New Well

[Mo]

I am finally having the well drilled this month, the driller needs to know of I want it lined or not. Do you line the whole well or just so far down? It's $4 a foot for 7" pvc pipe. I know that drilling a new well would be worst case. What is usually done? My neighbors isn't lined and is 240'.

[glenn-k]

Your driller, if a trustworthy guy, would be the best one to make a recommendation in this case.  Ask him what he recommends.  I drilled for about 10 years.  The driller will be familiar with the local conditions.  Minimum for a seal is 20' but it should be taken down at least to the surface of the bed rock or part of the formation that is solid enough to assure that there will not be caving or leakage around the seal.  In an unconsolidated formation it is possible for material to break loose and fall locking the pump in the well.  In a fractured rock formation that could also be a possibility.  Ask the driller his opinion and it may even be possible he will want to decide after he sees the condition of the formation he is drilling through if he is not installing casing as he goes.

Casing is usually installed as the well is drilled in percussion drilling in unconsolidated formations.  Solid rock many times does not require casing except for the seal.

I assume your driller will be doing some type of rotary drilling.

[MountainDon]

Around here everyone I've asked, all three of 'em, have the well lined. But like Glenn stated check locally.

Even tho it would add nearly a $1K to the cost I'd sure hate to find I couldn't pull up the pump at some future date due to no liner.  

[glenn-k]

Note that my well here is 675 feet deep with 20 feet of casing and the pump is set at 320 feet deep in the open hole --with no known problems. :-?

[Mo]

Thanks to all. I had ask the driller, he will be putting in 20' but it is up to us for the rest because he doesn't want to force a purchase where he will make money, But he would protect his well if it were his. I guess I will find out if we hit bedrock, and how deep. We are drilling into sandy soil, my 4' footers had chunks of sandstone starting 6 inches down. Thanks again.

[glenn-k]

Please let us know how things work out.

[desdawg]

Glenn, how did you determine the depth to set your pump? I had mine put clear down near the bottom rather than up higher. I guess I was thinking with all of our growth as more people drill and access the same water formation that the level might drop and I would still be in the wet.

[glenn-k]

A couple of factors on my pump depth.

If your flow is well over the capacity of the pump, then you could put it a minimum of about 10 to 20  feet under the water and be good for years.  Your well driller will be familiar with the average annual fluctuation or loss of static level over the years.  You can go deeper with no problem, but it's just that much more you have to pull out.

I had the drillers report of 1/2 gallon per minute estimated flow, and took a static level test at 169'.  I knew I wanted a reservoir above the pump - in the well bore, so that I could pump a reasonable amount of water before running dry.  I put a pump protector on the pump to shut it off when the well ran out of water.  I sized my pump with the capacity to pump from 600 feet or more, so at 320 feet I am pumping about 10 gpm.  I get about 400 gallons before running out - actual flow tested at 1 gpm after I had the pump in.  To test - pump dry - shut off -- wait 5 minutes - pump dry while measuring the flow.  Shut off and divide gallons by minutes.  This is your recovery rate.

The next factor is that I wanted to add a windmill to the pump before I put it to the bottom.  I could add a windmill cylinder, pipe and sucker rod at this point and set the windmill at 300 and the pump at 620 without pulling it out.  What a project that would be.  I have the windmill but the solar and electric is so easy, I hate to put it over the well.  

Maybe I need to drill a new well for the windmill. :-/  

[glenn-k]

More tests of well strength are as follows.

I use an electronic well sounder - beeps when it hits water.  Pump off measure static level -- the highest it stands.  

Pump on - usually 1/2 hour or until pumping level stabilizes - quits falling - this gets you to the bottom of the cone of depression - or the lowest point you can pump from the surrounding underground area at a given pumping rate.  It could get greater over extended time but is good enough for us for this test.  

Record the level.  Shut the pump off.  Check the level for 5 minutes and record the level again.  This is your five minute recovery rate level.  

You then take the reading you got -- lets say it came up 5 feet, and you were getting 10 gallons per minute pumping as an example.  Divide the gpm by 5 feet recovery in 5 minutes and this gives you 2 gallons per foot of draw down.  

If this was a test pump and you knew you wanted to get 40 gallons of water per minute, you would know that you would be pulling the pumping level down 20 feet to get 40 gallons per minute or 2gpfdd x 20 feet of draw down.  

This would help in figuring out the required horsepower and in keeping from installing the pump to high, or in knowing that you may need a pump protector if you are going to be pumping over well capacity.

