Solar Pond Pump Kits
by Chris - January 5th, 2011.Filed under: Solar Products. Tagged as: solar pond pump, solar pond pumps, solar pond pumps kits, solar power pond pump, solar powered pond pump, solar powered pond pumps, very small pond pump.
In concert with solar powered fountains, there has been a huge proliferation of solar pond pumps and solar pond pump kits. If you are confused by the difference, solar powered fountains are complete, ready to go units. Solar pond pumps are used to replace traditional pumps used in ponds and other large water ornaments.
If you are looking for a solar pond pump to replace your existing pump, or simply to add a new water feature to your pond, then you’ll need to be sure that the solar pond pump, solar panel, and batteries are all properly sized to one another. There are many solar pond pumps kits on the market to simplify this process, but many of the cheaper kits include a very small pond pump which are often not properly sized.
Sizing the Solar Pond Pump
Start with the power rating of the solar pond pump. I’ll assume that you already have an idea of how many gallons per minute or per hour you need. For instance, a common low-budget solar pond pump is a 6 volt, 45 gallon per hour pump. These are used in birdbaths and small ornamental solar powered fountains. For a larger pond, you would probably want to go with an 18 volt, 200 gallon per hour solar pond pump.
Sizing the Solar Panel
Once you have the solar pond pump specified, you need to check and make sure the solar panel is properly sized. This is where unscrupulous manufacturers of solar pond pump kits will skimp. A solar panel’s rated voltage needs to meet or exceed the solar pond pumps rated voltage. Additionally, the power rating for the solar panel should be two to three times higher than the power rating of the solar pond pump.
For example, if your pump is rated at 2.5 watts, the solar panel should be rated at 5 to 7.5 watts. The reason for this is because the solar pond pump is rated at the power level that it takes to operate correctly. The power rating for the solar panel represent the maximum power output it will produce in full sunlight. These power ratings are quite different.
Sizing the Batteries
Batteries are not completely necessary for a solar pond pump. However, they will make your solar pond pump run much better. Another reason that you want the solar panel to be rated two to three times higher than the pump is because you’ll want the extra power to get stored into the batteries.
While not technically correct, a good rule of thumb for properly sizing the batteries is to multiply the batteries voltage and amp-hour (AH) capacity to determine how long they’ll run the solar pond pump. For example, if your solar pond pump is rated at 6 volts and 2.5 watts and the batteries that come with it form a 6 volt 1 amp-hour (or 1000 mAH) battery, then the batteries have:
This means they should run your solar pond pump for:
They won’t actually run it for this long, but this gives you a ‘theoretical’ maximum run time on the batteries.
As a final thought, be sure to read my comments on the warranty for solar powered fountains. The same concerns apply to solar pond pumps.
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January 7th, 2011 at 5:47 am
Nice one, there is actually some great points on this post some of my associates will find this worthwhile, will send them a link, thanks
January 7th, 2011 at 6:13 pm
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January 18th, 2011 at 10:23 am
Hello.This post was really fascinating, particularly since I was looking for thoughts on this subject last Saturday.
January 21st, 2011 at 9:34 pm
Great information! I’ve been looking for something like this for a while now. Thanks!
January 22nd, 2011 at 2:04 am
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January 23rd, 2011 at 1:06 pm
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January 23rd, 2011 at 6:13 pm
I do agree with all the ideas you have presented in your post. They are very convincing and will definitely work. Thanks for the post.
March 29th, 2011 at 11:07 pm
Solar Pond Pump kit is really a one of the leading thing for the effective pond work. And this one really increase the power of our solar fountain. I really like the content of this post. Thanks for the sharing some regarding information.
April 8th, 2011 at 12:18 pm
Mr. Troutner, thanks so much for putting in the time required to make a site like this… I found it while researching a way to make a solar-powered fountain… Fountain today, maybe house tomorrow
Don’t know if you can answer questions or not, but I’ll ask anyway:
I bought a ready-made kit (DC pump, solar panel, battery) to make a very small fountain, and I’m suspecting the panel is not large enough to properly charge the battery *and* run the fountain during the day. To complicate matters, I also added to the length of cable running from the panel and the battery (so I could put the panel on the roof instead of on a stake pushed into the ground). I suspect the panel has a diode to control the charge, since there is no separate charge controller.
My questions are: Does increasing the cable length decrease the charge actually getting to the battery? And, the original panel is rated at 8 watts, would 25 watt panel as a replacement work, or will that fry the battery?
I can send the link to the kit if you want to try answering this…
Signed,
Trying solar in NC
April 8th, 2011 at 3:42 pm
Hey there NC,
Good question! Thanks for asking!
Yes, adding cable length will add resistance. It won’t stop your battery from charging, it just makes it charge slightly slower.
Upgrading to a 25 watt panel would definitely help. However, potentially frying your batteries is a concern.
You’ll want to ensure that the upgraded panel is rated to output the same voltage as the existing panel. Watts = Voltage X Current. You want your voltage to stay the same so that everything is compatible. This means any increase in wattage will result in extra current for charging the batteries and running the pump at the same time.
Be sure to read my latest post on How to Build a Simple Solar System to figure out how to make sure the panel won’t fry your batteries. In a nutshell: You need to figure out what the 20-hour amp-hour rating of the batteries are. You’ll want to make sure that the maximum current going into the batteries does not exceed 1.5% of the amp-hour rating of the batteries.
To put it mathematically:
Max Solar Panel Current <= Pump Operating Current + 1.5% Batteries Amp-hour rating
‘<=’ means less than or equal to
Cheers!
Chris Troutner
April 10th, 2011 at 5:47 pm
Okay, I’m confused, which is not unusual for this visually-oriented graphic designer… but I try!
I’m not sure I have the information needed to make the decision, can you help me with that? Below I’ll list all the info available to me about this kit:
DC Pump:
131 gallons per hour / 780 litters per hour
Voltage range: 6-9V DC
(couldn’t discern ampere info)
Solar Panel:
Rated power output: 8w
Nominal voltage output: 18-20 volts
Nominal current output: 444mA
Battery:
12v 2.6Ah/20hr
Voltage Regulation:
–standby: 13.4-13.8v
–cyclic: 14.6-14.8v
Initial Current: .78A max
The cable between the panel and battery was originally 5m/16.4ft, I added 15ft to it, for a total of 31.4ft.
April 20th, 2011 at 6:48 pm
Hey Gina,
I thought your question deserved a detailed answer, so I wrote up a post here:
http://thesolarpowerexpert.com/upgrading-a-solar-pond-pump-kit/
Cheers!
Chris
August 13th, 2011 at 5:41 am
Pond keepers always find helpful information online about fish pond pumps and for me using a solar powered pond pump instead of a wired one can save lot of money. It also makes it a lot easier to start a pond at home.
August 17th, 2011 at 6:32 pm
Hi, I purchased a 3 tier fountain and I bought a seperate solar kit which is made by Jebao 3.5W with Battery storage and it didn’t work. Red light kept coming on. So what other pump would you recommend?
Thanks,
Louisiana
August 18th, 2011 at 3:18 am
Hey Becky,
Great question! I started a forum thread based on your question. Check it out!
http://thesolarpowerexpert.com/forum/#/20110818/jebao-fountain-upgrade-804815/
Chris Troutner
February 7th, 2012 at 4:21 pm
When you are looking for a perfect pond pump for your pond consider all of the different aspects of pond pump merchandise on the market today, select carefully, and you will be very pleased with the results. Features such as maximum heads, maximum output, head ratings, flow pumps, pressure pumps, standard voltage verses low voltage pond pumps, submersible verses external pond pumps, energy efficiency and much more should be considered.