UPS For a basement sump pump, which one?

[Anonymous user]

Hi, I have a question, this seems really odd but I know I cannot be the only one but I do not seem to find any information for this anywhere.

Anyway, I am a computer programmer, I recently bought a nice house in the country with a basement. All has been good with the new house until recently. We seriously got over 5 ft of snow here in december and then the weather warmed up dramatically which melted all the snow, the heat wave also came in with a sudden rainstorm that soaked the ground and added more water to the melting snow. This left a lot of water seeping into the basement, which the sump pump was more than happy to handle. That was until that night some time in the middle of the night the power got knocked out and was out for 8 hours. Well for heat there was no big deal I have a fireplace, However after i got power back I decided to go down to the basement and when i stepped down, the carpet was wet. Then it dawned on me, no power, and the sump pump can't pump out the water. So after i cleaned up the mess i instantly thought battery backup for the sump pump. Eventually I will get a generator but that is a year or two down the road. Plus I would have to be home to switch over to generator so I would need a battery backup on the sump pump.

Anyway, all APC battery back ups are for computers. I do not see why I couldn't use one for a sump pump but which one? I can't unfortunately give you a lot of info on the electrical workings of the sump pump. What I can tell you is it plugs into a regular outlet on the wall so it is 120 volt. I know it is able to pump out about 15 gallons in just a few seconds. Basically all it does is during a severe storm it might fire up once or twice every hour for about 3-4 seconds and thats it. So basically i just need a Battery back up that can last through a storm, I am not sure how long i would be without power but the longer this could last the better.

Anyway any ideas on what I should use?

[Anonymous user · Accepted solution]

Been there, done that! You're best choice, as others suggested, is a backup 12v pump & battery and good maintenance charger (one that lowers the trickle charge voltage as the battery reaches capacity....otherwise you'll find that the battery deteriorates). I ran this same setup for a period of years, and IF a long power outage depletes the pump battery, simply run a wire to your car and use it to top up the pump battery. Also, your total cost will be much less than what a "Super-Size-UPS" might cost!

[Anonymous user]

been there, done that as well... We have a Craftsman model that came with a charger, DieHard Gold Marine Battery, battery box, pump and float.

works great for us.

worth noting however, the one we have will set off an alarm every time the pump is activated, Highly annoying, although it was being set off, not because of a power failure, but because the main pump float had become waterlogged, and tit not have enough buoyancy to trigger the switch on the pump. don't think the alarm ever went as a result of a power failure, but not sure.

FYI, you want a Marine battery and not an automotive one because the power draw is very different.

Cars need a very short burst of very high amperage. they are made with thinner lead plates to get more of those "Cold Cranking Amps" marine batteries have thicker lead plates, and are designed to handle a longer draw at a lower amperage. (an RV would use marine batteries to power 12v lighting, and 120v AC inverters and such like that....

I have also heard that there are backup systems that rely on the water pressure of the municipal water supply. IIRC, they will remove like 2-3 gallons of water for every gallon they allow to flow into the sump. although with a larger-scale blackout, you could still be SOL if the muni water pressure drops, as in the 2003(?) northeast/midwest blackout.

I think I saw something that said you could hook a couple of marine batteries in parallel to get either more amps, or more run-time. If you expect extended outages to be a serious problem, you may want to look into it. connect the batteries, positive pole to positive pole, Negative to negative, and they also said it's best to connect the positive and negative leads from the charger to opposite ends of the bank.

[BillP]

Seriously, a big UPS to do that task.

Hello from no problems with damp inland Eastern Australia here at 35°C.

The problem could be the surge demand placed by the pump motor as it starts, now you system is 110/120, here it's 240/480 and the surge currents to start an electric motor are much higher for you for the same power // Watt.

I have a 5.9kVA Honda powered backup generator which is divert wired into our office, workshop and home, it just starts a 2HP single phase air compressor and really struggles with a new 1.5HP submersible well pump 100m down the paddock. All the other appliances are easy, refrigeration, lights home theatre, server and full network, we don't use any Air Conditioning at all - ever.

Someone from APC should be by to let you know which one you'd need, but at a guess I reckon the petrol genset is going to be streets cheaper!

[BillP]

yeah, APC doesnt really recommend a UPS for a sump pump due to the type of load it is.

but, IF you plan on doing it anyway, you will need something a bit beefy to account for the inrush current of the device. from experience, with your average sump pump, i'd start looking at something like an [SUA2200 Smart UPS|http://www.apc.com/resource/include/techspec_index.cfm?base_sku=SUA2200].

[Anonymous user]

I dont think that APC backup units are made for this usage

You should check for a backup pump with a marine battery.

I Have one and it's the perfect solution.


http://www.flotecwater.com/pdf/Pg_8_2006.pdf


Carpediem

Message was edited by: carpediem99