Well repairs,,, OUCH!!

[gsganzer]

Came home on Monday night to find I had no water pressure from my well. Did the basic troubleshooting and isolated to either a worn pump (26 years old at best guess, replaced by previous owner) or a hole in the drop pipe.

Eight phone calls later and I finally find a well company that can get to it. Long story short, 400' of 1.25" pipe (replaced severely rusted galvanized with new SCH120 PVC), new wire (original was direct burial cable with no ground), replaced pump (increased pump to 5HP), new control box (due to upsized pump), new 86 gallon tank (replaced old air over water tank with a diaphragm tank)

$6700 bucks, OUCH!!

The good news, it should last me into retirement.

 

[riptides]

Came home on Monday night to find I had no water pressure from my well. Did the basic troubleshooting and isolated to either a worn pump (26 years old at best guess, replaced by previous owner) or a hole in the drop pipe.

Eight phone calls later and I finally find a well company that can get to it. Long story short, 400' of 1.25" pipe (replaced severely rusted galvanized with new SCH120 PVC), new wire (original was direct burial cable with no ground), replaced pump (increased pump to 5HP), new control box (due to upsized pump), new 86 gallon tank (replaced old air over water tank with a diaphragm tank)

$6700 bucks, OUCH!!

The good news, it should last me into retirement.

Divide that be 30 years and it may make you feel a little better?

Those unexpected replacements though are painful.

 

[gsganzer]

Any water well guys on here? I'm not sure I didn't just get sold a bag of bull.

Here's the details of my original set-up.
The original pump was a 1.5hp (not sure of the gpm rating) and sat at 400'.

The well guy recommended we bump to a 5hp pump for longevity ($1200 upgrade, also required upsizing wire and control box). He actually claims it's a 1.5hp/7gpm pump with a 5hp motor for longevity.

When we did the run test after installation, we found the pump runs the well dry in under 5 minutes, which means it runs the well dry before it recharges the tank. Obviously not a good scenario. He says it's a well problem and the only real fix is to spend another $5500 and add a "dry-pump cut-out" and a 3000 gallon water storage system.

I questioned him about whether the pump is oversized for the recharge rate of the well. Because regardless of whether I'm trying to re-fill an 86 gallon bladder tank or a 3000 gallon storage tank, starting and stopping a pump every 5 minutes is not how a pump should be run. I would think that unless there's no other option, a pump/motor combo should never be sized to out pump a well and run it dry.

Question for any well guys on TBN. Can you actually buy a 5hp motor on a 1.5hp pump or is this what he used because it's all he had? I'm kicking myself for not pulling the serial numbers off the pump and motor.

 

[hawkeye08]

Agree, you have too much pump or not enough well. Probably easier to fix pump. Don't know about the 5hp motor, sorry. Perhaps your well has changed and that is what took out the old pump?

I plan on looking into sch120PVC when we pull our pump next time. We're only down 200', started on poly pipe but even with torque arresters, too much movement so the wire would rub eventually. We put it on galvanized pipe, but had to have it pulled in the last couple years due to hole in pipe.

 

[ozley]

Did you have a well problem with the old pump in the well?

 

[Egon]

You could drill holes in the staters to reduce flow. A divert valve back to the well could be set up to reduce the usable flow.

 

[gsganzer]

Agree, you have too much pump or not enough well. Probably easier to fix pump. Don't know about the 5hp motor, sorry. Perhaps your well has changed and that is what took out the old pump?

I plan on looking into sch120PVC when we pull our pump next time. We're only down 200', started on poly pipe but even with torque arresters, too much movement so the wire would rub eventually. We put it on galvanized pipe, but had to have it pulled in the last couple years due to hole in pipe.

I'm surprised anyone uses galvanized pipe anymore. When I bought the house 15 years ago, I had a well issue (Short in the wire to the pump due to chafing). At that time, we replaced a good number of rusted sections. Fast forward to today and we had at least 5 sections that were almost perforated with rust again, in only 15 years.

The water lever above the pump is only 20-30', not ideal. 15 years ago I had 40' of water above the pump, so the aquifer has dropped. We've had almost 4 years of drought, so that might be part of it, but we've also had a lot more people drilling wells, which is probably the real culprit for the drop.

Old pump issue was due to some perforated drop pipe and pump wear.

 

[gsganzer]

A divert valve back to the well could be set up to reduce the usable flow.

Egon,
You might have hit on the solution. I could probably do it with a simple rotometer, so I could see the flow and adjust it.

 

[Oaktree]

Curiously, is an 86 gallon tank what everyone uses out your way? My well is gravity-feed so I don't have a tank, but everyone I know with a pump has a tank in the 15-20 gal range.
I get that a larger tank means fewer (though longer) pump cycles, but if your well can't handle it maybe a smaller tank might be in order.

 

[westcliffe01]

With a low delivery well, the best solution is a low capacity pump (well below well recovery rate) and then a buried cistern holding more than enough for your worst peak demand. The well pump can take its sweet time refilling the cistern, provided it will hold enough for you to live from for a few days. It is actually just about the default setup for an off grid home since the cost to have batteries and inverter that can run a 3-5hp well pump is prohibitive.

Sounds like your supplier is working for his best interest and not yours. With such a large accumulator the supplier should take the oversized pump back and put in one the same size or smaller than the one you had. Potentially adjust the pressure switch so it can dip lower in pressure and then use a booster pump with a check valve to supply pressurized water to the house. That way the well pump would not run as frequently and would last longer.