camel said:
I have seen various ways of linking caravan water butts together, but would the on board water pump draw water from two barrels at the same time if I fabricated an inlet hose to have two pipes from the same inlet pipe going in to the two barrels,
In theory if you could ensure the the suction on each pipe were equal then yes it could work, And when the pumped stopped taking water the Y link would act like a syphon and the levels of water in each barrel would equalise.
But the problem would be achieving equal suction on both legs, even a slight imbalance could drain one barrel preferentially, then as air entered the pipe the system would probably air lock.
Just rearranging the idea slightly: Just use a normal single hose for the pump inlet working in one barrel. Then using a separate length of hose set up a syphon between the barrels. as the water is drawn from one barrel its water level will drop, this will cause the second barrel to move water to teh first through the syphon, The water levels will equalise, and both barrels will tend to empty together.
If you are prepared to make a link hose between teh bottoms of the barrels then again water levels will tend to equalise as the pump draws water.
Third option. Be more frugal with water and only use one barrel.