How to Build a Peristaltic Pump Circuit


Peristaltic pump



A peristaltic pump is a pump, operated by a motor, that is able to uptake a liquid through one tube and drip it out through another tube.

The point is that it can uptake a liquid and redistribute to another place in need of that liquid.

You can place one tube in a bucket of water and the other tube at the base of a plant, and it can give the plant water at any time interval needed, like, for example, every 8 hours.

A peristaltic pump probably gets its name from the word peristalsis, which means wave-like movement. In biology, peristalsis is the wave-like muscle contractions that moves food to different areas of the body. First, peristalsis occurs when you swallow food. Food moves down the esophagus to the stomach through peristalsis and then again through the small intestine. Without getting too deep into biology, just know that peristalsis involves movement. A peristaltic pump moves liquids through it from one tube to the other tube.

A peristaltic pump can form a wide variety of uses but its function is transport a liquid from one area to another. It can transport any liquid. It can be used for watering plants if one tube is in water and the other tube is at the base of the plant.



Components

  • Peristaltic pump
  • Power Source


You can obtain a peristaltic pump on ebay for about $10-$12 or so.

It comes either as a 6V pump or a 12V pump.

A peristaltic pump is basically a DC motor. It operates just like a motor. It is a motor.

It has 2 terminals for connection.

Just like a motor, it will work regardless of the how the voltage source is connected to it in regards to polarity. However, if you switch the polarity, water will be pumped the opposite way.

On many peristaltic pumps, one tube is longer than the other. If you want the longer tube to be the tube uptaking the liquid, then the positive terminal voltage has to be connected to this end. Whatever terminal of the pump has the positive terminal voltage will be the tube uptaking the liquid. The other tube, that has the ground terminal of the power source connected to it, will be dispersing the liquid in drops. So keep this in mind when connecting power to the peristaltic pump.

Peristaltic Pump Circuit

The peristaltic pump circuit we will build is shown below.


Peristaltic pump circuit

All that is necessary in order for the peristaltic pump to work is sufficient voltage.

It works just like a DC motor.

The terminal that you connect positive voltage to will be the terminal that pumps up the water. The terminal that you connect the ground terminal of the power supply will be the terminal that disperses the water in drops. Normally, the longer end of the tube (if there is one) functions as the pump. But it also depends on what best suits you for what you're using the pump for.

By adjusting the voltage, you can increase the rate of pumping and water dispersion or decrease it. If we're using a 6V pump, it will work at 6V but not at a great speed. If you reall want to speed it up, you can adjust it to 12V. This will make it work at a much faster. You can adjust the voltage by directly changing the voltage on the DC power supply, if that is how you are supplying voltage to the circuit. Or you can give the circuit 12V of power and then use a potentiometer in the circuit so that you can set the voltage to the level wanted by adjusting the resistance.

And this is all that is necessary to run a peristaltic pump.

To see how a peristaltic pump can be controlled by an arduino microcontroller so that the pump turns on and off at regular time intervals, see How to Build a Peristaltic Circuit Controlled by an Arduino Microcontroller.

To see how this circuit works in real life, see the following video below.







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