Will this idea work to backflush a "shallow well" ?

[Egon]

Darn it Egon your right scratch that idea. I don't know if a .22 will work but my brother in-law is EOD in the army. Maybe he could rig me up a depth charge. The only bead setter we use around here booth is starting fluid.

Well maybe???

I'm wondering just what a screen would do for your well situation? It might not even be necessary?

Afraid there is not much help from my comments. Just some questions.

 

[JPRambo]

35 years ago I rented a place. The rent was low with the agreement we would keep up the home. We started to have less and less water flow from the 100 foot well. after removing the pump we had water at 10 feet, but after rigging the pump with a smaller pipe into the casing the water would fall to 40 foot. my father suggested and we installed, a deep well pump. a few year later the same problem. The neighbor helped us a lot when he could. He checked out the well and suggested we purchase dry ice . Cut the dry ice into slivers that would fit in the well casing and drop them in. Dropping the ice in FAST is the trick. push in as many as you can as the water bubbles out (the well was not artisian) After inserting as much dry ice as possible we capped off the well and waited and waited. Possibly 2 hour later maybe more we heard a swish and the ground rumbled a little. Carefully removed the cap letting the little bit of pressure out. Put the pump back and we had water (carbonated for weeks after) for the next 4 or 5 years till we built a new place.

 

[TheGoose]

You probably have what's known as a "Bremer" check valve which will keep you from backflushing the screen.

PM "Speedbump" on this site for more information about 2" galv. wells in Michigan.

 

[Larry Caldwell]

I was going to suggest the dry ice trick. That works pretty well to backflush a plugged well. Avoid explosives, since you can lose your water completely if you are unlucky. I also have my doubts about firing a lead bullet down the well.

Since there isn't much pressure at the well head, you can probably just get a powerful pump and pump water back down the well. See if you can find somebody with a PTO powered fire pump with a 2" discharge. Wildfire pumpers typically are like that. They will crank 100 gpm at 120 PSI, and will definitely blow the crud out of things.

An alternative would be to bang the screen out of the bottom of the pipe and drop a new one.