Water Line Repair

[dougtrr2]

My neighbor sprung a leak in the water line from his well to the house. There had been a storm and he had to reset an anchor for a power pole. It took him several tries and locations before he got in where he wanted. As we found out in one of his attempts he creased the plastic line and it finally failed several months later. We were lucky in that the first place we dug with my BX24 backhoe was within six inches of the ultimate leak. Overall it went surprisingly well. A couple lessons we learned:

As we dug down the first thing we found was the romex feed to the pump. We mistakenly assumed in was some unspecified distance above the water line. So I widened the hole and we found out it the water line was 12- 14" to the side of the romex and just slightly below.

My neighbor was very lucky, the final placement of the anchor missed the romex by less than six inches. Somehow the 5 foot anchor took a 30 degree bend the last two feet. How is that even possible?!

We did dig parallel to the line instead of at right angles. I think that was better. In my mind if you are at right angles you have more of a chance of doing major damage if you happen to go too deep. We were measuring and probing, but stuff can happen.

I think I should have dug a "step" in the hole to make it easier to get in and out. Four feet deep is a long way up when you get older.

Doug in SW IA

 

[two_bit_score]

Did you get pics of this? Sounds interesting.

 

[3Ts]

I think I should have dug a "step" in the hole to make it easier to get in and out. Four feet deep is a long way up when you get older.

I had to dig a hole 4.5' deep to bury my propane tank. For me a "step" just wasn't enough, I needed about 4 so I used a ladder to get in and out.

How did you repair the pipe? I knew where my sewer line was because I put it in just a couple of weeks earlier, but still creased it when digging to put in an electrical line. Since I didn't cut all the way thru, I took a piece of the same size pipe and cut a piece to cover the crease then heated it up and held it against the pipe to get the proper curvature, then glued it on. But, mine is not pressurized.

 

[RNeumann]

Code requires 1’ between the water and electrical lines- so that was installed correctly. It’s hard to locate older water lines as they typically didn’t have tracer wires. Today that is much more common. Typically a rental yard would have some locating equipment for the electrical and or tracer wires.
We have all seen the “call before you dig” ads and signs. While calling only locates the utility side of the meters that doesn’t mean property owners should do the rest- either hire it done or do it themselves. That applies to our little CUTs and TLBs as well! This is a good lesson for all of us! Thx for sharing and the reminder. Glad it was a relatively easy fix- all things considered.

 

[dougtrr2]

Sorry no pictures, so I guess maybe they don't really have their water back.

The repair was done with barbed fittings and a new piece of plastic pipe. On the recommendation of his plumber he put four stainless hose clamps on each fitting. To get the barbed fittings in the newer (thicker) pipe he heated the pipe up with a propane torch (again at the advice of his plumber). I didn't know you could heat the plastic up like that without it turing to mush.

Doug in SW IA

 

[RNeumann]

HDPE “pipe” can be heated in a pinch. The utilities and others with proper equipment “weld” fittings by heating the material until it just starts to melt and then it can be fused together.
Other pipe, like pvc, doesn’t take heat well at all.
Unfortunately the plumbing industry hasn’t done a very good job of making the distinction between “pipe” types. It was genius when they started to color code romex by size.

 

[JamesHW]

The pump for our dug well at the Farm is in the basement and the water pipe comes out of the wall next to it. We drain the plumbing in the fall and reconnect it in the spring each year that involves disconnecting the hose clamps and heating the pipe w/ a propane in order to disconnect the pump from the well side and the attached expansion tank in order to drain it (made the expensive mistake of not draining it a few years back). Quick connect fittings for pex have made draining the rest of the system much simpler and made burst pipes a thing of the past.