Hand crank pump for water filters

[Dale Wambaugh]

Years ago I used a plastic hand-crank pump that was made by Black and Decker and I went searching for something similar. I found a number of tiny hand-crank pumps used by hobbyists to fill and empty the fuel tanks on radio controlled cars and planes. They run around $10 and transfer 1/4oz of liquid per revolution.

I wonder if these pumps could be mated with something like the Seychelle in-line flter, a Sweetwater Siltstopper, Filter and the Platypus filter link to make a simple filter system that is basically a snap-together arrangement.

See these examples of the pumps:
http://www.towerhobbies.com/products/towp1211.html

http://www.atsrcplanes.com/hcfuelpump.htm

[Rick Dreher]

I’ve long thought (especially after pumping a couple gallons) that a crank-motion pump would be easier and faster than the typical linear-motion pump, even those that pump in both directions. I’d think that a filter pump would have to be more robust than small hobby pumps because of the considerable backpressure from the filter, which I’ve been told can be as high as 50 psi for really fine filter media.

Either one is better than the squeeze-bulb filter a hiking buddy once owned :-)

[Dale Wambaugh]

Yes, something with some gear reduction, giving some leverage for pressure and increasing the capacity per revolution. The hobby pumps are 1/4oz per revolution, which comes to something like 800 revs per liter– quite a workout.

[paul johnson]

a wee bit ‘o dimensional analysis reveals the following:

~33.8 oz/L x 4 revs/ oz = 135 revs per L

…still a workout. normal hiker pump-filters are typically 24-36 pumps per Liter, taking 1-2 minutes to pump a Liter, depending upon the pump (and stamina of the pumper).

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