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Siphon misconceptions.
Many textbooks assert or imply that it is air pressure that causes the fluid motion that allows a siphon to work. One website even asserts that a siphon could not work on the moon, because there's no atmosphere there. There's another misconception perpetrated by some textbooks. They suggest to the student mind that it is the difference in weight of liquid in the two arms of the tube that causes the siphon action. I've often thought that "Explain how a siphon works" would be a good question for Ph.D. physics oral exams. I'll bet most candidates would get it wrong. It's also interesting how many modern textbooks avoid any mention of siphons. First, let's define "siphon". The siphon is a liquid reservoir with an inverted U-tube. Its purpose is to drain liquid from the reservoir by liquid flow that passes over a higher level than the water surface in the reservoir. The net result is that the liquid passes from the reservoir to a lower level and does so continually and without external energy input until the reservoir level falls below the ouput level of the U-tube. The only practical difference between a siphon and a leaky bucket is the fact that the liquid passes to a higher level before draining out to a lower level. So we have two things to explain. (1) Why does the liquid continue to fill the siphon tube Fig. 1. The Siphon. completely, even though that requires water to be From The Wikipedia. at a higher level than the liquid level in the reservoir? and (2) Why does the liquid sustain motion through the tube? Lifting water in a tube. The liquid barometer is an example of water being lifted above the level of a reservoir. A tube closed at one end is filled with the liquid, then the closed end is raised up while the lower end is immersed in the liquid reservoir. The liquid in the tube stays there, until the tube height is greater than a certain height that depends on the density of the liquid and the pressure of the air outside the tube. The air pressure is sufficient to sustain a liquid height of about 34 feet for water, only about 32 inches for liquid mercury. Above that height, a near-vacuum forms above
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the liquid in the closed tube. Actually, the pressure there is called the vapor pressure of the liquid's vapor. This tells us that if the U-tube of a siphon were too great, the same thing would heppen, and a near-vacuum would be created near the top of the U-tube. This would interrupt the continuity of liquid in the tube, and siphon action would stop. This is exactly what happens. Ancient Roman engineers who built siphons into their water aquaducts were quite aware of this limitation of siphons. So air pressure is important to siphons by putting a limitation on how high they can lift water, and without lifting the water to the top of the U-tube, no siphoning can occur. But this isn't the whole story. Is it air pressure that sustains the water flow in a siphon? It is not. Siphoning in a vacuum. If there were no air pressure, could a siphon work? Definitely yes, at least for some liquids, but something else would be required to cause the liquid to form a continuous path through the elevated U-tube. Very cohesive liquids can do this, the molecules attracting each other so strongly that they can maintain a chain-like continuouity up and across a U-tube, yet still maintain a liquid's other properties. This has been demonstrated in the laboratory. See: Siphon in a vacuum. So it's continuity of the liquid in the U-tube that is essential for a siphon. The continuity can be sustained by external air pressure, but even in the absence of air, cohesive forces in some liquids are sufficient to sustain it. So we can conclude that air pressure is not always necessary to provide the conditions necessary for a siphon. And air pressure isn't the reason that the liquid flows through the siphon tube for any kind of liquid. Maintaining the flow. Let's suppose we have the conditions necessary for a siphon, with liquid from the reservoir filling the tube. The output portion of the U-tube is necessarily longer than the length of the input portion (measured from liquid level to top of U-tube). So it is all too tempting to think of this a something like a pulley and rope with unequal weights attached to the rope on either side. Then the heavier weight "pulls down" the other one. This misconception is reinforced by thinking of the liquid in the tube by analogy with a smooth and flexible chain passing over a pulley. But that's the danger of naive analogies, they untimately break down for the two situations are never completely alike. A few years ago a journal article stimulated some
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Fig. 2. The naive

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chain analogy. controversy in journals and on the web. Hughes, Stephen W. (2010) A practical example of a siphon at work. From The Wikipedia. Physics Education, 45(2), pp. 162-166. For example: Siphons, Revisited. Alex Richert and P.-M. Binder, University of Hawaii at Hilo. The Physics Teacher, Vol. 49, February 2011.

Fig. 3. Reverse siphon? From The Wikipedia.

