Rule 2000 not lifting

[Celestialsailor]

I know manufacturers always over state their specs and I think it may be a combination of that and the fact that my Rule 2000 maybe very old and therefore worn out but here is the scenario…
My Pearson 365 has a bilge run from the 2000 that rises 6’6”s. The run is 15 ft with no kinks, hard bends or sagging hose. When running, I can feel the water in the 1 1/8” hose about 12”s away from the termination point.
Could the pump be worn out? I’ve only had the boat 10 months. It was a plumbing nightmare when I. Ought it and it’s still not pumping right. Is 6’6” rise too much for it?
I was thinking of buying a Rule 3700 and reducing the pump outlet to the 1 1/8” line in order to lift less rated weight. Input from any experienced sailor welcome.

[Bowdrie]

15 feet of 1-1/8th hose, (smooth hose,) will contain ~6lbs of water, and the 6'6" height of column will have ~3psi. against the pump.
The corrugated hose will hold more.
That's a substantial load.
Yes, they cheat the specs, all of them.

[HopCar]

Sometimes the plastic impeller in these pumps will get damaged and the shaft will slip in the impeller. This causes the impeller to spin slower or not at all. If the pump worked when it was new, just buy a new pump.

[cal40john]

Have you ever seen a centrifugal pump with the power reversed? It pumps, but terribly.

It should work -
2 meter rise 13.6 volts, 1300 gpm
https://www.xylem.com/siteassets/bra...0-4000-gph.pdf

[rslifkin]

With a run like that I'd expect your output to be cut down to 40 - 50% of the nominal rating, but it should be able to pump water through that hose. As cal40john said, it's rated for 1300 gph with 2 meters of head. Add some resistance for the hose run itself and you're probably down to 1000 gph or less, but if it can't move water at all, something is wrong with the pump.

[thinwater]

Originally Posted by Bowdrie

15 feet of 1-1/8th hose, (smooth hose,) will contain ~6lbs of water, and the 6'6" height of column will have ~3psi. against the pump.
The corrugated hose will hold more.
That's a substantial load.
Yes, they cheat the specs, all of them.

The diameter is not at all related to the static head. Archimedes Principle. One atmosphere (14.7 psi) is about 34 feet of water. So yes, a little less that 3 psi.

[Bowdrie]

Originally Posted by thinwater

The diameter is not at all related to the static head. Archimedes Principle. One atmosphere (14.7 psi) is about 34 feet of water. So yes, a little less that 3 psi.

True enough, but it does represent a "mass" that must be moved.

[HeywoodJ]

More importantly, the Rule 2000 curve shows a deadhead lift of 21'/6.4m. At 6.5'/2m it should easily provide some flow. If the deadhead was close to 2m then I'd question it, but at 3x that value something is wrong, either with the pump, or with the pump intake, or on the discharge side.

[donradcliffe]

I had a shower sump box with a Rule pump plus a check valve downstream to keep from backflowing when it shut off. If I ever heeled the boat so the pump had air under it, I would then have to drain the output to get it to pump again. Never did get around to replacing it with a strainer and a diaphragm pump, but I should have.

[wholybee]

Have you checked the voltage at the pump? A long run of too small wire, or a bad connection, and it won't get full voltage, and won't achieve rated output.

[ItDepends]

Originally Posted by Bowdrie

True enough, but it does represent a "mass" that must be moved.

No, you are wrong. Pressure doesn't work that way. A larger hose will ALWAYS give you more flow because of lower resistance. The pressure at the bottom is the same no matter what the diameter of the hose.

Trust me on this.

[Celestialsailor]

Originally Posted by HopCar

Sometimes the plastic impeller in these pumps will get damaged and the shaft will slip in the impeller. This causes the impeller to spin slower or not at all. If the pump worked when it was new, just buy a new pump.

Round three, I will check that.

Originally Posted by cal40john

Have you ever seen a centrifugal pump with the power reversed? It pumps, but terribly.

