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Hand pumps are manually operated
pump A pump is a device that moves fluids (liquids or gases), or sometimes slurries, by mechanical action, typically converted from electrical energy into hydraulic energy. Pumps can be classified into three major groups according to the method they u ...
s; they use human power and
mechanical advantage Mechanical advantage is a measure of the force amplification achieved by using a tool, mechanical device or machine system. The device trades off input forces against movement to obtain a desired amplification in the output force. The model for t ...
to move fluids or air from one place to another. They are widely used in every country in the world for a variety of industrial, marine, irrigation and leisure activities. There are many different types of hand pump available, mainly operating on a piston, diaphragm or rotary vane principle with a check valve on the entry and exit ports to the chamber operating in opposing directions. Most hand pumps are either
piston pump A piston pump is a type of positive displacement pump where the high-pressure seal reciprocates with the piston. Piston pumps can be used to move liquids or compress gases. They can operate over a wide range of pressures. High pressure operation ...
s or
plunger pump A plunger pump is a type of positive displacement pump where the high-pressure seal is stationary and a smooth cylindrical plunger slides through the seal. This makes them different from piston pumps and allows them to be used at higher pressures. ...
s, and are positive displacement. Hand pumps are commonly used in
developing countries A developing country is a sovereign state with a lesser developed industrial base and a lower Human Development Index (HDI) relative to other countries. However, this definition is not universally agreed upon. There is also no clear agreem ...
for both community supply and self-supply of water and can be installed on
borehole A borehole is a narrow shaft bored in the ground, either vertically or horizontally. A borehole may be constructed for many different purposes, including the extraction of water ( drilled water well and tube well), other liquids (such as petro ...
s or hand-dug
wells Wells most commonly refers to: * Wells, Somerset, a cathedral city in Somerset, England * Well, an excavation or structure created in the ground * Wells (name) Wells may also refer to: Places Canada *Wells, British Columbia England * Wells ...
.


History

One sort of pump once common worldwide was a hand-powered water pump, or 'pitcher pump'. It was commonly installed over community
water well A well is an excavation or structure created in the ground by digging, driving, or drilling to access liquid resources, usually water. The oldest and most common kind of well is a water well, to access groundwater in underground aquifers. Th ...
s in the days before piped water supplies. In parts of Britain and Ireland, it was often called ''the parish pump''. Though such community pumps are no longer common, people still used the expression ''parish pump'' to describe a place or forum where matters of local interest are discussed. Because water from pitcher pumps is drawn directly from the soil, it is more prone to contamination. If such water is not filtered and purified, consumption of it might lead to gastrointestinal or other water-borne diseases. A notorious case is the
1854 Broad Street cholera outbreak Events January–March * January 4 – The McDonald Islands are discovered by Captain William McDonald aboard the ''Samarang''. * January 6 – The fictional detective Sherlock Holmes is perhaps born. * January 9 – The ...
. At the time it was not known how cholera was transmitted, but physician
John Snow John Snow (15 March 1813 – 16 June 1858) was an English physician and a leader in the development of anaesthesia and medical hygiene. He is considered one of the founders of modern epidemiology, in part because of his work in tracing the so ...
suspected contaminated water and had the handle of the public pump he suspected removed; the outbreak then subsided. Modern hand-operated community pumps are considered the most sustainable low-cost option for safe water supply in resource-poor settings, often in rural areas in developing countries. A hand pump opens access to deeper groundwater that is often not polluted and also improves the safety of a well by protecting the water source from contaminated buckets. Pumps such as the Afridev pump are designed to be cheap to build and install, and easy to maintain with simple parts. However, scarcity of spare parts for these type of pumps in some regions of Africa has diminished their utility for these areas.


