Choosing a cylinder - standard or flanged?

I’m buying my first cylinder and I’m unsure whether it is worth paying extra for a flanged cylinder for extra comfort. I anticipate doing mostly water pumping if that makes a difference.

I would appreciate any advice from anyone experienced.

I think as a newbie to pumping a flanged cylinder would be the safest way to go for comfort and sealing.

If you are planning to buy an air pump and use it as a water pump, you should know that air pumps can’t pump water without getting damaged.

Do you know what kind of pumping system you are going to buy? If you have a link that shows the pump, I could help if it can handle water or not.

Thanks for replying.

I’m really following the suggestions from Firegoat made here:
Buying pump in uk

So I am thinking of a Sealey VS402 (Sealey - Leading Professional Tool & Workshop Equipment Supplier) and a cylinder and a pump connector from https://www.thickwall.co.uk .

The price quoted on Sealey’s website is much higher than elsewhere so I’d probably buy it from ebay at around £28. There are cheaper unbranded brake bleeders on ebay but I don’t know whether to trust them.

Does this look viable?

The brake bleeding pumps are fine, as long as they have a gauge.
They usually come with some kind of reservoir thing, so that they can be used with a liquid without sucking it into the mechanism and ruining it.

It’s a low pressure operation that we’re talking about here and also very little actual pumping that the mechanism has to do. So cheaply made hand pumps are plenty strong to work and work well for a long time.

As for tube design, I like the flange. I made my own, but it was a copy how LA Pumps makes theirs. I’m tinkering in my mind with how to make a silicone ring for the thing, just to make it extra comfy. Hopefully I’ll figure that out just in time to grow out of my current tube. *dare to dream*

If the cylinder is more then a couple inches longer then your pumped unit, you should easily be able to figure out a water fill line that covers your glans and doesn’t come out the top of the cylinder.

This is what I do and it prevents the added container in the lines.

Yes, that pump should do the trick. The plastic container is installed on the vacuum tube between the cylinder and pump to catch water that is drawn from the cylinder.

As a newbie though, I think you should just start by getting conditioned to air pumping and after perfecting that, move on to water pumping. The water just adds another level of difficulty for newbies to worry about.

Start out by using a gauge pressure of 3”hg and only 5 to 10 minutes, and slowly move up from there as you get conditioned to pumping. I would suggest adding more time before adding more pressure until you get up to 20 to 25 minutes continuous in the cylinder.