Abstract:
Unlike other planets, 75% of the earth is covered with water. All living creations that breathe consumes water. Even 60% of our body is consisted of water. Water is used for drinking, sanitation and bathing, running mega industries as a heat exchanger and for agricultural irrigation applications. However, the distribution of water is uneven. Some exist as surface water, another found beneath the ground collected by rains seeping in to it. From ancient times, peoples strive to make water easily found around so as to make life very simple. They devised different methods of transporting water from its source to the place where they wanted. For example, bucket and rope on a windlass, Persian wheels are some of the old technologies used. This days, there are advanced water lifting technologies like submersible pumps that can lift water at a considerable depth and centrifugal pumps that supply water to mega cities. However, advanced electromechanical pumping devices are not utilized in rural areas where electric facilities are not available. One best practise of water lifting specially in wells is Hand pumps. Hand pumps function by displacing water using a foot valve and rod mechanisms inside riser pipe by manually cranking the handle. The technologies have disadvantages as it needs frequent replacements and maintenance services. To increase the performance of the hand pumps and to get better solutions, this thesis is aimed to integrate the hand pump with the solar photovoltaic DC drive slider crank mechanism that can robust the efficiency and reliability of the pump for its intended use especially for agricultural irrigation practices for developing countries like Ethiopia which are found under the tropical solar belt. Relevant literature reviews states PV driven power pumping has excellent economical profitability and performance capabilities unlike diesel driven pumps for remote irrigation applications with remarkable life span even after 20 years of service only show 5% degradation. Therefore applying solar PV systems for water lifting from wells is becoming a field of research interest though there is a gap in advancing cost effective deep well pumps like hand pumps. Based on location background solar sizing, kinematic, dynamic, stress analysis are analysed. Using 1.5KW frequency inverter and 3KW variable induction motor, power is supplied to drive the pump on a 12 meter wood structure test stand. At three different heads seven experiments are taken and data are analysed by linear regression model. Flow characteristics, performance volumetric, mechanical and overall efficiencies are investigated. The total investment cost of the pump requires only 40000birr with a payback period of 7 years leaving sensible profit.