drill your own well?

[twodogs]

I live in SW PA, and I built a barn a few years back. I am toying with the idea of getting cows in a few years, and I started thinking about getting water to the barn. Has anyone 'drilled' their own well? I looked online & noticed a few sites suggesting driving a well point in the ground, but I don't know that it will work where I live. I would prefer skipping the idea of trenching 3' from my house to my barn.

Thanks!

 

[paulharvey]

If you have any hard rock it probably won't work. Basically you use a hi pressure water jet to sink the well points, 20-40 ft. I don't know if you can go much deeper, and I don't know if you'll hit good water at that depth in your area. Another thing to consider is if a 2" well will supply your needs. With that said, your only out maybe $100 if it doesnt; so worth a chance if you can save $3500 on a professional.

Someone will bring up legalities, but no one will ever know unless you tell them.

 

[oldnslo]

How much water per day would you require. Most well points or sand points have a limited flow rate. They worked pretty well for the old hand pumps but have had limited success with electric pumps unless your water table is real high and the ground allows water flow real easy.

We used these some as a kid in Central MN where the water table was around 4 foot and the soil was gravel. Expect to get a lot of sediment since the screen on the point is not real fine and if it is it plugs.

 

[Egon]

What do the neighbours have?

 

[RedNeckRacin]

I wouldn't think it would be worth the hassle unless your in a low area with a high water table. WE just drilled our well three years ago for the horses and ended up going about 280' deep to get enough flow.

 

[MossRoad]

I live in SW PA, and I built a barn a few years back. I am toying with the idea of getting cows in a few years, and I started thinking about getting water to the barn. Has anyone 'drilled' their own well? I looked online & noticed a few sites suggesting driving a well point in the ground, but I don't know that it will work where I live. I would prefer skipping the idea of trenching 3' from my house to my barn.

Thanks!

This makes no sense...
You want to drill a well, which could be 50-many hundreds feet deep to avoid digging a three foot trench???

Is there a typo there and you really have to trench a lot farther than 3'??

As for driving a well point, it only works if you have soft soil and not rock. Rock requires drilling. For example, we have sand and can hand drive a well very easily.

 

[jix]

Drill. No other way is worth the hassles.

 

[quicksandfarmer]

This makes no sense...
You want to drill a well, which could be 50-many hundreds feet deep to avoid digging a three foot trench???

Is there a typo there and you really have to trench a lot farther than 3'??

I think he means 3' deep.

It all depends on how far down the water is. There are places on my property where I can hit water with a post-hole digger. My dad paid a well-driller to drill a 600+ foot dry hole.

It really becomes a different game if you have to go more than about 20 feet. With a shallow well you can have the pump on the surface and pull the water up. Beyond 20 feet or so you can't pull water, you have to push it, which means a submerged pump at the bottom of the well, which means casing and wiring and a pretty big hole.

Depending on your soil you could go 20 feet with one of these:
Amazon.com: Seymour Mfg. AU-S6 Post Hole Auger: Home Improvement

Read the comments. I made a 10' hole with one and it wasn't much work.

Amazon.com: Seymour Mfg. AU-S6 Post Hole Auger: Home Improvement

 

[EddieWalker]

I've looked into those things, but keep coming back to the limited size of the hole you can drill, which means the pump has to be above ground instead of in the ground, which is what I prefer. The depth is also limited, and you really need to pick a spot that doesn't have any rocks.

I'm still trying to figure out how to get water to my garden, but I think drilling a well at the garden is out. My current plan is to go down to the low spot on my land that is always wet and dig a hole there and pump the water from there using a solar powered pump.

Eddie

 

[paulharvey]

I've looked into those things, but keep coming back to the limited size of the hole you can drill, which means the pump has to be above ground instead of in the ground, which is what I prefer. The depth is also limited, and you really need to pick a spot that doesn't have any rocks.

I'm still trying to figure out how to get water to my garden, but I think drilling a well at the garden is out. My current plan is to go down to the low spot on my land that is always wet and dig a hole there and pump the water from there using a solar powered pump.

Eddie

Sounds like in your situation you could use a "Kelley well". No idea if that's a real term, but it's what we call it. Dig out a good 6-8 ft or deeper hole, put a good sized piece of plastic or metal pipe (8 or 12") with slits or small holes in it. Wrap the pipe with filter fabric and back fill around pipe with #57 stone. Then simply drop a suction hose in it for a gas pump or even the 1" Harbor Freight 110v pump with a small length of 1" pvc.

 

[Sawyer Rob]

Folks use to pound down their own wells in around here, all the time, some still do...

They aren't "drilled" the pipe is "pounded" down, using a "drive" point and "drive" couplers... 20 feet is no problem around here and 30' is possible, but it's hard to pound a well down further without REAL well equipment. Some folks pounded them down through a hole in their basement floor, others out in the barn

A 2" well that is in decent water, puts out plenty of water to use an electric pump on, so that's not a problem...

It really depends on where you live as to what you will end up with for water quality, or even if you have water that close to the surface...

