How To Make A Cheap Solar Water Cascade With Pots

Solar Water Cascade With Pots

To build a very cheap, very effective Solar Water Cascade with pots  , in just a few minutes, is so easy, read our latest blog.

You don't need to spend hundreds of pounds to achieve something that really looks great, here is what you need:

• An SE 500 solar Fountain from Powerbee.
• A small piece of Tubing from Powerbee.
• Two small garden pots, one larger than the other, each with a tray to suit the size.
• A drill
• A Pencil
• Some small stones (or not – it's really up to you how you decorate the pots)

That's it!

I bought some pots from my local garden centre for less than £10, and made a really good looking Solar Water Feature, you can see the video, at the end of this blog, which shows you exactly how to do it.

Important Points

There are a few important points to cover though just to make sure you get it right.

• Location

Find a sunny location for the solar panel, this is really important, the solar cells really needs to be facing south, the Solar Cascade will still work in summer if facing East or West, but south is the best, and anything other than south will have reduced performance. North, North West, North East facing is out of the question.

• Don't make the Cascade to high 30 cm or less is perfect

The higher the cascade the higher the water needs to be pumped, this all takes energy, so the taller the water cascade the more powerful pump you will need.

The reason we advise on the Sunspay SE 500 is that it has a good flow rate, it will on a half sunny day, comfortable pump water through tubing up to 30 cms, all day long, consistently, and this is what you want for a cascade, a nice flowing water feature, which just carries on trickling away, and soothing your soul.

If you want to you can make a small water cascade, and use the se 450 or se 360, there is a handy guide to our pumps, which tells you how high they will push water through tubing.

• The base Tray

The base tray, which is really your water reservoir needs to be able to hold at least 7 cm depth of water, this ensures the actual pump itself is submerged, the SE 500 has dry run protection built in to it, so if there is not enough water it will automatically stop pumping.

There are loads of base trays at the garden centre for less than £2 which will suit. The base tray needs to be water tight, no leaks or holes.

The pots and stones

The pots you use is really down to choice, I chose some very simple terracotta pots, and I plan on buying some water plants, just to give it a little 'greenery', but you could literally go wild with the design, paint designs on them, use multi colour pots, it's really down to taste.

I also bought some small pea gravel, and found a few smooth stones lying around the garden; you can choose whatever decoration you like.

Instructions

Basically it could be simpler:

• The base tray holds the water.

• The following pot / pots and or trays need to have a small hole in them, in the centre, so that you can thread the tubing through.

• The tubing is connected to the pump; the pump sits in the base tray at the bottom, and pumps the water up though the tubing.

The very first pot needs to have a little 'nick' in it, so that the cable from the pump does not make it sit at a funny angle, certainly with terracotta this is very easily achieved just by running a drill in one place along the edge. Although I am sure there are a lot of ways of doing this, this one seemed to me to be safe, and wouldn't break the pot.

The pots already had holes in them for water drainage, because I bought flower pots, so no drilling required :) then I just marked the centre of the second tray, and drilled a hole, around 9mm, so that the tubing can pass through it.

Then place the pump in the water tight base tray, connect the tubing to the pump, thread the tubing through the hole in the first larger pot, slide this pot down the tubing and over the pump, fit the cable in the 'nick'.

Thread the second tray on to the tubing, this basically acts as a stand for the second pot, and also looks nice when water trickles over it, then thread the second pot on, and cut the tubing, leave a little tubing sticking out of the pot, as this holds it in place.

Fill the bottom tray with water.

Connect the pump to your backup battery, and connect the battery to the solar panel. (It's really easy to do and in the instructions and the video).

Then turn on your battery on, hey presto! You have an extremely cost effective cascading fountain, that you can tell your friends that you designed and built yourself!

The important  thing about the SE 500 solar water pump, is that you can completely control the flow rate of the water, so you can get the flow exactly how you want.

You will be amazed at the reaction of your friends and family, because although it's very simple to do, after you place a few stones and greenery around the pots, it looks like a professional solar water cascade.

Please see our Video which shows you exactly how to make a solar cascade with flower pots.