Today I’m going to show you how to build a floating faucet fountain.
This is a pretty cool fountain that creates the illusion of a faucet that appears to magically float on a stream of water above the bucket.
Watch the video below and enjoy the magic of this amazing floating fountain!
Materials:
Tools:
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Now let’s see how I build it!
For this project you’re going to need a bucket, or any kind of waterproof container, a bunch of natural river rocks, a clear rigid acrylic tube, a small submersible water pump and a spigot or faucet.
A submersible water pump is ideal for this project because it is quiet and easy to install. It will be placed at the bottom of the bucket, but I don’t want the cord coming up over the edge of the bucket.
So, I’m going to drill a small hole down into the back of the bucket. The hole should be big enough to fit the cord of the pump, and for this purpose I’m using 6 mm drill bit.
Also, I don’t like the look of the red and black wire without outer jacket and I decided to cover them with black heat shrink tubing. The length of the wires is 46 cm, but I cut around 44 cm of the heat shrink tubing, leaving 2 cm of the wires exposed.
For powering this pump I’m using 12 V DC power supply.
Using a lighter, I shrunk the heat shrink tubing.
With that done, I can run the cord through the bucket.
Another piece of heat shrink needs to go through the wires, which I’ll use later in the project.
The ends of the wires are already prepared to soldering, but I need to strip just a little bit more of the insulation of the black wire.
So, I soldered the red wire onto the shorter tip of the DC power jack, and the black wire onto the longer tip of the jack.
After that I used the lighter to shrink the heat-shrink piece I previously added, and insulated the connection.
This is a clear rigid acrylic tube. It has 20 mm outer diameter and is 50 cm long, which is perfect size for my bucket.
Before gluing the tube to the faucet, I need to drill some small holes in the top of the tube, because I want water to be able to come out of the top easily, which will actually create the illusion we’re going for.
I drilled 8 holes equal distance apart with 3 mm drill bit, and made sure they’re really close to the top, only 3 mm away.
Then I removed all the burrs with a sandpaper both inside and outside, which will additionally help make stronger bond with the glue.
Two-part epoxy is a great choice for gluing acrylic to metal and it only takes 5 min to cure.
I applied generous amount of epoxy inside the faucet, avoiding the sides, because I want to have enough clear space for the holes of the acrylic tube that I previously drilled.
The inside diameter of the acrylic tube is too wide for the nozzle that comes with the pump. But I’ll fix that with hot glue.
First, I applied hot glue around the nozzle. While the glue was still hot, I placed the tube above the nozzle. And then, I applied large amount of hot glue around the tube.
Now the tube is attached to the pump and the faucet and the glue is completely cured, so I can move on with the project.
At this point, I positioned the tube in the middle of the bucket, and started pilling the river rocks up. The rocks are going to hold everything in place.
The pump is inside the bucket, the tube is straight up, and the faucet is in the right position, which means that everything is in place. The cord is down behind the faucet, so we can seal off the hole where the cord is running out. I’m going to use some hot glue for that.
This is the power adapter that I’m using. I already mentioned that for powering the pump I’m going to use 12 V DC power supply. Now I need to connect the pump to the adapter and plug it in.
The final step is adding some water in the bucket. You can add as much water as you want.
OK. So, let’s plug the fountain in and see how it works.
The water came up out the holes in the top of the tube and started flowing around the sides. And this is exactly what we need.
The illusion of floating faucet is achieved, which means that I’m done with this project. I really like how it turned out. It looks absolutely amazing.
This was very fun project, and is something you can definitely try at home.
If you like this project give me a thumbs up, leave a comment down below and don’t forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel.
