SCIENCE DIY
MATERIALS
Wine bottle filler, springless valve, with ½" acrylic
tube available from Fermtech ( fermtech.ca)
Trigger spray top from any consumer spray bottle.
I used one from a quart bottle of Clorox Clean-Up.
Tubing, clear flexible vinyl, 3" OD, ½" ID, about 3'
from hardware, aquarium, or brewing supply stores
Tubing, rigid plastic or metal, 6" OD, about 3'
Bucket or CD/DVD stack case or other container for
water source
Flat plastic tub or other container for catch basin
Rigid plastic sheet, 5" or 1" thick, 2" square
such as acrylic (plexiglass) or similar
Assorted nuts and washers or other small metal
weights to try as counterweights
Electrical tape
Cyanoacrylate glue aka super glue or crazy glue
Stool or stand to raise water source
Panavise or other way to hold pump above catch basin
water line
Ring stand or other way to raise output tube
Waste valve
(open)
Outlet
Inlet
Check valve
(closed)
Valves shown symbolically
Outlet
Waste valve
(closed)
Inlet
Check valve
(open)
TOOLS
Drill and drill bits: 1", 6", ¼", 7", 2", 8", ½"
File, small
Fine-toothed band saw, jigsaw, or razor saw
Hot glue gun
Hot air gun or hair dryer
Vise or wooden vee (optional) to hold pipe for drilling
Waste valve
(open)
Outlet
Inlet
Check valve
(closed)
A
from its top. Make a pilot punch first and hold
the wand in a vise or wooden vee so it stays in
place and the drill doesn’t wander.
Keep widening the hole with progressively
larger drill bits, in 5" increments, until you
have a ½" hole (Figure B). Increasing by
larger increments may break the plastic.
With a fine-toothed saw, cut the clear acrylic tube off the black valve and save it for later
(Figure C). File the cut end of the valve square
and smooth. Clean off any plastic burrs.
At the bottom end of the valve, file the 2
“ears” down flat (Figure D). Scrape away any
burrs, and wash the shavings out of the valve.
Mark a ½"× 2" rectangle on the plastic
sheet, drill a 1" hole centered inside, and cut
it out with a fine-toothed saw. Clean off any
burrs and super-glue it to the end of the valve
with the pin through the hole (Figure E).
bit through one wall only. Work your way up to
a 2" hole, as you did before (Figure F).
Cut the drilled tube to 2", remove burrs,
and push it through the hole drilled in the
valve (Figure G). Super-glue the tube in place
with its hole facing the valve’s movable cone.
3. Make the check valve.
My check valve came from inside a spray
bottle. Valve styles vary for different products,
but here’s what worked with a 1qt bottle of
Clorox Clean-Up.
Unscrew the spray top, pull off its siphon
tube, and save it for later. Open the spray
mechanism (Figure H) and remove the ball
valve (Figure I). Trim excess plastic on both
sides, and hot-glue the valve to the short
end of the acrylic tube, oriented to only allow
water to run away from the waste valve.
2. Install the waste valve.
Mark a point centered ½" from one end of the
acrylic tube you saved, and drill it with a 1"
4. Add the input and output tubes.
Drill a hole in the bottom of a bucket or similar container, and hot-glue in one end of a
144 Make: makezine.com/30
