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Changes
added details of pump model equations and their implications
===Suitable conditions===
[[Image:horse rope pump.jpg|thumb|right|200px|'''Horse Rope pump''', powered by horses or donkeys. Pumps from wells to 65 m deep. Pump capacity 5 times more than a hand powered model. Used in Nicaragua. Photo: Henk Holtslag]]
A Rope pump can be used to draw water from large diameter hand dug wells of 3 meters to boreholes as small as 6 cm. One person can draw water up from 35 m deep, two persons can pump from 60 m deep (using a second crank) and if powered by an engine it can pump from 100 meters or more. A Rope pump can be driven by hand, bicycle, animals, wind or engines. If well made, a hand Rope pump delivers 35 litres / min from 10 meters depth and halve of that if the well is 20 metres deep. Rope Pumps can be [http://www.mawama.org/rope-pump/rope-pump-efficiency very efficient] but typically have an efficiencies of 65%, [http://www.mawama.org/rope-pump/rope-pump-efficiency model equations of the rope pump] confirm the best rope speed to around 1.2m/s and the piston spacing to be 1m. Hand pump models are most commonly used at depths less than 35m.
Some 70,000 Rope pumps are now in use in Nicaragua, 10,000 in countries like Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador and Bolivia. 30,000 in African countries like Ethiopia, Ghana, Senegal, Tanzania, Zambia, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Malawi and 6000 in Cambodia and India. In total, the Rope pump is used in over 25 countries.