Types


Suction and lift hand pumps

Suction and lift are important considerations when pumping fluids. Suction is the vertical distance between the fluid to be pumped and the centre of the pump, while lift is the vertical distance between the pump and the delivery point. The depth from which a hand pump will suck is limited by atmospheric pressure to an operating depth of less than 7 meters. The height to which a hand pump will lift is governed by the ability of the pump and the operator to lift the weight in the delivery pipe. Thus the same pump and operator will be able to achieve a greater lift with a smaller diameter pipe than they could with a larger diameter pipe. In addition to their use in drawing water from shallow groundwater sources for water supplies, another version of the hand-powered suction pump, with low lift and high delivery, was developed in the later 19th century for use as a ship's bilge pump (for smaller coastal vessels) and as a building site contractor's pump. It was known as a deluge pump. One manufacturer who illustrated this product from the late 1880s onwards into the early 20th century was Goulds Manufacturing Co.


Force Pump

Where it is necessary to raise water to a height above that to which a suction or lift pump will operate effectively (about 7 metres), or to raise the pressure so that it will exit a nozzle with a strong force, such as through a fire hose, a force pump may be used. As with a suction pump, in its manual form it relies on an operator to pump a handle. The difference is however that after the water is sucked through the lower valve (as a result of raising the piston that is attached to the handle), its means of exit is via a pipe or nozzle in the side of the main cylinder. The water, once it has been drawn up above the lower valve and trapped there, is forced out the exit when the piston or plunger is pushed down again on the next stroke.


Siphon

A siphon (or syphon) at its simplest is a bent tube, with one end placed in the water to be moved, and the other end into the vessel to receive the water. The receiving vessel must be at a lower level than the supplying vessel. Water will always try to find its lowest level. Using this principle, very simple pumps with plastic or rubber bulb with flap valve at each end are used for emptying fuel or water cans into tanks. Once the bulb is full, the fluid will flow without further effort from the higher to the lower container. Many hand pumps will allow the passage of fluid through them in the direction of flow and diaphragm pumps are particularly good at this. Thus where the levels are correct large volumes of liquid such as swimming pools can be emptied with very little effort and no expensive energy use.


Chain pump

A chain pump is made of an endless chain carrying a series of discs that descend into the water, and then ascend inside a tube, carrying with them a large quantity of water. They are a simply made, old hand-powered pumping technology In the 18th century they were used as ship's bilge pumps.


Direct action

Direct action hand pumps have a pumping rod that is moved up and down, directly by the user, discharging water. Direct action handpumps are easy to install and maintain but are limited to the maximum column of water a person can physically lift of up to 15 m. Examples of direct action pumps include the canzee pump and the EMAS pump.


Deep wells

Deep well hand pumps are used for high lifts of more than 15 m. The weight of the column of water is too great to be lifted directly and some form of mechanical advantage system such as a lever or flywheel is used. High lift pumps need to be stronger and sturdier to cope with the extra stresses. The installation, maintenance and repair of deep well hand pumps is more complicated than with other hand pumps. A deep well hand pump theoretically has no limit to which it can extract water. In practice, the depth is limited by the physical power a human being can exert in lifting the column of water, which is around 30 m


Diaphragm

Diaphragm pumps have the advantage that they pump relatively lightly due to the lack of pulling rods and are corrosion resistant. Their disadvantage is that they need a specific length of tubing and high quality rubber diaphragms, which are costly and are relatively inefficient due to the extra work needed to deform the diaphragm. Rubber diaphragms will eventually leak and need to be replaced. Because this is usually complicated and costly, diaphragm pumps operating in poor rural areas are often abandoned once the diaphragm wears out.


Progressive cavity

Progressive cavity pump Progressive may refer to: Politics * Progressivism, a political philosophy in support of social reform ** Progressivism in the United States, the political philosophy in the American context * Progressive realism, an American foreign policy pa ...
s consist of a single helix rotor inserted into a double helix stator. As the rotor is turned, the voids in the stator are screwed upwards along the axis of rotation. Progressive cavity pumps can have complicated gearing mechanisms and are difficult for local pump technicians to maintain and repair. A rope and washer pump is a type of progressive cavity hand pump.