It should work -
2 meter rise 13.6 volts, 1300 gpm
https://www.xylem.com/siteassets/bra...0-4000-gph.pdf

I will check for that. Even though I never initially wired it.

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

I had a shower sump box with a Rule pump plus a check valve downstream to keep from backflowing when it shut off. If I ever heeled the boat so the pump had air under it, I would then have to drain the output to get it to pump again. Never did get around to replacing it with a strainer and a diaphragm pump, but I should have.

I had a johnson bilge pump that did that.

Originally Posted by wholybee

Have you checked the voltage at the pump? A long run of too small wire, or a bad connection, and it won't get full voltage, and won't achieve rated output.

I will check the voltage. Old pump, old wiring.




Believe it of not, when I bought the boat, the rule 2000 was plumbed to the inlet of the manual bilge pump. So when the pump turned on...nothing would happen. I never check the plumbing, just assume there was a block or something. So I thought I would hand pump the bilge out. Then when I stopped hand pumping to rest ( there was about 20 gallons in the bilge from a leaky shaft log while underway) it would continue to expel bilge water. That's when I learned the electric bilge pump was plumbed to the manual inlet and the manual hose disconnected. So now I'm thinking the Rule 2000 has been a problem for some time. I'm still leaning towards a Rule 3700 which is a 1 1/2" outlet but reduced at the outlet to except the 1 1/8" hose. That would increase the flow rate and head weight, guaranteeing a good flow.

[cal40john]

Originally Posted by Celestialsailor

Round three, I will check that.

I will check for that. Even though I never initially wired it.



I had a johnson bilge pump that did that.



I will check the voltage. Old pump, old wiring.




Believe it of not, when I bought the boat, the rule 2000 was plumbed to the inlet of the manual bilge pump. So when the pump turned on...nothing would happen. I never check the plumbing, just assume there was a block or something. So I thought I would hand pump the bilge out. Then when I stopped hand pumping to rest ( there was about 20 gallons in the bilge from a leaky shaft log while underway) it would continue to expel bilge water. That's when I learned the electric bilge pump was plumbed to the manual inlet and the manual hose disconnected. So now I'm thinking the Rule 2000 has been a problem for some time. I'm still leaning towards a Rule 3700 which is a 1 1/2" outlet but reduced at the outlet to except the 1 1/8" hose. That would increase the flow rate and head weight, guaranteeing a good flow.

I'd had my boat for a couple of months and the diaphragm bilge pump never expelled any water, then I decided to add enough water to the bilge to verify the pump actually worked. The previous owner had swapped the inlet and outlet hoses.

[ItDepends]

Originally Posted by Celestialsailor

I'm still leaning towards a Rule 3700 which is a 1 1/2" outlet but reduced at the outlet to except the 1 1/8" hose. That would increase the flow rate and head weight, guaranteeing a good flow.

Reducing the hose diameter will always, always, ALWAYS reduce the flow. You do not understand how pressure works.

Maybe, just maybe, all the time I spent studying fluid dynamics I completely missed the point. Maybe, just maybe, all those piping systems I designed for industrial plants were completely bogus. Maybe you are smarter than every chemical engineer out there, and none of them get how fluid flow, pumps and pipes work.

Want to bet????

Here's the thing, carry your "logic" to the extreme... use 1/4" hose.... really low "head weight" things should pump REALY fast!

"Head weight" by the way just is not a thing...

[wholybee]

Originally Posted by Celestialsailor

I'm still leaning towards a Rule 3700 which is a 1 1/2" outlet but reduced at the outlet to except the 1 1/8" hose. That would increase the flow rate and head weight, guaranteeing a good flow.

The size of the hose has NO difference on a pumps head range. It is the distance between the 2 levels of water, the level in the bilge, and the level of the outlet (or highest point in the line) It isn't even measured from the pump, but the water level.

It is caused by atmospheric pressure, not mass or gravity. The difference in pressure on the surface of water in the bilge, vs pressure on the higher level of water is the force to be overcome by the pump.