Fig. 4. Vittorio Zonca's 1607 mill. From Dircks (1861).

If it were the weight in the arms of the U-tube that causes water flow, then this hypothetical reverse siphon (Fig. 3) ought to work, causing flow from right to left since the left side of the tube contains more liquid and clearly must be heavier. In fact this ought to allow a siphon to raise liquid from lower to higher levels. Vittorio Zonca (1568-1602), In his folio "Novo Teatro di Machine et Edificii" (Padua, 1607) even proposed this idea as if it could be a useful device to lift water to drive the waterwheel (or turbine) of a mill. (Fig. 4.) Of course it could never work. In fact, this overbalanced siphon flows from left to right, from higher to lower level, just as an ordinary siphon does. Robert Boyle (16271691), discussed the "hydrostatic" paradox to reveal the misconception involved. His clever example was a "self-flowing" flask (Fig. 5). Why doesn't the greater weight of liquid in the flask force liquid to a higher level in the
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narrow tube so that it spills over and flows back into the flask. Perpetual motion! Add a small waterwheel just below the outlet and you could extract energy from the fluid flow. If there were any flow. Even today there are people who see this picture of the flask and can't imagine why it doesn't work. College students are often puzzled by it and at a loss to explain its fallacy. Zonca can be forgiven, for he lived at a time before the cocept of force was well understood, and long before vector analysis of forces became a standard tool for analyzing physical systems. Today's physics students have no such excuse. To make the story short, the misconception here is to suppose that Fig. 5. Boyle's "self-flowing flask". the entire weight of the liquid in the The Hydrostatic Paradox. flask must be supported by the smaller weight of liquid in the tube. This seems impossible, so one imagines the liquid must flow from left to right. But the weight of liquid is partly supported by the sloping walls of the flask. The wall exerts forces normal (perpendicular) to the wall, and these have upward components. The liquid in the flask is not entirely supported by weight of liquid on the right, but largely by the flask walls. Overlooking that fact leads to the apparent paradox. The Flemish scientist Simon Stevin (15481620) first explained this. The French mathematician Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) illustrated it with a demonstration device, Pascal's Vases, which had glass flasks of various shapes and orientations connected to a common water reservoir. The water level in each flask, whatever the flask's shape, was at the same height. Of course this is the essence of Aristotle's principle that "Water seeks its own level."

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Fig. 6. Pascal's vases (left). The pressures at A and B are the same. Showing forces due to the vessel walls (right).

Pressure is the reason. We have seen that it isn't the weight difference in the U-tube arms that initiates flow. It is the pressure difference within the liquid that does that. It helps to realize a fundamental fact about hydrostatics. The pressure difference between two points in a liquid is equal to the gH where is the liquid density, g is the acceleration due to gravity and H is the height difference. This is true so long as the liquid has continuity between the two points, that is, if a continuous line can be drawn between the points, passing only through the liquid.

Fig. 7. A continuous line may be drawn through the liquid, connecting points A and B. Therefore the pressure difference between these points is gH, where is the liquid density.

But the reader may object that siphon action isn't a static situation, but a dynamic (moving) one. True. But when a siphon is constructed one initially fills the tube and closes off the lower end of the tube, preventing fluid flow. This is a static situation
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and the pressure difference between the lower end of the tube and the liquid level in the reservoir is established. As soon as the lower end is opened, liquid flows from the higher to lower pressure. To analyze this, the obsessive reader may wish to apply Bernoulli's equation to recalculate the altered pressures, but the pressure difference is still in the same sense and the flow still continues.

The bottom line.

A water siphon (which most people have in mind when you mention "siphon") will not work well in a vacuum, because water isn't cohesive enough to maintain much height in the U-tube without air pressure supporting it. But highly cohesive liquids can sustain siphon action in a vacuum. In any case, it isn't atmospheric pressure that sustains the siphon flow. The weight difference of liquid in the tube arms isn't the reason for siphon flow. The siphon's flow is a result of the pressure difference between the liquid level in the reservoir and the level of the output tube's opening. Donald E. Simanek, Oct. 2012. Send comments, corrections and additional ideas to the address shown at the right. Return to top. Return to the Museum's main gallery. Return to Donald Simanek's front page.

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