Range of lift

The range of lift of different types of hand pumps is given below:


Hand pumps and access to clean water

In November 2002, the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights asserted that access to clean, safe water goes beyond the classification of water as an economic commodity. The committee stressed the fundamental right of sufficient access to clean water for both domestic and personal use. “The human right to water is indispensable for leading a life in human dignity.” With this in mind, manufacturers of water pumps, like those produced by GOAZ Development in Malaysia, have a wide range of potential customers: governments, non- governmental organizations, women’s groups, community groups and other organizations of various types interested to developing access to groundwater.


Village level operation and maintenance

VLOM, meaning
Village Level Operation and Maintenance Village Level Operation and Maintenance (VLOM) is an unofficial classification given to handpumps used in developing countries that require minimal maintenance or that can be done "at the village level." Not all maintenance and repair needs to be d ...
, is a term first used during the UNDP and World Bank Rural Water Supply Hand Pumps Project. This project lasted from 1981 to 1991, and studied the availability and maintenance of hand pump systems. 40 kinds of hand pumps were analyzed in laboratories, and the performance of 2700 hand pumps was analyzed in the field. The study established that centralized maintenance structure was a cause of many problems in hand pump programs, and that maintenance at the village level is best. The VLOM concept was initially applied to hardware, with the following aims: the possibility of maintenance by village workers, having spare parts manufactured within the country to make sure spare parts are available, endurance in the field, and cost effectiveness. With time, more emphasis was placed on maintenance management. Thus, the “M” came to represent “management of maintenance.” Therefore, greater community choice of service, who will service, and financial accountability by the community to the caretakers of the pump have gained more importance within the VLOM concept. The Swiss Centre Resource Centre and Consultancies for Development, Skat, continues to work on design and support structure for hand pump development as the host of Secretariat of the Rural Water Supply Network (RWSN).


Hand pump development projects

An example of a Bank funded project that highlights many issues of hand pumps is the 1992 Mali Rural Supply Project. The project brought approximately 230 rural villages inclined towards periods of drought, and 228,000 people access to safe water.World Bank, Operations Evaluation Departmen
Sustaining Rural Water Systems:The Case of Mali
Autumn 1997, Retrieved on 25 April 2011
The project is notable in its attempt to bring responsibility for the upkeep of the pumps to the villages themselves. The complexity of the pumps is a fundamental problem for all programs of this kind, as well as the quality of the pumps given the heavy demands of a village. A 1994 study, also Bank funded, of the endurance of hand pumps in Africa showed that only 41 to 51 percent of hand pumps were still functioning. The Mali Rural Supply Project did positively affect the longevity of hand pumps by doing the following: establishing local depots of spare parts, training individuals to maintain pumps, scheduling inspections from officials of the project, forming local committees and recruiting volunteers. Much attention has been given to the benefits of the use of hand pumps in developing nations, as opposed to more traditional methods. In communities reliant on groundwater, through a borehole or well, the utilization of a bucket and rope system has hygienic issues. The bucket and rope system is not compatible with the use of a cover slab, which can prevent pollution of groundwater. In addition, unwashed hands can contaminate the bucket and rope. Hand pumps avoid these issues and are therefore preferable. However, villagers did not stop using traditional means of gathering water during this project. This was especially true when rain provided villagers with shallow water sources. These shallow wells were often easier to access than the wells with hand pumps. When faced with the option of using near surface water or traveling to the hand pumps, many villagers chose the former. In addition, animal contamination and the mixing of groundwater and surface water were factors in sub- par sanitation. Another issue that faced the project was the fact that the pumps could only provide a maximum of 20 liters of water per person day, which required an unrealistic staggering of water retrieval. In addition, many depots withdrew support after the donated inventory ran out, the contracts given to consultants eventually closed, and maintenance was not kept up to a high standard. A June 2008 study, conducted by the World Bank, Review of Effectiveness of Rural Water Supply Schemes in India, showed that approximately 45 percent of rural piped water projects focused on breakdown maintenance instead of scheduled maintenance. In addition, about 20% were reported to be in “serious or somewhat serious neglect of maintenance.”


