Situation is worsening further.. There is draught at Farm

Situation is worsening further.. There is draught at Farm

Subbu was expressing his anger and frustration.  Reason there is no rain.  No rain for the past many days, stopped counting how much.  Today the frustration is because the ground water has further fallen down. He said he spent some time atop the water tank near the wind pump to see the output.  Sometime the output is very small even when the windpump is rotating fast.  After 5 minutes it is giving more water. Again less water.

Reason, due to reduced water at the borewell, it takes time for water to seepage.  This is bad sign.

The vegetation around the farm is so dry that it takes one match stick to initiate wild fire.
to mitigate the receding water, we want to increase the pipe length to 150 feet. That means purchase 5 more piples of 2" dia anticipating new pump installation.

Meanwhile our new pump sent by ABS is still on its way.  I am betting my hopes on increased water through that.

Funny guys the courier TCI-XPS are;  The consignment has taken the below route.  From Kanyakumari the guy told it has gone to Tirunelveli whereas it should have been delivered en-route.  But Tirunelveli guy says it is heading towards SALEM again.  Why ?  because the pump was loaded deep inside the long truck. There is 9 tonne of material after that. Funny !. Guys in the delivery business cannot give such excuse. Anyway he promised he will deliver tomorrow at Nanguneri.

This is the magic of Linear Programming Problem and advanced Logistics planning by modern men.

Consignment number : 688734211  (TCI-XPS)
From Station To Station Despatch Date Time Arrival Date Time
XVSH (VASHI) XMBH (MUMBAI-HUB) 16-SEP-2015 20:28 16-SEP-2015 23:20
XMBH (MUMBAI-HUB) XSLH (SALEM-HUB) 17-SEP-2015 15:35 19-SEP-2015 23:00
XSLH (SALEM-HUB) XKKI (KANYAKUMARI) 20-SEP-2015 18:02 21-SEP-2015 13:56
XKKI (KANYAKUMARI) XTNV (TIRUNEVELI) 22-SEP-2015 11:53 --

Meanwhile the chain block has reached Valliyoor. Subbu took delivery of that from KPN travels. He was satisfied as it was so heavy. It can withstand any weight.  Good purchase. He said same material in tirunelveli was not that strong and was also costing twice.

Chain block can be had from coimbatore : Sudhir Jaiswal 09843089006 (Fine Chain Centre), finebearingco@yahoo.co.in

The effort is going to be effortless lifting the pump

One of the sour point is lifting the pipe assembly from borewell manually everytime you need to access the pump or repair something.  It requires 4 people to pull the pipe assembly of around 100 feet with a rope.

Pipes, inside rod, pump and water will weigh over 300 Kg to 500 Kg.

 Last time on my visit to the farm,  I had purchased a pully fastened to the tower for pulling the rope effortlessly. Still it requires two employees and two hires costing around 1000/- on labor for every incident.  And the "pull" also will be rough and may hurt the pipe or people.

In order to reduce the manual effort and make it more easy, I have decided to go for chain block.

A chain is a kind of geared pully which will lift heavy objects.  For our application we wanted to go for 3 Ton.  Actually 1 Ton would be sufficient. But I reasoned that once we have this device, it can be used in future for any kind of material that we want to lift. Say a Cow !

A 3 Ton chain block with 3 meter lift would be around INR 8.5K and is ordered from Coimbatore.  This will reach the farm just in time when our new pump from Navi Mumbai also will reach.  That should be comfortable for Subbu.

Farm Update 18-Sep-2015

It is now countless days have passed with no rain in sight.   Nearest rain was some 25 kilometers away. Lot of bird sanctuaries around also have not got any rain.  All the farm planning has gone for a toss.

I told Subbu "Don't worry.  The days are not far off. Instead of cribbing no rain, only sun shine, we will be rejoicing on Sun Shine" Yes we will harness the solar energy through our new project on concentrating that.  I briefed him how we are going to do that in affordable way.

He mentioned that when Grid current comes, all issues will be solved. I explained him what's wrong with Grid, Nuclear or thermal currents.   Why Renewable energy is superior.

I told him that after all hardships, still when windmill is running, we are getting "FREE" energy.  He agreed. Yes sir. if everything works, we are getting one drum per hour (1000 liters) without any spend.

Still we are buying water very often due to prolonged dry spell.

