May082010

=Meetings and Exploring Las Delicias - May 8, 2010= There are several files/links below for more data and pictures - but here is a summary of what was discussed. Sorry about possible repetition with earlier posts.

WATER DISTRIBUTION
Morena met with the leaders of the different sectors of Las Delicias to discuss in-equitable distribution of water - the leaders think the main problem is the way that the control valves are operated (e.g. that Chilo is not doing his job effectively).

On the map (link below) "Tramo 6" is the section of Las Delicias with the biggest problem of receiving less water - this section has been growing (i.e. more homes) and will likely continue to grow - it also has 1" pipes for a long distance and is pretty remote/downstream from the rest of the community.

In the past, the low end of Calle Principal (below "Tramo 11") and "Tramo 12" received lower water flow, but in April, some of the connections between pipes were changes (where Tramo 11 and Tramo 9b connect to Calle Principal) - apparently 120 m of new pipe was added.

A desire to have water meters at households (contadores) was expressed to enable people to control water use (by having a pay structure that people using more than a baseline quota pay more).

OPERATION OF WATER PUMP
Visited the well/pump station and observed the procedure for operating the pump:
 * 1) Turn on power to entire system []
 * 2) Turn on Automatic control of transfer (60 HP) pump []
 * 3) Turn on sumbersible well pump []
 * 4) The operation of the pumps ( low level control) is automatic. Usually the bombero runs the submersible pump for 10 minutes until water appears clear and oil free before pumping to the cistern. Level of water in the cistern is controlled by manual adjustment of a valve between the well pump and the cistern []. There is no control scheme for the transfer pump
 * 5) There is a flow meter between the well and the cistern []. I have a video of this in operation if you are interested
 * 6) There is a pressure meter downstream of the transfer pump, which shows a pressure of about 250 PSI in the start of the pipeline leading to the tanks. []
 * 7) There are power indicators on the submersible pump and the main electric meter displays a variety of power information - see the photo stream for examples []

There are a couple of manuals related to the pumps and electronics but they do not appear to have a lot of useful information (in particular they do not contain detailed information about the pump specs.

SCHEDULE OF PUMP OPERATION
We discussed operation of the pump (again). Tanks 1 and 3 can be filled by the pump and Tank 2 is only filled by water from the mountain. When the pump operates, water flows to both Tanks 1 and 3 because the pipes are not strong enough to handle pressure when only one tank is being filled. Tank 3 fills in about 3.5 hours bu tank 1 takes 4.5 hours (so it is never filled completely). This is the schedule of operation of the pump/tanks:


 * 11 AM start the pump - valves on exits from Tank 1 and Tank 3 are closed
 * 2:30 PM: tank 3 is full so open the valves on both Tank 1 and Tank 3
 * 6 PM: stop the pump
 * ?? 9 PM: water stops flowing from tank 3 because it is empty - the time is not known precisely but should be easy to find out by interviewing residents

The pumps are only operated two or three days per week.

ELEVATION AND GPS
We traveled to the well/pump station, to Tank 1, Tank 3, the clinic, and the location where the pipeline changes diameter between the Pedrona and Tank 1. The files below show the GPS track (in Google Earth and Excel) and elevations for the key locations on the map (on Map, Excel, and Powerpoint)

MAP of water system with elevations of key points, color coding, and comments. Generally the right side of the map is high elevation and the left is low elevation.
[]

PHOTOS from pump test:
[] Summary Powerpoint of Key Data