Hand pump affordability in rural developing areas

Whether or not a project to use hand pumps in a developing country is an affordable alternative certainly depends on who or what organization pays the bill. However, the example of a 1992 Ethiopia aid project illustrates what the cost would be for the locals who benefit from the project. This example relates to isolated, rural communities in the rural South. 165 Afridevs hand pumps were imported from India. Each cost approximately US$700, including clearing, transportation and installation. These pumps serve around 55 households each. At that time, the World Bank established that the average per capita income in Ethiopia was $120. A hand pump, first produced by researchers at the
University of Waterloo The University of Waterloo (UWaterloo, UW, or Waterloo) is a public research university with a main campus in Waterloo, Ontario Waterloo is a city in the Canadian province of Ontario. It is one of three cities in the Regional Municipality ...
and then refined at the University of Malaya, has been designed with local access to parts in mind. Materials readily available, like a rope covered in chicken fat or leather belt, can be used to ensure maintenance. GOAZ Development sells these pumps from $160 to $300. Therefore, 11% of one’s annual income would go towards accessing clean water. This is over twice as much as the 5% that the World Bank stated should be the maximum amount paid by a family.


Gallery

File:A beautiful hand pump in village Bado, Sindh.jpg, A hand pump in village Bado, near Shikarpur
Sindh Sindh (; ; ur, , ; historically romanized as Sind) is one of the four provinces of Pakistan. Located in the southeastern region of the country, Sindh is the third-largest province of Pakistan by land area and the second-largest province ...
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Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...
. File:Pump-tah.jpg, Hand-operated, reciprocating, positive displacement, water pump in
Košice Košice ( , ; german: Kaschau ; hu, Kassa ; pl, Коszyce) is the largest city in eastern Slovakia. It is situated on the river Hornád at the eastern reaches of the Slovak Ore Mountains, near the border with Hungary. With a population of app ...
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Ťahanovce Ťahanovce ( hu, Hernádtihany, ) is a borough (city ward) of the city of Košice, Slovakia. The first written mention about Ťahanovce is dated back to 1263. It was an independent village until 1969 when it was connected with Košice. Ťahanovce ...
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Slovakia Slovakia (; sk, Slovensko ), officially the Slovak Republic ( sk, Slovenská republika, links=no ), is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, Hungary to the south, Austria to the s ...
(walking beam pump). File:DrawingWater.jpg, A child drawing water from a ''hand pump'',
Oklahoma City Oklahoma City (), officially the City of Oklahoma City, and often shortened to OKC, is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, it ranks 20th among United States cities in population, a ...
, Oklahoma, USA 1939. File:Pumping water in Wilder, Fentress County TN 1942.gif, The sole water supply of this section of
Wilder, Tennessee Wilder is an unincorporated community in Fentress County, Tennessee, United States. The community is in the Cumberland Mountains near Cookeville, Tennessee. History Early development Wilder was a planned company town, intended to provide housin ...
, USA 1942. File:La Russell Water Pump.jpg, A 1904 community ''hand pump'' surviving modern encroachment in 2010 on the middle of Main Street at
La Russell, Missouri La Russell is a city in Jasper County, Missouri, United States. The population was 134 at the 2020 census. It is part of the Joplin, Missouri Metropolitan Statistical Area. Geography La Russell is located in the valley of the Spring River, adj ...
, USA. File:Village Pump at Thorpe Abbotts.jpg, The covered Village Pump in
Thorpe Abbots Thorpe is a variant of the Middle English word ''thorp'', meaning hamlet or small village. Thorpe may refer to: People * Thorpe (surname), including a list of people with the name Places England *Thorpe, Cumbria *Thorpe, Derbyshire * Thorpe, ...
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Norfolk Norfolk () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and south-west, and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the No ...
, England File:Fotothek df pk 0000135 002.jpg, Hand pump in use during reconstruction of Germany after
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
File:BerlinWaterPump.jpg, Hand-operated, water pump in
Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
, Germany File:Afridev.jpg, A rural handpump in
Liberia Liberia (), officially the Republic of Liberia, is a country on the West African coast. It is bordered by Sierra Leone to Liberia–Sierra Leone border, its northwest, Guinea to its north, Ivory Coast to its east, and the Atlantic Ocean ...
. File:01 Bruges - Fontaine - JPG1.jpg, A city handpump in
Bruges, Belgium Bruges ( , nl, Brugge ) is the capital and largest City status in Belgium, city of the Provinces of Belgium, province of West Flanders in the Flemish Region of Belgium, in the northwest of the country, and the sixth-largest city of the countr ...
. File:Well Pekkatori Raahe 20160731.jpg, Hand pump in
Raahe Raahe (; sv, Brahestad; ) is a town and municipality of Finland. Founded by Swedish statesman and Governor General of Finland Count Per Brahe the Younger in 1649, it is one of 10 historic wooden towns (or town centers) remaining in Finland. Examp ...
, Finland File:Handschwengelpumpe Lobstädter Straße Leipzig 06.JPG, Hand pump in
Leipzig Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as wel ...
, Germany File:Retro Hand Pump.JPG, Hand Pump carved by
Bijay Boghani Bijay is a given name. Notable people with this name include: *Bijay Biswaal (born 1964), Indian painter *Bijay Chand Mahtab (1881–1941), Maharaja of Bardhaman *Bijay Chhetri (born 2001), Indian footballer *Bijay Kumar Gachhadar (born 1954), Nepa ...
in
chalk Chalk is a soft, white, porous, sedimentary carbonate rock. It is a form of limestone composed of the mineral calcite and originally formed deep under the sea by the compression of microscopic plankton that had settled to the sea floor. Chalk ...
File:Old hand water pump.jpg, Old hand water pump (c. 1924) at the Colored School in
Alapaha, Georgia Alapaha is a town in Berrien County, Georgia, United States, along the Alapaha River. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 481. Alapaha developed from a trade settlement on the site of a Seminole village with the same name. The p ...
, US; typical of the period and the area File:Ebenezer, GA, US (06).jpg, Hand pump at
Ebenezer, Georgia Ebenezer, also known as New Ebenezer, is a ghost town in Effingham County, Georgia, United States, along the banks of Ebenezer Creek. It was listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places as Ebenezer Townsite and Jerusalem Lutheran Chu ...
, USA File:Handpump Repairing service in Bohardih Bilaspur Chhattisgarh.jpg, An India Mark II handpump in Bohardih, near Bilaspur,
Chhattisgarh Chhattisgarh (, ) is a landlocked state in Central India. It is the ninth largest state by area, and with a population of roughly 30 million, the seventeenth most populous. It borders seven states – Uttar Pradesh to the north, Madhya Prade ...
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India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
.


