How to Make a DIY Airlift Mud Pump

I have a spring fed pond that has been abandoned and allowed to silt over. Brush has grown around it and clogged it with rotting leaves. It has gotten to the point that in sections the silt is so think that grass has grown over and you cannot tell how soggy it is. It is not uncommon for me to be weedeating and step wrong and sink to my waist in think mud.

This causes a danger, and is a breeding ground for mosquitoes so I have been looking for options. I cann’t afford to hire someone with a dredger, my backhoe can’t get to the area, and I was at a loss.

I was playing on youtube and found a guy that uses airlift pumps for outdoor hydroponics. it uses a cheap air pump instead of a more expensive electric pump, and because it is air powered and not electric it is safet around water. Down the internet research hole I went.

In looking at how it worked I learned that gold prospectors use dredges to suck up mud, recovery divers also use similar systems to recover boats that are lost under tons of sand.

Can the process work for thick mud? I see videos of Koi pond owners using similar systems all the time on a smaller scale. The lack of videos means one of two things – no one has thought of it, or it doesn’t work.

I cobbled some pipes to make my Experimental DIY Airlift Mud Pump, the most expensive pieces being the fittings. It took me less that 15 minutes to build.

I put my diesel air compressor in the truck and drove down the hill to the pond. Now right now Tennessee is under a state of emergency due to extreme dry conditions and we are under a total burn ban. I did not know until I went out to my pond how dry it was. It has really thickened the mud, and if I was careful I could walk slowly on the thick dried crust that formed.

This made the experiment much more difficult.

An airlift pump will lift waterlogged debris the same distance up and the nozzle is held under the water. the pond was 10 feet deep, so I bought a 10 foot section of pipe to make my airlift. If it was wet enough for me to push the nozzle 10 feet down under the surface, it would shoot mud 10 feet into the air.

The ground was too dry to do that, so it only went down about 3 feet – which made it hard for the mud to make its way out the other end of the pipe.

Instead of a geyser of mud, I got more of an old faithful eruption…

As the pressure build up, the mud would spurt out. It made a neat sound, as I got to where I could estimate the time between spurts.

What was happening is that it sucked the mud from around the nozzle and had to wait until more wet mud oozed down around the pipe end.

I cannot wait until the weather changes and I have lots of wet mud to work with. Once I get some time to experiment with nozzle configurations and get a good working model I will scale up to 4 inch pipe.

Navy divers use 9 inch pipe and have to be careful as the suction is so strong it can pull body parts into the tube.

[koaasst]

i just ran the air hose with no end down the pipe with valve up top, its amazing that the air coming from that little air line will push debris and muck all the way out of the pipe from that deep

[daviddavids]

thanks for posting. some thoughts. to function correctly, the riser of an air lift pump should be nearly vertical. suggest you try a shorter version. cheers

[siulanainad]

Giant venturi. Great job. Another pressure supply tool instead of air is a power washer.

[paytonjones]

that’s me after a night of drinkin followed by taco bell

[jameswest]

I did something like this to wash in a well. I have very sandy soil in South Carolina. It worked good down to 45ft, but it was tough on my air compressor.

[oceanmichelle]

want to build a system to pump mud in some standing water, to send it through a pipe or hose to fill a large hole. Do people have ideas/answers?

[huntingkc]

You gave it a try, thank you for sharing

[dmcmanam]

That looks like it would work great if the pump was submerged a few feet lower in the mud. I have 8ft depth of water and mud and may try a similar system.

[drifter]

Think it would work better injecting water in from a trash pump

[johndunn]

I think you need to slow your air down. I think 🤔 what lifts is a train of air bubbles marching up the pipe and kinda dragging a gulp of bottom sludge along. It should be like blupe, blupe, blupe not shhhhj splat, shhhh spat, shhhh splat.

[khandam]

so how is thsi working 4 years latter? did you wind up using a bigger 4" pipe?

[lutzy]

What did you have your air pressure set to on the compressor?

[akbychoice]

Needs to be vertical to work well, the air wants to go up not horizontally.

[dave]

Looked like a total failure to me...Am I missing something?
I've tried more things than I care to remember (trying to clean the muck out of my pond)
The ONLY thing that actually worked was a commercial diaphragm pump but the price was over $2, 000 to buy!
Rental is the way to go. Just make sure that you have made some type of holding container to contain the
muck and let the water flow back to the pond. (The longer the distance to flow back to the pond, the
cleaner the return water will be)

[Robgification]

Great idea and thank you. What size pump were you using?

[jaytalreja]

can you tell me what are the dimension you used in your pump and how can i make it at home.

[dennyhawk]

Payton Jones, are you the guy laying on the roof NAKED passed out surrounded by beer bottles and lawn chairs on the internet and the caption is "did you have this much fun as this guy last night"? You sound like you are! Lol