[Texan_lost_in_cali]

Anyone ever dig there own well? Besides Glenn with the proper well drilling tools.... more a DIY operation.

[MountainDon]

Someplace on this forum is a story of a self drilled well, or at least the attempt. I'd do a search but I was headimg off to bed. Gotta get up early tommorrow for something... Oh, Work. That's it!    Oh, and I once dug a well on a lakeshore back home. With a shovel. (Water only for landscape irrigation, and because I wanted to see if it worked.)

[glenn-k]

When I was flying the medical personnel to the clinic in Mexico, I used to visit the villagers.  The children of the village  took me to their well drilling project.  They had a ladder in a hole about 4 feet in diameter and 15 feet deep.  Two men went down into the bottom of the well with a shovel, a bucket on a rope and a yellow plastic machine gun.  They would fill the bucket and send it to the top - others would dump it and send it back down.  This continued until they were done - I wasn't there to see it completed but they were very proud of it.

This is how they dug their well.  

[desdawg]

OK, I have to bite. Tell me about the yellow plastic machine gun.  

[glenn-k]

I knew this was going to happen. :-/

I think it was a squirt gun and they just used it to squirt themselves to cool off.  I'm not really sure and didn't see them shoot anybody with it.

These were 2 older fellows - probably in their 30's - that just adds to the mystery. :-?

[Amanda_931]

Did you install your own septic.

Given our love of topic highjacking, of course the well-drilling adventures would be on page two of that one.

http://www.countryplans.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1163465601/20#20

[glenn-k]

Good Job, Amanda.  You ferreted that thing right out.

I knew it was here somewhere. :-/

[Amanda_931]

I really can't take much credit for that--I was going up the list of topics with new posts on them, and it was the next one up.

That doesn't happen all the time.

[Mo]

I read a book call "40 Acres and No Mule", they had dug their own well by using a green spring pole and a large pointed rock tied to the end, they would pull it down twist the rock real quick and let it up again. They did it to get through bedrock. After reading that I decided that the $1300 for the well seemed fair since he had the drilling rig I have rock.

[glenn-k]

That method was invented by the Chinese over 2000 years ago - percussion drilling.  Sometimes it took them many generations to drill a well.

I did a later form of that drilling - Cable Tool drilling.  I used drilling scows which were also known as bailers but weighed anything from 500 lbs empty to over 2000 lbs full on the big ones.

[Mo]

I all, my well has been dug I think I should have used the spring pole.   We were going to drill next to the cabin but the health department wanted us to move up on the hill across the road so move we did. We hit shale at 20 feet and water at 25 feet, coal at 35 feet for 7 feet and a crevas at 50 feet hard rock at 55 feet and nothing ever came out after that. The driller said that the casting is going into the crevas so he stopped at 70 feet and left for the day to let it settle. He came back on Friday morning and drilled 20 feet and nothing came out. He wants to pump out the mess and clean up the bottom of the hole and see how much water we have and if it will be any good if lined and used for storage. Any thoughts out there because I am clueless. Thanks

[Amanda_931]

Why I think rain water harvesting is good.

Where legal.

And maybe even where not.

[MountainDon]

Where legal.

Oh crap! Don't tell me collecting rain is illegal someplace!!   :-? :-/ What's that all about? Well, actually please do tell me.  
Thanks Amanda

[Amanda_931]

I gather that in parts of the west (I was going to say arid, but it may not be, may be where they collect water to send to California) you do not own the water that falls on your house.

That water rights (like oil, gas, mineral, and timber rights in other places) do not necessarily go with the land when you buy it.

[MountainDon]

Well how about that!    I know I don't have the gas, oil, and mineral rights, but I do have the timber rights. As for water I have a state permit to draw up to 3 acre-feet a year. I ever thought about the rain being regulated.  :-/  I don't think I'll loose any sleep over the legality/illegality of it all. But that is interesting. Next they'll be telling me I can only breath so much air a year.  

Oh my goodness, I just looked and I may have a problem with the catch basin pond I want to build on one of the slopes for erosion control. I'm sorry I looked; I think I already forgot that I looked.  

[glenn-k]

Hi Mo.

If I read all of that right you had water at 25 feet - according to what you said the driller doesn't think there is any more water coming in below that one area - the rest is dry hole, but while it is not producing water it can be used to store water and your pump can be set deeper if he cleans it out - usually by surging with air or pumping.  Sounds like he knows what he is doing.  I drilled for 10 years.