How effective are they, obviously they will only work when the sun
shines? Also how long will the last, do they break down quite quickly,
or are they reliable? Any other help, such as good source,would be
appreciated. It is not practical to run electricity to the proposed pond.
TIA
--
All replies to this email address are deleted on receipt.

Common sense, not common market.

"Broadback" wrote in message
...
How effective are they, obviously they will only work when the sun shines?
Also how long will the last, do they break down quite quickly, or are they
reliable? Any other help, such as good source,would be appreciated. It
is not practical to run electricity to the proposed pond.
TIA

Ours was very good, we propose to re-instate it. We bought it many years
ago, they're probably much cheaper now. It stopped when the filter became
clogged.

We're also going to install a solar hot waterwith a solar powered pump.

Mary

"Steve Firth" wrote in message
.. .

We have a solar system like that in Italy which I built. The pump used
is an LVM "Niagara" which gives a 1 bar head, more than adequate for a
circulating pump in such a system and also useful for a fountain. The
pumps are submersible and continually rated so should be fine for use in
a garden pond. They can either be dropped into the water "as is" or
installed as an inline pump.

Ours was/is submersible and the claim was that it would raise water to a
metre.We only raised it to about two feet, so that it then trickled over
stones back into the pond.

I found that they work well with a 40W photovoltaic panel, cost of pump
and panel is about £150-170 depending on where you shop.

Ours was nothing like as much as that - including the panel.

They must be cheaper now.We got a panel which trickle charges the caravan
leisure battery in the caravan for £10 from Maplins.

Mary

In message , Broadback
writes
How effective are they, obviously they will only work when the sun
shines? Also how long will the last, do they break down quite quickly,
or are they reliable? Any other help, such as good source,would be
appreciated. It is not practical to run electricity to the proposed pond.
TIA

**** useless

HTH

--
geoff

"raden" wrote in message
...
In message , Broadback
writes
How effective are they, obviously they will only work when the sun shines?
Also how long will the last, do they break down quite quickly, or are they
reliable? Any other help, such as good source,would be appreciated. It
is not practical to run electricity to the proposed pond.
TIA

**** useless

And your experience is?

Mary

HTH

--
geoff

In message , Mary
Fisher writes

"raden" wrote in message
...
In message , Broadback
writes
How effective are they, obviously they will only work when the sun shines?
Also how long will the last, do they break down quite quickly, or are they
reliable? Any other help, such as good source,would be appreciated. It
is not practical to run electricity to the proposed pond.
TIA

**** useless

And your experience is?

Mary

The crap one I bought a few years ago

It looks like they might be a bit better now, from other posts

--
geoff

"raden" wrote in message
...
In message , Mary Fisher
writes

"raden" wrote in message
...
In message , Broadback
writes
How effective are they, obviously they will only work when the sun
shines?
Also how long will the last, do they break down quite quickly, or are
they
reliable? Any other help, such as good source,would be appreciated. It
is not practical to run electricity to the proposed pond.
TIA

**** useless

And your experience is?

Mary

The crap one I bought a few years ago

It looks like they might be a bit better now, from other posts

We bought ours in the late eighties. It was fine.

Mary

--
geoff

"Steve Firth" wrote in message
. ..
Mary Fisher wrote:

"Steve Firth" wrote in message
.. .


I found that they work well with a 40W photovoltaic panel, cost of pump
and panel is about £150-170 depending on where you shop.

Ours was nothing like as much as that - including the panel.

Err yes, but you've already said that your pump would only raise water
to a metre

Fair enough, that's all we wanted. In those days it was quite exceptional, I
would expect things to have got better.


They must be cheaper now.We got a panel which trickle charges the caravan
leisure battery in the caravan for £10 from Maplins.

£130 for a 40W panel is very cheap, £3.25 per watt. For comparison the
unit you bought from Maplins supplies less than 1 watt and therefore
cost if you got it for the price that you said cost you £10 per watt.
The panel that you have, I'm sorry to say will, do almost nothing for
your leisure battery.

Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you but it does. It's our van and our panel,
we know. I can't be bothered looking for the rating but you're making
assumptions which aren't supported.

It may well draw more current from it the battery
at night than it supplies during the day unless you fit it with a
Schottky blocking diode. Even then 80mA isn't really worth bothering
with. I think you may have forgotten how much you paid BTW, Maplin only
seem to list one unit anywhere near that price, a 1W unit at £19.99.

It was a special offer, someone on this group pointed it out. I also bought
an electronic min/max thermometer at the same time which does splendid duty
in the greenhouse.

Look, I'm not an apologist for Maplins, I don't like the place nowadays. But
these two items were exceptions which proved the rule and it was a few years
ago.

"Steve Firth" wrote in message
. ..
Mary Fisher wrote:

£130 for a 40W panel is very cheap, £3.25 per watt. For comparison the
unit you bought from Maplins supplies less than 1 watt and therefore
cost if you got it for the price that you said cost you £10 per watt.
The panel that you have, I'm sorry to say will, do almost nothing for
your leisure battery.

Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you but it does.

It can't. Anymore than a gnat can lift an elephant up a cliff on a
strand of spider silk.

It's our van and our panel, we know. I can't be bothered looking for the
rating but you're making assumptions which aren't supported.

sigh No I'm not.

You don't know the panel, you're making assumptions.

? You would need a current of about an amp to keep a
caravan battery (usually 100AH - 115AH) topped up.

Yes.

There's no way that
you could buy a 12 watt PV panel for £10, ever. And as posted the price
of even a 1 watt panel (which is inadequate even to maintain a charge in
a leisure battery) is twice what you paid.

You believe what I said about what we paid but not the other things I'm
saying. You can't cherry pick - well you can, you aee doing, but it's not
sensible. It was a special offer, some years ago. I asked Spouse about it at
lunchtime, he said it was £10 from Maplins some years ago. It was a bargain.
It works. So if you say it couldn't you're saying that both he and I are
liars, which we're not. Nor are we deluded.

I suspect that you don't have a means of determining the charge in the
battery accurately. FWIW, once charged the leisure battery in my boat
will hold its charge dropping to about 70% over six months if compeltely
isolated. I suggest that like Drivel's scale inhibitor your PV panel
isn't actually doing anything other than providing a security blanket.

You're wrong.

In message , Steve Firth
writes
Mary Fisher wrote:

£130 for a 40W panel is very cheap, £3.25 per watt. For comparison the
unit you bought from Maplins supplies less than 1 watt and therefore
cost if you got it for the price that you said cost you £10 per watt.
The panel that you have, I'm sorry to say will, do almost nothing for
your leisure battery.

Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you but it does.

It can't. Anymore than a gnat can lift an elephant up a cliff on a
strand of spider silk.

It's our van and our panel, we know. I can't be bothered looking for the
rating but you're making assumptions which aren't supported.

sigh No I'm not. You would need a current of about an amp to keep a
caravan battery (usually 100AH - 115AH) topped up. There's no way that
you could buy a 12 watt PV panel for £10, ever.

I did, I bought 5 of them

but that's another story

And as posted the price
of even a 1 watt panel (which is inadequate even to maintain a charge in
a leisure battery) is twice what you paid.

I suspect that you don't have a means of determining the charge in the
battery accurately. FWIW, once charged the leisure battery in my boat
will hold its charge dropping to about 70% over six months if compeltely
isolated. I suggest that like Drivel's scale inhibitor your PV panel
isn't actually doing anything other than providing a security blanket.


--
geoff