Drilling a water well

   / Drilling a water well #1  

C4Ranch

Veteran Member
Joined
Sep 9, 2011
Messages
1,049
Location
Eastland Co, Texas
Tractor
Kubota L5240 HSTC
My place didn't have a water well rather 2 1.5k gal storage tanks for the small house and another one for one of the barns.
I'm thinking about replacing with a well. Is there anything I should look for in a driller? Any time of the year that is cheaper? Figure I'll have to go 350-400'.

TIA!

J
 
   / Drilling a water well #2  
talk to some neighbors and see who did theirs.. and how deep they are.

deffinately choose someone who drills in your area.. not a out of town, slightly cheaper guy.

drillers that have been around or in business longer is usually a good sign too.
 
   / Drilling a water well #3  
talk to some neighbors and see who did theirs.. and how deep they are.

deffinately choose someone who drills in your area.. not a out of town, slightly cheaper guy.

drillers that have been around or in business longer is usually a good sign too.
I agree wholeheartedly with your post. I would like to add this point. There are requirements regarding GPM flow in providing adequate water for the size of the Home. I think that 15-18 GPM flow is the least that One should have for a 3 bedroom home. Check with your driller. Just a thought. Best wishes.
 
   / Drilling a water well #4  
C4Ranch,

Find a dowser who can help locate a water source in stead of drilling blindly. Then find a driller in the area. Get an itemized cost break down to everything that the driller will do to drill to your water supply satisfaction of gpm. This includes travel time for the rig, fuel for the drilling unit, casing, liner, well casing sealer, etc. If the driller breaks down for any reason who pays for the down time. After the well is drilled - Who is going to insert the pump, type of pump and hookup to power source, pressure tank and now a pump house. My son went thru this last Sept. and we hit 60gpm @ 185'. We did our own dowsing. Hope this helps

idaho2
 
   / Drilling a water well #5  
First: I'm curious to know how you fill your tanks.
As to the drillers: In my area, one driller is significantly more expensive than the other and they both stay in business so, you might, talk to the locals about the kind of work the drillers do, get estimates from the ones that have good references, and then make your decision. Angie's List might save you some time in checkig references. Angie wasn't around when I had a well drilled.
 
   / Drilling a water well #6  
I think that 15-18 GPM flow is the least that One should have for a 3 bedroom home. Check with your driller. Just a thought. Best wishes.

Nah.....5-8gpm is adequate.....and less if you have enough reserve in the well.
 
   / Drilling a water well #7  
Make sure there is water, some places there is none, I have seen 800 ft holes with dust in the bottom.

Also make sure if there is water that it is palatable .

Storage tanks that are filled by a truck are a ominous sign to me.

Good Luck---J
 
   / Drilling a water well #8  
I had mine done 7 years ago and tgey used a rotary air drill. Got most of it done ine one day came back the second day to finish it up. 120' deep. I doused and glad I did because where I orignially planned the site would have been a bad choice. I get 20-25gpm and no issues yet. Having to run power and waterline 300' feet was a pain in my rocky soil but worth not having to stress about runnimg short on water. Rates at the time were $35/ft plus a few hundred for setup and permits. I had another guy do the pump and cost on that was about $5k. He talked me into a constant pressure system which works ok but could have lived with traditional style and saved some money.

Good luck. The driller told me that drilling was like going to vegas and putting money down on the craps table. Sometimes you win sometimes you don't..luckily we won.
 
   / Drilling a water well #9  
Also check the county well reports. Youd be suprised what you can find out. I found copies of my neighbors wells, depths, types of soil at each layer, and gpm. This also helped in determining best location. South side reports had much better results than those on the north side.
 
   / Drilling a water well #10  
I agree wholeheartedly with your post. I would like to add this point. There are requirements regarding GPM flow in providing adequate water for the size of the Home. I think that 15-18 GPM flow is the least that One should have for a 3 bedroom home. Check with your driller. Just a thought. Best wishes.

Most of the wells that I have heard about in my county are 5 GPM. Many are lucky to get 5 GPM. One nearby lot has over 30 GPM, which is amazing, while we really got real lucky with 15 GPM.

Our well has 223 feet of standing water which means we have almost 1,300 gallons of water in the pipe! Pi * R squared * depth = 3.14*.25*223 = 174 cubic feet. 174 cf * 7.5 gallons per cubic feet is 1297.5 gallons!

My best guesstimate is that we use at most 200 gallons a day and I think we really use close to 100 gallons a day. Our well pump is no more than GPM, so in theory, we could run the pump constantly and not run out of water since the well is 15 GPM. Not that I would ever Ever EVER try such a thing. That well is precious.

We were at a friends house and their neighbor came over and asked if they had water since the neighbor was not getting water from her well. The neighbors boyfriend had run the well dry by watering the lawn. :rolleyes: City boys. :laughing::laughing::laughing:

Later,
Dan
 

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