What is Rope Pump?
The rope pump, now popular in Central America, is quite simple. It consists of a continuous loop of rope. It is wrapped around a bicycle wheel at the top of the well.
It hangs loose down into the well, and then is brought up through the inside of a plastic pipe to the top again. On the rope are attached valves, made from used inner tubes (or any suitable flexible material such as used shoe leather), every 20 to 30 cm. The bicycle wheel can be cranked by hand so that the rope moves down the outside of the pipe and then up again inside the pipe. A bicycle frame can be modified by a welder and with a hacksaw to hold the bicycle wheel, and the foot pedals modified to become a hand crank. As the rope comes up the inside of the pipe, the valves push water from the bottom of the well to the top. A junction is made into the pipe near the top so the rope continues up to the wheel while the water spills out of the pipe to a waiting container.
Students Make Rope Pump at Science Fair
All the components of the rope pump are usually available in any medium sized town: rope, used inner tubes, used bicycle frame and wheel, and plastic pipe. None is very expensive.
The rope pump has been around for years, perhaps decades, but in the past few years it has become popular and widely used in Nicaragua.
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