Well, where is the water going ?

1.  Still casurina is drinking more water. Without water it is drying up even after those plants have become adults.
2. Some leftover banana is there.  The primary banana plant is not irrigated. The young suckers are actually feeding on mother plant and it is left at that.  The remaining banana has become sick. They need to be removed. The red banana is not growing that much.
3. Most of water is spent on fruit trees, coconut and jasmine.

The pursuit is ON.....

Kandan and Bicycle

"Has Kandan learned to ride the bicycle at last ?" -  I asked. I thought all of our compulsive advise would have worked.

"No sir, No way.  His wife is riding the cycle. His son is owning a bike. But Kandan always "walks" his cycle.  He even lifted up on his bicycle on shoulders to cross the fields by walk"

Well, that is Kandan. You cannot change anyone unless he has interest in anything."  said Subbu.

So Kandan feels cycle is a burden.

A bold step to increase Water Output

My depiction of the new pump
inside the borewell

It is clear, that if I need to increase my cultivation I need more water.  One way is the maximise the productivity of the existing pump.   Earlier I attempted to replace the 1.25" pipe with 2" pipe and failed.

This time we are making a bold decision.   With friendly engineers from ABS, we have decided we will do the following;;

New Pump scheduled to reach farm.
The first one is a filter and the other
is the pump

1.  Replace the existing pump which has 200 mm depth with another one which has 350 mm travel depth.  This will also increase the bore from 62mm to 82mm.

My estimate is as is it will give 30% more water.

2. Once this stabilises, now we need to increase  the vertical  movement of   rod assembly at the windmill by replacing a crank shaft.  That will utilise the 350 mm depth of the pump to a large extent. Currently the verticle movement is only 100mm.  We need to make it atleast 200 or 250 mm.  That will give 4 times more water than what I am getting.

ABS is ready to do both the changes.  But they are doubting if due to increased load, the rod assembly will bend.  I am confident it will not.

decided to take a risk. After all what is life without risk.

Some Progress in Experiments on Concentrated Solar Energy

I have achieved some significant maturity in my Balcony experiments on Concentrated Solar Energy.

The story :   As already explained, I am in dire need of some energy source for the farm.  Wind has limitations. Beyond that we have plenty of sun shine. Why don't we use it ?  The solar cell is in the hands of business mafia and is unaffordable.  It costs over 6 lacs per 5 KV which is too much for a fragile piece of thing that may work hardly for 3 years.  (Though they promise life untill eternity, i have serious doubts about service and support on cheap Chinese panels and corrupt dealers).

Well I have decided i will pursue CSP.  this is a failure in many places. I wonder why.  On a closer look I find businessmen have discarded it because they cannot make money. Or they have wantedly made it so much costly that even Governments cannot afford to setup. That is why it is failure.

It is our endevour to bring this cheap source to common man somehow.  Small experiments have began.

Today I achieved 300+ temperature using the dish.  That is the limit my thermometer can show.  Inside the tiffen Box Target, the salt was having temperature of 180Dec C.  Very good enough to do some useful work. Even with half the mirrors i could still get 133 deg C in the morning Sun. What else you want ?

My balcony experiments are aimed at choosing the right method to concentrate solar energy. I will continue till i get confidence to invest in large setup.

Detailed progress on Solar experiments are being posted in my facebook group
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1634868576725613/

Farm Update 04-Nov-2015

1.  The windpump is working smooth for the past many days.  The new solution has really worked. There is normal wind also. I believe we are getting between 1000 to 4000 liters of water perday. That is sufficient to maintain crops irrigated in round-robin fashion.

2.  We are still waiting for the rains to come to make the next move.   We need to procure and plant Jasmine plants.  Subbu said he heard Rameshwaram Jasmine is the best.  He has ordered 100 saplings from there. However they will supply only when they get atleast one shower.

3. Painting has been done for all the structures like Gate fence and room with green paint.  This is to keep the team occupied.

4. The shadenet has fallen in the wind.  It is torn also.  Without this the nursary will not work. It is an eyesore to see a broken nursary.   I have ordered for one more bundle of Shadenet 50 meters costing Rs. 2100 including courier from Coimbatore. It will reach tomorrow. Post that Subbu team will mend the nursary.

Somehow the team is not showing interest in nursary, compost pit or any such non-traditional things.

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