Well House Design

dmccarty · Feb 18, 2012

I could have sworn I had a thread on well house design but I could not find it. It was interesting reading the titles on the threads I created many years ago.

We need a well house. When we built the house, I built a box that is roughly 5'x5'x5', as a temporary cover for the well. This has been temporary for over seven years.

The well pad contains the pressure tank, plumbing, and power, along with the well head.

Years ago I placed some gravel around the pad to build on and that is as far as I have gotten. A car accident got in the way of building a well house and I think this year I might be able to complete the project.

At this point I think the well house will be 12'x12'. Our water is pretty hard and putting in a system to soften the water is something we need to do. The well house is going to get tied into the garden fence so I think it will have two doors. One on the outside of the the fence and the other on the inside of the garden. I like this idea since it will give more room to work around the well i needed.

In the fall of 2010 our pressure tank failed. It was easy to just flip the "box" off of the well and replace the tank. 12'x12' gives a decent amount of room as does the two doors.

When the pump has to be pulled, will there be enough room?

How likely is it that the well house would have to be moved to do work on the well?

Thanks,
Dan

SandburRanch · Feb 18, 2012

dmccarty said:
I could have sworn I had a thread on well house design but I could not find it. It was interesting reading the titles on the threads I created many years ago.

We need a well house. When we built the house, I built a box that is roughly 5'x5'x5', as a temporary cover for the well. This has been temporary for over seven years. The well pad contains the pressure tank, plumbing, and power, along with the well head.

Years ago I placed some gravel around the pad to build on and that is as far as I have gotten. A car accident got in the way of building a well house and I think this year I might be able to complete the project.

At this point I think the well house will be 12'x12'. Our water is pretty hard and putting in a system to soften the water is something we need to do. The well house is going to get tied into the garden fence so I think it will have two doors. One on the outside of the the fence and the other on the inside of the garden. I like this idea since it will give more room to work around the well i needed.

In the fall of 2010 our pressure tank failed. It was easy to just flip the "box" off of the well and replace the tank. 12'x12' gives a decent amount of room as does the two doors.

When the pump has to be pulled, will there be enough room?

How likely is it that the well house would have to be moved to do work on the well?

Thanks,
Dan

I built ours 8x12 which would give plenty of room for softener equipment although I don't have it, but your idea of 12x12 would probably be wise since you are planning on 2 doors.

Just don't build the pressure tank into a corner with piping in front of it like I did to save space. When the bladder fails and the tank won't drain that weight becomes a problem attempting to lift it over piping that's no more than a foot above the floor. I had to go to plan "B" to drain it so I could move it out by myself.

"When the pump has to be pulled, will there be enough room"? With synthetic pipe there will be plenty of room out the door.

"How likely is it that the well house would have to be moved to do work on the well"? Not likely. Anything other than pulling and repair/replacing the pump it will more than likely be less expensive to drill a new well with a pit-less adapter and plumb it into your well house connecting to your original pipe. ( See paragraph speaking of pipe and entrance sleeves in concrete floors ).

Speaking of pipe. I recommend running 2 pipes from the well house. One for house water and the second for outdoor/garden water with valving. This way if indoor plumbing needs repair we still have water to outdoor hydrants. I run house water through a sediment tank and then a filter. Outdoor water gets no filtering but could have been run through the sediment tank if it had been originally planned that way.

If you plan a concrete floor don't skimp on 3 or 4 inch long radius PVC sleeves (ells) for flexible piping and possibly electric line entrance when pouring the floor. If using screw pipe the PVC ells will need to be modified for screw well pipe.

dmccarty · Feb 18, 2012

SandburRanch said:
I built ours 8x12 which would give plenty of room for softener equipment although I don't have it, but your idea of 12x12 would probably be wise since you are planning on 2 doors.

Just don't build the pressure tank into a corner with piping in front of it like I did to save space. When the bladder fails and the tank won't drain that weight becomes a problem attempting to lift it over piping that's no more than a foot above the floor. I had to go to plan "B" to drain it so I could move it out by myself.

"When the pump has to be pulled, will there be enough room"? With synthetic pipe there will be plenty of room out the door.

"How likely is it that the well house would have to be moved to do work on the well"? Not likely. Anything other than pulling and repair/replacing the pump it will more than likely be less expensive to drill a new well with a pit-less adapter and plumb it into your well house connecting to your original pipe. ( See paragraph speaking of pipe and entrance sleeves in concrete floors ).

Speaking of pipe. I recommend running 2 pipes from the well house. One for house water and the second for outdoor/garden water with valving. This way if indoor plumbing needs repair we still have water to outdoor hydrants. I run house water through a sediment tank and then a filter. Outdoor water gets no filtering but could have been run through the sediment tank if it had been originally planned that way.

If you plan a concrete floor don't skimp on 3 or 4 inch long radius PVC sleeves (ells) for flexible piping and possibly electric line entrance when pouring the floor. If using screw pipe the PVC ells will need to be modified for screw well pipe.

The well has a concrete pad and I put down gravel level with the pad. I am not going to pour more concrete. We have extra power lines that were run from the house to the well. These were for future expansion if we ever build a barn. The power and water supply to the house are already in PVC and running to the trench to the house. For our garden, I just run a house from the well. Though burying a line to the garden would be a good idea....

The way the pad is setup, the pressure tank can be rolled right out the planed doorway.

Yes they are heavy. :laughing:

I cannot really see why I would have to move the well house and if I have to I have to. We have black pipe in the well so it should be easy to pull up. My MIL's well house is made of brick like yours but smaller.

Later,
Dan