When considering a hand pump for your well, pumping effort is an important variable to consider. Typically any effort requiring more than 20 lbs. of force is a lot of effort to get water out of your pump.

For this comparison, we have identified the “least effort” setup for the Simple Pump deep well hand pump and the Bison Pumps hand pump. Items we have considered are:

• Smallest cylinder
• Pumping to open container

The range of about 12-18 lbs is what most people would consider “moderate effort”.

Bison leaves the “moderate” range around the 150-foot water level. The Simple Pump is still inside “moderate” at our limit of the 325-foot water level.