Whale Gulper Pump 220 used for vacuuming water

[SteveSarabande]

I want a pump that I can install under the sink and use like a vacuum cleaner around the boat. I have seen one on a boat I was on, it had a long hose that could be used to suck water out of bilges, engine compartments, lockers.

In my boat it would need to a 4m pipe on the inlet that would need to self prime and suck air at times. The vertical lift of the inlet would be no more than 1m.

Would this one work, Whale Gulper Pump 220, http://www.whalepumps.com/marine/pr...=10021&Product_ID=10037&FriendlyID=Gulper-220

What does "Self-priming up to 3 m (10 ft)" mean, is that a vertical 3m or just the length of the pipe

 

[vyv_cox]

I cannot see any reason why not. We use a manual pump of this type as an emergency bilge pump http://coxengineering.sharepoint.com/Pages/bilgepump.aspx A diaphragm pump will self prime and to some extent pump air. The self priming statement means vertical height, although system resistance in a very long hose might reduce that a bit.

 

[Capt Popeye]

Not to answer your request in anyway, sorry, but just to flag up the caution about using any pump not designed /built for fuel oil to pump up said fuel oil etc

 

[prv]

I'm about to do that very thing. It will be fine.

Ariam has a shower sump in the heads compartment. We never actually use it as a shower, as the rest of the compartment is not adequately waterproofed and our water capacity is quite limited, but it is quite handy when cleaning the place at the end of a trip. Obviously a shower sump requires a discharge pump, which the boat has.

When moving the pump to a better location last year, I added a T-valve and a coil of clear hose to provide exactly the kind of "bilge hoover" you're thinking of. Ariam has lots of small compartments which don't fully drain to where the bilge pump pickups are, and said pickups don't collect the last dregs anyway.

So far so good, except that the pump in question is not a diaphragm type. It's apparently sensitive to crud in the water, and has a small filter mounted in the inlet hose. Who on earth decided this was a good choice for a shower sump, I have no idea. Anyway, the pump stopped sucking last week, I cleaned out the filter (which was solid with bilge crud) and it still didn't really go, so I decided it was about time to replace it with the correct kind of pump for this situation. I have a Gulper 220 sitting on the table (£65 delivered, via Ebay) and will be installing it next weekend.

Pete

 

[superheat6k]

I have used the Gulper for about 18 months as engine room hoover and this doubles as fwd shower sump drain pump, with some simple cable clips for the suction pipe nozzle. Due to the flexing of the suction hose I use I find the last dregs don't quite clear the pipe, so it won't clear the last few mm of water, as the suction pulses with each stroke, and once it is drawing air the fluid falls back past the air.

One note of caution - the Gulper flap valves don't like any solid muck in them - the pump just stops pumping, so I installed a simple inline strainer a few inches before the pump inlet, then periodically I have to clear out the detritus it collects.