No Motor Ram Pumps

[Bejay]

In Oregon the ban on motorized mining within essential salmon habitat plagues many placer miners. How does one get water to a piece of mining equipment? For some the answer may be the use of a ram pump. A mining partner/friend built one to send water up to camp and I have a placer claim or two that have small waterfalls on them and I have been thinking of utilizing the ram pump to supply water to a small trummel. The pumps work endlessly so I was considering pumping water a successful distance from the stream and maybe even then using motorized mining equipment. Over the years I have employed many methods of achieving the end goal of extracting placer gold from gravels and the concept seems intriguing. Here is how it works.
https://permaculturenews.org/2014/04/02/ram-pumps/

 

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[AzViper]

Bejay I built a Ram Pump. Here is a video showing how it works.



Video on building a Ram Pump from PVC.

 

[delnorter]

It will be interesting to see what you come up with Bejay. Keep us posted.

A long time ago, I had an old friend down this way who was the atypical fixer/inventor/rounder. He built a large ram water system utilizing the gradual grade of a small creek to pump water a short horizontal distance and then a pretty fair vertical distance to fill a redwood water tank built on a large redwood stump. He then piped the water to his house with just gravity. As I recall the inflow pipe had to be run up the creek a fair distance to get enough fall. The over flow from the water tank and the ram relief valve water ran back to the creek. I also seem to remember his pressure tank was a regular pressure tank you'd use for a well system.

I have a ground water well where I live, but hope to one day have the opportunity and place to build a ram system.

AzViper, great videos. Isn't PVC a great invention. I could build one of those.

Mike

 

[GoldpannerDave]

Bejay I built a Ram Pump. Here is a video showing how it works.



Video on building a Ram Pump from PVC.

AzViper, I declare, you have built just about everything related to gold and gold mining!! Thanks once again for sharing.

 

[Bejay]

So this pump will pump water from a creek with fall, up to a large tank some distance from the creek. Then a miner would have water in the tank to run some mining equipment. Some ram pumps are quite large....as shown in the beginning article of this thread. I know of a fairly large trammel operation that was run in the desert utilizing a storage tank of water. They could operate about 4 to 6 hrs a day with the water they stored via motorized well pumps filling the tank the rest of the 20 hrs.

The ram pump is not a motorized pump and therefore according to the Federal mining laws the miner has free access to the water and the Oregon motorized mining ban within the essential salmon habitat river/stream area is moot.

Booming would even be possible.

Bejay

 

[et1955]

I have asked this before and was shut down, why not a pump driven by a water wheel.

 

[N-Lionberger]

The waterwheel powered pump was utilized back in the gold rush, from what I understand the disadvantage is how far up a hill it will pump. I seem to remember ram pumps could lift water 10 times the initial drop so you could work waaay up the hill as opposed to on the stream bank, a gold rush flutter wheel would produce enough water at bank level to run a big long tom but forget about trying to push it up the hill. I could see a flutter wheel driven ram pump on a flat section of creek, why not?

 

[arizau]

Bejay I built a Ram Pump. Here is a video showing how it works.



Video on building a Ram Pump from PVC.

The following is a link to your original posting of the video about the build. http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/gold-prospecting/395650-pumping-water-no-gas-electric-pump.html I also remember there was another thread about ram pumps by someone back in the southeast if I remember correctly. I will post that link too if I can find it. Both have interesting discussions.
Found it: http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/g...g-water-source-without-electric-gas-pump.html

 

[Bejay]

We built a small ram pump a year ago to pump water up into our camp (our claim trailers). With that said I gave thought to utilizing the concept in a larger scale to pump water up and away from the creek to some hi bar placer deposits that lie away from the "no motorized mining zone" along what the State of Oregon terms: "essential salmon habitat". The issue is obtaining the desired fall (column/feed pipe/hose) of water to the piston/pump. In the case in my, I have a significant waterfall on one of my placer claims and may be able to utilize the fall to elevate vertically the water to a small trummel operation up in the hi bar flat.

About 48 years ago I discovered a miners cabin and some test holes that were quite a distance from the creek. The two test holes (which looked like graves dug into old river aggregate) had water in them....most likely spring fed. Prior to the Oregon dredge ban I was always focused on dredging and never deviated from that focus. But now with the current ban and the State Trooper patrolling the area on occasion I am reluctant to venture down the states ban penalties....as the claim I want to work is easy access for a trooper....even though they usually don't venture far from their rig.

One must also realize that the dredge ban has removed a lot of miners from keeping their claims....and we see many dredge claims opening up...."MyLandMatters Claims Advantage report". It really makes sense to overcome the State ban language and keep miners active removing their discovery. A lot of attention has been brought forth to overcome the motorized issue. I will offer that the Motorized language is a big loophole for challenging the State:...... as the Supreme court has often ruled that a law can not target a single user and yet allow others the freedom to utilize that which is banned for another. In actuality a motorized challenge would not even bring forth the issue of mining.....as it is all about motorized. To date no entity has taken on the challenge per my proposal. Sorry for the thread stray but the ram pump is just a means to an end....keeping a placer miner extracting gold. Interestingly the State requires a miner obtain a permit to run a sluice.

Thanks for the ram pump input and sharing the info....I believe may miners will gain from such knowledge.

Bejay

 

[AzViper]

AzViper, I declare, you have built just about everything related to gold and gold mining!! Thanks once again for sharing.

Dave neither of those videos are mine. I had those stored on my PC back when I built the RAM pump. Thought they would come in use someday. If you do a search on YT you will find many methods of the RAM pumps. As BeJay mentioned its a great way to fill a stock tank if the user has a running creek or stream. If I recall correctly for every foot of water fall the user will have a 7 foot rise after the Ram pump. This meaning if the water falls 7 feet into the the Ram pump the user would be able to pump water up hill 49 feet. Also the longer and larger diameter of the pipe placed into the stream that feeds the Ram pump the better.

 

[AzViper]

The following is a link to your original posting of the video about the build. http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/gold-prospecting/395650-pumping-water-no-gas-electric-pump.html

I knew I had posted about Ram pumps years ago arizau but posts get buried quickly. Thanks for the repost...