Submersible pump selection hints

A submersible pump specification can create problems for many people ... you will hear terms like maximum head, maximum flow and pressure drop when people talk of submersible pump selection for ponds and water features. We help you out here. Your submersible pump .... In any pond, fountain or water feature it is generally necessary to install a submersible pump to achieve the following. A submersible pump provides oxygen for fish ... the water pump in circulating the water over a waterfall or through a spray or a drop from one level to another allows oxygen to become dissolved in the circulating water.

A submersible pump provides oxygen not just for the wellbeing of the fish but also to maintain suitable conditions for biofilter bacteria. The submersible pump used in fish ponds must run 24 hours per day otherwise those beneficial bacteria in your biofilter will die from oxygen starvation. Removing waste chemicals secreted by fish in a water environment needs lot of oxygen which must be dissolved in the water.

Submersible pump ... selection introduction

The points briefly discussed here are considered in far greater detail by following the pond pump links on this page. This is what you need to look for and learn a bit about ... your dealer may not know much more than you so beware
A submersible pump of the type we will discuss is used extensively in all types of water features. Such a submersible pump is referred to as a centrifugal submersible pump ... quite simply this means the submersible pump has an impellor that spins around and uses centrifugal force to deliver water.

They are low in cost to manufacture and hard to damage because even if the outlet from the submersible pump becomes blocked no damage occurs. In this way flow control is made easy by restricting the outlet pipe using a valve or even by clamping the pipe partly shut.

Using a submersible pump in ponds means using a submersible pump in something like 99% of all circumstances ... the pump would normally lie just off the bottom of the pond, completely submersed. Because they are submersed the height a submersible pump needs to pump against is measured from the water surface and not from the bottom of the pond. This height is normally referred to as "head" in submersible pump jargon.

Think of a submersible pump as being able to provide a fixed amount of energy to circulating water. Think of this constant energy derived from the electric motor as being shared out in 2 ways .... submersible pump energy in part 1 is used to pump volume and the submersible pump energy part 2 is used to lift that volume. If you give larger share of this energy to volume then the lift has to be less

Here's a simple analogy .. you would need the same energy if you carried one bucket of water up a flight of stairs 20 feet high as you would if you carried 2 buckets of water up a flight of stairs 10 feet high. A submersible pump is just like this ... if you want to pump more volume higher then get a bigger submersible pump. One size cannot fit all situations for the simple reason the energy from the pump motor is constant in most cases.

You will now understand that to specify and buy a submersible pump that will do a good job it is necessary to know how much water is to be pumped and how high that volume of water must be pumped. Without both bits of information you cannot specify a submersible pump accurately.

Now if you want to really explore this further follow the pond pump links on this page ... but one word of warning here. If you see words like maximum head and maximum volume stated for a submersible pump these terms have little practical significance and buying on this basis will lead to disappointment and wasted money.