Small Nozzle (and an introduction)

Hi all,
A quick intorduction first- I am an engineer living in the UK and enjoy tinkering with all sorts of projects, but particularly like playing around with fluid related ones.
I saw a video posted earlier this week on the Make Magazine Blog of a lighted Laminar flow nozzle, so decided it would be worth having a go at making one myself. After a bit of searching I came across this place, and was able to gain enough information to get started, so have put a rough prototype together, which I thought you may be interested in.

I will try and get a more detailed write up over the next few days, but in the meantime, here is a basic description;

It seems common for nozzles to be at least 4" diameter, and more usually 6" to 8", however for my needs, the nozzle doesn't need to be any where as big as I wanted a small jet, so I scaled down the ideas. Hopefully this will form part of an eight head fountain for a project next summer.

Apart from the straws, all the other parts were in stock, which has driven the design.The main body is manufactured from a piece of aluminium pipe, 35mm bore about 150mm long. The end plates are aluminium sheet approx 1.5mm thick, held together with M6 studding and with gaskets cut from NBR sheeting.

Following the flow of water;
Water enters through a 6mm push-fit fitting, secured to the base plate with an 1/8" BSP nut. Water then passes through two layers of nylon cut from a scouting pad, before hitting a thin piece of aluminium sheet to divert the flow sideways, where it then meets two more layers of scouring pad. On top of this is a piece of perforated aluminium sheet, all spaced by a strip of nylon shim. This stack up is approx 15mm. Next the water flows through the usual pack of drinking straws, topped off with a piece of brass mesh. Finally there is another piece of nylon shim approx 35mm before the nozzle cap is reached. The nozzle is simply a 4mm hole, countersunk at 100 degrees, and then polished.

The nozzle was connected to the tap with a length of hose and run up, I can get about 18" of parabola with a smooth flow. Checking the flow with a weir gauge gave a flow of approx 1 lpm before the flow breaks up.

There is plenty of potential for improvements, but I'm very happy with it as a first pass.

I will put a proper write up on my website www.superpants.net in the near future, including internal photos.
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Well done superpants! It looks fabulous! A couple of the terms that I'm not familiar with, BSP nut and NBR sheeting?

One thing to improve the design would be to create a tangential flow inlet. Other than that I think you got it nailed! Great job, and a great write-up!

Thanks for the comments;
Apologies for using unfamiliar terms- NBR is Nitrile Butadiene Rubber, it is a type of rubber often used for gaskets that I had a sample piece of. BSP is British Standard Pipe, the UK standard for pipe threads (the same as the European G pipe thread).

As for the tangential input, If my understanding is correct the main reason for doing this is to avoid any differential pressure or flow up the straws in line with the input fitting. My take on this was to fit a metal plate baffle. It may be that this won't be as effective as a tangential input, but it was much simpler to make in a metal bodied part, hence taking a chance on whether it would work, which thankfully it does seem to have done. I'd be interested in anyone elses thoughts on this?

Oh, I missed the part about the metal baffle. Yeah, it's just for diffusing the differential pressure. What is your end goal? What type of fountain are you planning on making?

Glad I'd understood the reason for the tangential input correctly, I was hoping I hadn't missed something fundamental!

I am heavily involved with running activities for Scouts- especially at large scale events. Every three years we have a joint scout and Guide camp for over 4000. I have been harbouring ideas for a 'waterpark' for this event for some time, but with the aim of coupling it with some activities that get the kids thinking about science and engineering. I have therefore been gathering up ideas and experimenting with some of them, with the intention of building this next summer. One item I am planning on building is an 8 channel DMX controlled fountain (so it can be synced with lighting), but hadn't settled on any nozzle design. Finding the blog post on the Make site set me thinking that this type of nozzle would work well. I can then link in a kid-controlled tabletop version (maybe made of acrylic) to get across the science ideas behind this.

On a slightly different note, my nozzle has been blogged on the Make Magazine website itself. Make Blog

Thanks for the inspiration!

How did you get featured on Make???? I've been trying to get on there forever! Great job! I'm jealous!

Getting in the make blog seems somewhat hit and miss- I have had some stuff picked up after posting photos in the Flickr make pool. Other times I have submitted to the site directly and they haven't been used. I submitted this time and it got picked up. It seems to me they like stuff that has a link directly to info on the project on your own website, seem to like topical projects- i.e. where something similar has been covered recently (as happened in this case), and like projects with photos or instructions. HTH.

A bit more detail of the innards;
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Left to right;
6mm pushfit fitting
Aluminium end plate and nitrile rubber gasket
Nut to secure fitting
Scouring pad
Metal baffle
More scouring pad
Nylon shim used as spacer
Perforated aluminium sheet
Straws
Brass mesh screen
More nylon shim as spacer
Gasket
End cap

At the rear is the aluminium tube and the lengths of studding used to secure it all together.

Hi there and welcome

(sorry I have not been here so much, have a stressful daytime at home)

But that tiny nozzles is perfect
I love the tiny ones, would love to have some of them inside at winter times, with light and knocker

Thanks Mr Liteglow!
I'm pleased with the welcome- this seems a very friendly forum- much more so than some i have visited!
I look forward to contibuting more. I think the next step is likely to be a unit based on 50mm tube, but this will have to wait until I pick the aluminium tube up from my garage.

I`m glad you like this forum
There is only 1 rule here, share and be happy

Did you see my little nozzles?

I hadn't found those- seems like you are tring to acheive something similar. From the looks of it you are using a shorter tube. What bore and what nozzle size do you have there?

superpants wrote:I hadn't found those- seems like you are tring to acheive something similar. From the looks of it you are using a shorter tube. What bore and what nozzle size do you have there?

I dont know the size
I just used whatever was lying around..
It was a year ago, but I still think they are down here if you want to know the dimensions

Oh - niiiiiice !

THis gives me hope that my 4" attempt may work !

Thanks for posting this !

Liteglow- Not to worry, seems like you have a good pair of nozzles there.

Steve- no problem, good luck with building yours!

Steven in CA wrote:Oh - niiiiiice !

THis gives me hope that my 4" attempt may work !

Thanks for posting this !

The 4" works nice if you aren't going for the world record, http://mad-laboratory.com/2008/07/21/laminar-flow-fountain-brass-nozzle-insert/

It's a great place to start.

Evening all,
I realise it has been a while since the last project, but I have now built another small nozzle. This time out of clear acrylic so that the innards can be seen.

The construction is otherwise fairly similar to the previous nozzle. The main body is made from a 55mm bore acrlic tube. The outlet nozzle is made of aluminium, turned up on the lathe and epoxied into the front plate. The unit is held togteher with 4 M6 clamp bolts.

I like it

Thanks!

superpants wrote:Thanks!

What will the price be of you can manage to build 2 of them and sell them ?
I only need the nozzle with the brass ring output, the water input hole, straws and filter does I already have :-)

I think 2 nozzle like that would be pretty to have indoor

I will have to work a price out- I hadn't made any intention to sell it, so please bear with me as this may take a week or so to work out!

No problem...

I dont ask because I need to know ..
But just curious :-) I would like to maybe have 2 tiny nozzles inside..
But only if the cost is low..

Most of the parts I can maybe create myself, the main problem is only the water output. (the brass ring?) !
if you have a lathe it can maybe be easy to build... the output should be maybe 6-9mm ?