Well Water Filtration?

   / Well Water Filtration? #1  

Beltzington

Platinum Member
Joined
Oct 4, 2008
Messages
954
Location
Appling, Georgia
Tractor
JD 3720
The property we are building our retirement home has a 20+ year old well that sat idle for last 5 of those years. Once I got the pump wired back up the it provides about 15gpm. If I do not run the pump for a few days it pumps muddy water for about 30 seconds and then runs clear. Water was tested after shock treating it with chlorine and determined safe for consumption. The water has a clean smell and taste.

Based on these facts I was wondering what type of filtration you would recommend, obviously I do not want muddy water getting into our home water system. Passive preferred over active but filtration effectiveness would be the most important factor. I have room for settling tanks etc.

Appreciate your advice
 
   / Well Water Filtration? #2  
Just a simple inline sediment filter should work.Fairly inexpensive.You may have to change filters once a week or so for a while.Deep well or shallow?I would expect it to clear up with regular use.
 
   / Well Water Filtration?
  • Thread Starter
#3  
Well depth is unknown, the man who had it drilled had died and his wife was never involved with his "hobby" farm. When I had the cap off for the chlorine treatment I dropped a plumb bob on a string and it went down about 60', however I could not ascertain if it was at the bottom or hung up.
I am also considering installing a cistern filled by the well pump and using a separate pump off the cistern to provide higher pressure and flow rate to the house then the well pump can provide.
 
   / Well Water Filtration? #4  
as mentioned, it will probably clear up with more regular use, but it can't hurt to throw on a sediment and carbon filter.
 
   / Well Water Filtration? #5  
Of course the sediment will have to be cleared but I would not drink any well water without running it through a UV light. Just something I think you should consider.
 
   / Well Water Filtration? #6  
I'd personally bring the water up to a pressure tank at 50-60PSI with a pressure switch running the pump. This keeps the pump from cycling on every time you fill a glass of water. After the pressure tank put an inline chlorinator, and a 100-120 gallon contact tank.

Contact tanks allow the oxidation from the chlorination to react with bacteria, iron, and any other dissolved solids which causes them to precipitate to the bottom of the tank as sediment. This should be flushed as often as once a month depending on your usage and how much sediment your well typically produces (your water goes out of the top of the tank with pressure from the pressure tank and there is a flush valve at the bottom to remove the sediment). After the contact tank, the water flow should feed into a conditioner.

This is where things can be a little tricky. I advise sending some samples to some filtration places to test for what types of mediums are recommended. I personally like a mix of various filtration mediums, and have no preference over natural or synthetic (both are used in mine). Since your well was tested as consumable, pretty much any conditioner will work to remove the chlorine. Do some research on the powerheads used on the conditioners.

All the powerhead is, is a powered valve system connected to a timer, flow meter, or both. When a certain amount of time, water usage, or a combination of the two are reached, it backwashes the filter sending everything it has collected out to a floor drain or similar (same way the contact tank is manually flushed). What powerhead setup you want will be best determined by your water usage. Fancy ones monitor your water usage and have a timer. You set how often you want it to backwash, and you set it for how many gallons you want used before it backwashes. If the time comes to backwash, but you haven't used the gallons, you can have it set it to skip 1 or 2 of the backwash cycles. Simple ones just operate on a timer (which is what I have).

You can expect anywhere from 10 to 30 years on a decent conditioner as long as you have enough chlorine going into the system to keep it bacteria free (the point of UV treatments) and are getting enough "contact time" between the chlorine and water inside the contact tank. 120 gallon contact tank is generally enough for most households, though you can't have too much contact time killing bacteria and precipitating dissolved solids, so if you can fit a larger tank or want to run multiple contact tanks in series that can be done too. Another thing to remember, everything between the chlorinator and the conditioner must be plumbed with CPVC (the yellow tinted stuff). Plain white PVC will not withstand the chlorine.

This will give you water that is the quality of the average bottled water. Cleaned of bacteria like city water, but cleaned of the chlorine used to do that task also. Most of the powerheads allow a "bypass" feature that lets you occasionally run chlorine through your household plumbing to keep it clean and bacteria free (like the internals of your toilet). UV lights tend to lose their intensity and bacteria killing power somewhat rapidly. When I put my system in and had read on the subject, the intensity of the UVs put out by UV lights near half after a year of use and the contact time between the water and the UV lights in a high consumption household isn't near enough to kill 100% of the bacteria common to well water even at 100% intensity.

If you want to take it a step farther you can go into water softeners. Water softeners can reduce your overall water usage as soaps will suds up more and you'll use less, softer waters are gentler on fabrics when washing clothes and the detergents suds up more and remove stains better, water spots on washed cars are a thing of the past. Old softeners that used salt of some sort used to end up with some extra sodium in the water, which isn't the case with newer softeners. Newer softeners only use salt to clean the filtration media during the backwash cycles and no salt ever enters your home. These systems use very little salt also.

Some people do not care to drink softened water (I am one), and for those I recommend a point of use reverse osmosis system that goes under the sinks you will be getting drinking water from. At this point you have the purest water that can be had.

If you research it all out and plan well, a system should be low maintenance and last well over 10 years before needing any repairs or replacements and when you calculate the cost of a good system out over a timespan like that, it is much cheaper than a city water bill for much better water.
 
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   / Well Water Filtration? #7  
Agree with all the above comments but its important to really give the bore and the pump a good flushing if it stands idle for too long. Run it onto the lawn or somewhere else for many hours before you run it through any filters.

You may find it needs quite a few days of running to get rid of the stagnant/stinky/muddy water thats been sitting in and around the bore for years.
 
   / Well Water Filtration? #8  
Some people do not care to drink softened water (I am one), and for those I recommend a point of use reverse osmosis system that goes under the sinks you will be getting drinking water from. At this point you have the purest water that can be had.

I was advised (by the people who sell them) not to use an RO filter for water from our rainwater tank. They said the membranes will clog up with algae too quickly. They advised sticking to a multi stage cartridge filter with a UV light. So thats what I have connected to our drinking water tap and I have no complaints. Dunno if that also applies to well water.
 
   / Well Water Filtration? #9  
If you're going through a complete chlorination, conditioning, and softening before the RO, it doesn't matter what the source of the water is, the membranes will last at or near the maximum they are rated for. By the time the water gets to the RO it's been cleaned of anything that will clog or grow.
 
   / Well Water Filtration? #10  
The property we are building our retirement home has a 20+ year old well that sat idle for last 5 of those years.

Have you considered just using rainwater for the house? We have two 5,000 gallon tanks that keep us supplied all year and we use them for everything in the house. We only use the bore water for the garden.

The rainwater is used untreated and unfiltered for everything in the house except drinking (which goes through a multi-stage filter).

Correction... I throw a bit of chlorine in the tanks one or twice a year.
 

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