See also

*
Ram Pump A plunger pump is a type of positive displacement pump where the high-pressure seal is stationary and a smooth cylindrical plunger slides through the seal. This makes them different from piston pumps and allows them to be used at higher pressures. ...
*
Bush pump The bush pump, also known as the Zimbabwe bush pump, is a positive displacement pump based on lever action used to extract water from a bore hole well. It is the standard hand pump in Zimbabwe, and is used in Zimbabwe and Namibia. There are appr ...
*
Drinking water Drinking water is water that is used in drink or food preparation; potable water is water that is safe to be used as drinking water. The amount of drinking water required to maintain good health varies, and depends on physical activity level, a ...
* India Mark II *
Rope pump A rope pump is a kind of pump where a loose hanging rope is lowered into a well and drawn up through a long pipe with the bottom immersed in water. On the rope, round disks or knots matching the diameter of the pipe are attached which pull the wa ...
*
Treadle pump A treadle pump is a human-powered suction pump that sits on top of a well and is used for irrigation. It is designed to lift water from a depth of seven metres or less. The pumping is activated by stepping up and down on a treadle, which are levers ...
*
Water supply Water supply is the provision of water by public utilities, commercial organisations, community endeavors or by individuals, usually via a system of pumps and pipes. Public water supply systems are crucial to properly functioning societies. Thes ...
*
Water well A well is an excavation or structure created in the ground by digging, driving, or drilling to access liquid resources, usually water. The oldest and most common kind of well is a water well, to access groundwater in underground aquifers. Th ...


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hand Pump Pumps Appropriate technology Water supply Human power