DISCUSSION

Pump is a delivery system. It has been designed to convert mechanical energy into fluid energy.
It rises up the head fluid by energy conversion. Head fluid is a specific measurement of water
pressure above a geodetic datum. It is usually measured as a water surface elevation, expressed
in a unit of meters or feet. Four pump is used in this particular experiment namely centrifugal
pump, axial flow pump gear pump and turbine pump.
Centrifugal Pump is used to increase the pressure of fluid and make the fluid moves in the pipe.
The fluid enters the pump impeller along or near to the rotating axis and is accelerated by the
impeller, flowing radially outward into a diffuser or volute chamber (casing), from where it exits
into the downstream piping. This pump is used for large discharge through smaller heads.
An axial flow pump, or AFP, is a common type of pump that essentially consists of a propeller in
a pipe. The propeller can be driven directly by a sealed motor in the pipe or mounted to the pipe
from the outside or by a right-angle drive shaft that pierces the pipe. The Axial Flow Pump is
used to run at peak efficiency at low flow or high-pressure and high-flow or low pressure. Gear
pump uses the meshing of gears to pump fluid by displacement. They are one of the most
common types of pumps for hydraulic fluid power applications. Gear Pump varies with speed
but remain constant against pressure. Turbine Pump is used to handle the small amount of fluid
with high total head.
The pumps used have differences in their characteristics, resulting in the different power input
and power output between each pump. Power input and power output can be calculated using the
stated equation:
Power input,
Pin =

2 T
T
60

Power output,
P =

. g . Q. H
Where,

is fluid density
g is gravity (=9.81)
Q is flow rate
H is delivery head

Power output is dependent on the efficiency of the pump, therefore the efficiency of the pump is
calculated.
Pump efficiency,

P
Po

Another equation that we used to find the value of head pump is Bernoullis equation. A few
assumptions were made to validify the equation which are the flow is steady, inviscid and
incompressible.
Bernoulli equation:
P1 V 21
+
g 2 g

P2 V 22
Z 1 + H p= + + Z 2
g 2 g

From the result that we obtained after conducting this experiment, we can see that when the
motor speed is increased, the pressure and would decrease. When it is operating with different
speeds, it gives various values for pressure head, flow rate, and power consumed while we take
the reading. Higher flow rate results in slower time. This will allow us to obtain the factors that
affect the efficiency of the pumps. We can see clearly from the graph that the efficiency and head
pump is directly proportional to the flow rate. This is due to the increasing velocity when the
flow rate is faster and the power output is directly proportional to the flow rate.
Some of the data that we collected were not accurate. This is because of the errors made
throughout the experiment. The first error was parallax error. It was hard to maintain
perpendicular vision to the scale because it was positioned at the lower part of the table, resulting
in parallax error and inaccurate reading. The second error was categorized as systematic error as
it involves the equipments itself. Vibrations that occurred throughout the experiment caused
instability in some of the equipment which leads to inaccurate data collection.
Modification should be made in the future to make sure that accurate result and data can be
obtained. The eye of the observer should be exactly perpendicular to the scale. The instruments
should be regularly serviced to reduce unnecessary vibrations.