Treadle Pump, Treadle Pump...

" ... if I can build a treadle pump that you can build a treadle pump too!!"




This melodic-mnemonic is a music video intended to introduce the concept of the treadle pump. It also demonstrates our latest Solar CITIES initiative training Africans in diaspora (particularly Nigerians, like Paul Chido Iwunna, our Nigerian-German colleague featured in the video) in "Green-collar jobs and sustainable development technology" here in Germany and then traveling to our mother-countries to share the knowledge and technologies with our homeland communities.  In this case  Chido and I  and Dr. Charisma Acey (American professor of Urban Planning married to a Nigerian) traveled to Port Harcourt with Chido's mother to build a treadle pump with local craftsmen  for the family home so they no longer have to pull water from the borehole with a small bucket and a rope. It is our intention to involve many more Africans and Middle Eastern and Asian immigrants here in Germany and abroad so that we can all participate in the "Sustainable Green Brain Gain"!  Won't you join us?

Chords and Lyrics:

(Chorus: G6, A7, Cm, G )

Treadle Pump Treadle Pump, if I can make a treadle pump then you can make a treadle pump too!
A cool effective water pump that runs on human power and functions as a stair master too!

(Verse I section 1: Em, A7, Em A7, Cmaj7, Em, A7)

You start by building pistons cut from 4 inch PVC 'cause it's cheap and it's fast and the plastic will last.
A great new use for sewer pipes, just cut them to 9 inches, then glue them in caps,
Drill two holes, just like that
Use a half inch plastic nipple, threaded with one-half-inch taps... but you can use a metal nipple too, just screw and screw!



(Verse II section 2:  Em, A7, Em, A7, Cmaj7, C#dim, D)


Now you mount your check valves, note each piston has one in and one out... (uh, huh, upstroke in, downstroke out!)
These connect to water hoses carrying your water about (as you tread you can dance, twist, and shout!)
'cause we want to make things simple, cheap and fun as they can be -- your legs will run your water pump for free!


(Chorus: G6, A7, Cm, G )
Treadle pump Treadle Pump, why use electricity when you can get a workout and pump your water too?
Treadle pump, Treadle pump, if you're still using fossil fuels, something must be wrong with you!

(Verse II section 1: Em, A7, Em A7, Cmaj7, Em, A7)
 
Cut two five inch pieces of your PVC to make the piston discs -- each has three where the leather will be;
Cut each section open and then put it in the oven -- it will soften and flatten to make plastic mats and then...
Cut six discs out -- three per piston -- watch out, middle discs must quite precisely fit...
that's the tricky bit!

(Verse II section 2:  Em, A7, Em, A7, Cmaj7, C#dim, D)

Five inch circles made of leather, two per piston under the discs -- after soaking the leather gets soft.
All the rest is carpentry, the pistons are the hardest piece; the treadle is made out of bamboo or wood.
Just connect the treadles to two pulleys pulling up and down...
It'll pump water from 7 meters underground!!

(Chorus:  G6, A7, Cm, G)
Treadle Pump Treadle Pump, if I can make a treadle pump then you can make a treadle pump too!
A cool effective water pump that runs on human power and functions as a stair master too!

Treadle pump Treadle Pump, why use electricity when you can get a workout and pump your water too?
Treadle pump, Treadle pump, if you're still using fossil fuels, something must be wrong with you!






Tags:
 Treadle Pump, Solar CITIES, do-it-yourself, Nigeria, NIDO, Nigerians in Diaspora Organization, T.H. Culhane, IDE