My well has almost stopped producing, not good when you have kids.

My stupid wife (did I say that???) tried to fill a 1000-gallon kiddie pool with the garden hose. One shit load of sand and clay puked out before she went dry. I replaced the pump (the old one was noisy and about dead anyways) and now it will go dry if you flush the crapper several times. Can’t do the washing, only can have quick showers, if it’s yellow let it mellow, if it’s brown flush it down…..

Phoned the well guy (actually every one of them) to clean it and the earliest one will be here is 2 months!!!

Phoned this company called Well Tech.
Said that the sand screen is calcified and blocking the water. They pump CO2 into the well to de-calcify the screen. Sounds like snake oil to me, where did all the damn sand and clay come from if it’s calcified . Hell, I could pump it dry and dump 20 gallons of vinegar down it and get that result.
$3200.!!!! And no guaranty.

Any thoughts?

Signed,
Up shit creek …literally.

Is yours submersible or on top of the ground?? What kind is it? what symptoms do you have??

Being in the country I have to keep 4 different wells going on our property and I have one that feeds my pond when the creek gets low.

If it is spitting up dirt, you may have a dry hole!

CO2 (carbon dioxide) when bubbled through water, will form carbonic acid (one of the reasons coke & pepsi are acidic in nature). When something is calcified, it is covered with lime scale (Sodium Carbonate). This is an acid/base reaction.

Other acids you can use are acetic (vineagar), citric (fruit acid), sulfamic (powdered radiator cleaner), phosphoric (ice machine cleaner), hydrochloric (pool acid) and sulfric (battery acid).

Personally never heard of it being done, but I did spend about 30 years in watertreatment and the theory sounds good to me. Next question is cost.

or

drill a new well.

Hey Jake

75' well, 20+ years old, new deep jet pump working fine, new foot valve. It doesn't lose its prime unless it goes dry.

We've never had a problem, last year I rented a 13hp 4500psi pressure washer and ran it 12hrs+ a day for three days. Pump was going all the time. We've never gone dry before.

We have enough water to get by for now...barely.

Around here quite a lot of wells did the same as yours last year......reason....water table dropped. They had to have them drilled lower.

The $3200 fix sounds like snake oil......as you say 20 gals of vinagar would be a lot cheaper, if that's the problem.


I would check with your neibours and see how deep their wells are and see if anyone else is having a problem. Then call any other well driller in the book.

Happened to me at my house in Vermont.... I just didnt use the house for a few weeks, and the water came back up...

I know that advice isnt worth shit in a house you live in full time though,

I agree with asking your neighbors how there wells are performing...Maybe go away for a few days and see what happens

No problems with the neighbors, but their well is almost a football field away and 100' deeper. The next neighbor has one about the same as mine, no problem. After that we're into a 1/4 mile + away, again no problems.

Thinking of running a line to our pond (spring fed), so that we can at least run the house till someone gets here.

Researched the calcified theory...they say a slowly progressing lack of water. Ours stopped suddenly.

That guy smells like total to me.

The problem is there's so many crooks in the well biz...who do you trust?!?!?!

The one we're waiting for comes highly recommended, by many people, as honest.

Rather than take water from the pond & risk the possibility of ingesting crypto or ghiardia ask the neighbor if you can run a 3/4" or 1" hose to your house & back feed it thru a hose bib. Close the valve to your well & that way you'll have enough to get by until the well guy gets there.

I'm surprised you can't get someone there on an emergency. All I have to do is call one of many & they're here within 24 hrs at the longest.
Good luck Mark.

.........b

Mark,
Have them video the well. It will tell you the condition and whether it's salvageable and it's cheaper than gambling with their recommendation.

What diameter is the well and has it been tested recently? Do you know what is the standing water level and the draw down? What is the hp and flow rate of your pump? Is it for domestic use only?

I agree with your question, a sanded well doesn't sound like calcified screens. A screen has collapsed or the well has run out of water sounds the most likely to me.

Our family owns agricultural land and we have a number of irrigation wells so I'm somewhat familiar with this.

Carl

You said you replaced the pump. How far down into the well is the new pump located? You might be able to get more water by lowering the pump a bit more below the "refill" level for the water in the hole.

Is the spring fed pond still filling normally? It could be an additional indication about whether the water table has dropped or not.

Drillers can also "fracture" a well. The idea is to crack the sides of the hole so more water seeps in. This would require setting up the drilling rig, so you might ask then to do this in addition to boring a deeper hole...

Good luck.
Joe

With the one neibours well being 100' deeper and the other neibours being about the same, I'd guess you ran out of well and need to go deeper.

A spring feed pond can be feed from a surface stream or a close to surface spring.

I have a artesian well at the farm, but I have to go 75' to 100' for good water (enough flow ect)

Geeze ......when we had our well drilled, they struck water at 350' and set the pump at 405'. I agree that it sounds like you may have to go deeper. I think that the $3200 is BS!! My complete turn key well drilling cost me $3800.00 about 5 years ago, so 3200 to "fix it with no guarantees" .......I would shop around !!!!

David S

I was just thinking of using the pond water to flush the crappers. My bathrooms are on top of each other and it would be an easy tie in. whats a hose bib?



There is a major building spree in my area, everyone wants to move to the country. No new houses around me though. Property values have doubled here in the last 3 years. All the well guys are booked a minimum 6 months in advance.



I had to raise it a couple of feet to get it out of the sand. It's 73' or so, the water use to be about 10' from the top.



6" drilled well, was 10' from the top, now in the AM its barely a third full. 1/2hp jet pump, the pump works fine as long as it doesn't go dry. Don't know flow or tested, other than it's health board tested fine.

I'm about half way down a hill, my neighbor's a bit down from me, but the farmer at the top of the hill has a 6' (yes, 6 foot) artesian well that produces too much. My pond is built on an artesian spring but it's at least 7-800' away from the house, it's overflowing.

One other explanation for what happened is the there was a small earth quake and the fault shift caused the well to fill up.......

You could run a demand pump to the shitters....You would have to re-plumb your lines to make it work. When you flushed they would refill.

Bottled water for drinking ect. Showering...well friends or the local pool.

You could get water trucked in...use the pool as your source of supply. Cover it till the well problem is fixed. Move it indoors (garage) to keep it cool and keep the alge down. If you used the pool idea, you would only have to reconnect your supply line in one place....

Check into getting your well fracked...as was mentioned before...I had a friend of mine do it and it made a world of difference...his was running slowly though, not dry. I think that it cost him about $3000 also..

You only use hydrofracturing if your well is drilled in rock, my well is drilled in sand/gravel/clay.