SR

 

[MNBobcat]

Sounds like in your situation you could use a "Kelley well". No idea if that's a real term, but it's what we call it. Dig out a good 6-8 ft or deeper hole, put a good sized piece of plastic or metal pipe (8 or 12") with slits or small holes in it. Wrap the pipe with filter fabric and back fill around pipe with #57 stone. Then simply drop a suction hose in it for a gas pump or even the 1" Harbor Freight 110v pump with a small length of 1" pvc.

You guys are way over complicating things. Just drive in a sand point. As long as you don't need to go over 25 feet deep you're good to go.

I bought a pneumatic jackhammer off of craigslist and used that to drive the point and well casing 17 feet into the ground. It takes about 5 - 10 minutes and you're done. I invested in the jackhammer because I drove 6 sandpoints for my well because I needed a high rate of flow (40 gpm). I plumbed all 6 wells together.

But for what the OP needs, a single sandpoint would be plenty. You can either pound the casing in by hand or rent a jackhammer.

 

[MNBobcat]

By the way, a shallow well isn't generally considered potable as it can have contaminants. They are fine for watering plants.

For the cows, I might opt to run a water line from the house to the barn. You can rent a walk behind gas powered trencher for under a $100. I trenched 200 feet with one a couple of years ago. Its not a big deal. Just make sure you have utilities located first.

 

[paulharvey]

You guys are way over complicating things. Just drive in a sand point. As long as you don't need to go over 25 feet deep you're good to go.

I bought a pneumatic jackhammer off of craigslist and used that to drive the point and well casing 17 feet into the ground. It takes about 5 - 10 minutes and you're done. I invested in the jackhammer because I drove 6 sandpoints for my well because I needed a high rate of flow (40 gpm). I plumbed all 6 wells together.

But for what the OP needs, a single sandpoint would be plenty. You can either pound the casing in by hand or rent a jackhammer.

You guys actually drive them? Every job I've been on, where we used well points, we jetted them in. Of coarse we also where using well points for De-Watering; but same product, same objective, get water out of the ground. Guess it's just we always have track hoes and such around when we are messing with them.

 

[MNBobcat]

Yes we drive them. They have a "Drive Cap" that screws onto the end of the well casing and are meant to be hammered on. The trick is to keep giving the pipe a clockwise turn with a pipe wrench every so often to keep the joints tight. The point has a solid steel tip for driving into the ground. The common size, I believe, is 1 1/2" though I believe 2" might be available.

 

[MossRoad]

You guys are way over complicating things. Just drive in a sand point. As long as you don't need to go over 25 feet deep you're good to go.

I bought a pneumatic jackhammer off of craigslist and used that to drive the point and well casing 17 feet into the ground. It takes about 5 - 10 minutes and you're done. I invested in the jackhammer because I drove 6 sandpoints for my well because I needed a high rate of flow (40 gpm). I plumbed all 6 wells together.

But for what the OP needs, a single sandpoint would be plenty. You can either pound the casing in by hand or rent a jackhammer.

Yeah, but the OP is in Pittsburg.... whole lotta rock there, as I recall.

 

[blucoondawg]

You can easily use electric pumps on driven point wells, there's a lot of them around here. My folks have a 1.25" point with a shallow well pump, the point is down 28 feet, I can't remember what the level of the water in the pipe is. If you have to go deeper than what a shallow well pump will pull then you can drive a 2" point and use a jet pump, that system will go quite a bit deeper, 80 to 100 feet max in some cases depending on the pump size, this requires you to sink a 2 inch point then lower a smaller pipe down it with a foot valve at the bottom it forces water down to push the water back up. The problem will be getting a point down to the water, we are in cobbly mixed rock area and got down almost 50 feet but we drove it with a good sized Bosch electric jackhammer my cousin borrowed from work

If you do try to drive a point buy your material from a reputable plumbing supply house, get a good quality point, we had trouble with pipe from the big box stores not holding up well to driving even with keeping the couplings tight

 

[ultrarunner]

Just got a bid for a 150' deep well in easy to access and good drilling conditions... 21k and it does not include development such as a pump, power or storage...

About a third is regulatory fees... the days of sinking a well are fast going the way of the dinosaur.

 

[blucoondawg]

You could drill to China for 21k around here. A minimum depth well around here would go around 4k everything done you start going 150ft it might be up to 10k depending on rock and stuff like that

 

[Sprinklerman]

Sounds like in your situation you could use a "Kelley well". No idea if that's a real term, but it's what we call it. Dig out a good 6-8 ft or deeper hole, put a good sized piece of plastic or metal pipe (8 or 12") with slits or small holes in it. Wrap the pipe with filter fabric and back fill around pipe with #57 stone. Then simply drop a suction hose in it for a gas pump or even the 1" Harbor Freight 110v pump with a small length of 1" pvc.

Thats similar to the old hand dug wells , we did something similar a few years back. Dug a 10 ft square hole about 14 feet deep we hit water at that point . Set some 12 inch pvc sewer pipe in it . I took a circular saw and cut slits in the pipe and the double wrapped it with filter cloth. We then lined the hole with filter cloth and filled it with large wash gravel . I then hung a 4 inch submersable pump down the pipe and pressure tank about 20 ft away . In the summer when it was dry it we always had water . It was pushing 15 gpm at full bore .



Drilling a well in central maryland 400 ft well $ 15,000