pipe to pump out via the
back door.

The former choice is a neater more permanent solution but involves some
hard work. The latter just involves parting with a little more cash and
the more fiddly process of throwing a hose up the basement steps and out
through an open back door each time we need to "Man the Pumps".

For now at least, I'm going to buy the extra garden hose required for
the "Quick 'n' Dirty" fix since it'll do the job for now and I can
reconsider the more elegant solution at my leisure when the novelty of
laying out a hose to an open backdoor on a regular basis starts wearing
thin.

The modest pumping rate of 16.5 litre per minute might seem a little
marginal but compared to using a wet 'n' dry vac cannister as a 20 litre
bucket in a 'One bucket chain', it's a much superior solution, even
allowing for the 15 minute per half hour duty cycle limitation[1].

The pump is specified to produce 15psi/1 bar of pressure but whether
that's at the rated 16.5 litres per minute flow rate or just the barest
of trickles is not spelled out. I guess I can check that out later with a
measuring jug and a stopwatch once I've bought the extra 10 metre length
of garden hose to let me pump the sump out to the back door. Whatever
flow rate I measure out of the backdoor will obviously be improved upon
with the more direct exit route onto the driveway by the front door so
it'll be interesting to get some measure of the pump's performance even
under this less than ideal condition.

[1] My problem is less to do with a sudden and overwhelming inundation
than it is to do with a slow but persistent rise of water level that
needs to be kept at bay for hours on end. A high capacity pump would
spend most of its time idle, waiting for the level to rise sufficiently
in the sump for it to have something to work with. I think this little
pump will suffice but if I'm wrong, I'll have only 'wasted £20.39' in
discovering the error and it's easy enough to purchase a better one later
on when one has proof positive of the need for a more expensive pump.

--
Johnny B Good