FrustratedinNJ
Member
I think it could be like the head of a vacuum cleaner hose. I could imagine some type of material near the intake that could be loosened or eroded by turbulence.
A shroud should make it easy to ensure that the higher-velocity intake is not right next to the bore wall. I don't see why it would take "many times" to get the intake away from the well sides. Yes, the picture is for a submersible pump, but it seems to me that the same general construction could be adapted. Maybe extend the sleeve a foot below the jet assembly intake to let the flow smooth out.
Ahhhhh, finally someone sypathetic to my plight offering a helpful practical solution. Not that you electrical folks haven't been helpful, you have. Very helpful with the electrical problem. But throwing up yer hands in seeming exasperation isn't too helpful. I'm thinking there must be a way to slow this pump down without burning it out. I suggested a rheostat and if I'm off base with that, it'd be nice if someone could tell me why.
Remember that I'm proposing just running the pump for very short periods, like just 15 seconds at a time. Followed by a nice long cooling off period. It's just that I don't want to end up burning the windings out because they might do so even on just one such startup.
Is that what you guys think could happen? I mean, if I'm actually doubling the current flow through the windings I can see where that could happen. But the idea that I'm doubling the current flow seems to be something that's not agreed upon by everyone here. So if whatever additional current I'm pushing through the windings isn't likely to burn them out, per se, given the short running time involved, then I'm fine with letting things cool down before pumping again.
I do have other electric motors here. Maybe I should try one of them out under the same conditions and see if they burn out over time.
So, Reach, your suggestion is a good one and one that I already thunk of and was even going to try until I realized that the plastic "shroud" that I'd bought wasn't something I wanted to put down in my well. Basically, it's kinda toxic. It was a PVC pipe fitting about 5.5" diameter and maybe 7" long. Rigging it around the jet body would have been interesting but once I realized it was too toxic to use, I gave up on it.
I also previously mentioned a gizmo to keep the foot valve (FV) away from the well wall. That's a plastic food container about 4" in diameter mounted on the end of the FV. I pulled the pipes once after mounting it and it was still in place when the pipes came out. I therefore think it's still in place down there but there's no guarantee of that. But when it was still on I was getting brown water when pumping normally, same as now. So I assume it's still in place and it's just not enough to solve the problem completely.
I mentioned plastic casing previously because I found that it is available (non-toxic PVC). The "6-inch" size is pretty expensive but smaller sizes are available and come in 5 ft lengths. Note that it's actually less than 6" OD and I believe it would fit inside my present casing but I'd have to double-check before I actually ordered any.
A much less expensive approach than the 6-inch size would be to try a 5 ft length of smaller size as a shroud around the jet body. I do think that might well work IF other commentors here are correct that there's not much movement in the jet body other than on initial start-up. I'm not so sure myself about that.
But I agree with your feeling that the vacuum cleaner effect is in play here. I mean, I'm sucking water, no? And given the "fire hose" strength of what I see coming out my faucet I'm sucking water at a fierce rate. It's not surprising to me that silt could easily be sucked off the uncased well wall if the FV is in any kind of proximity to it.
I know that someone else here posed that the silt is just a normal function of the well in that when I draw water, other water simply comes in and carries silt with it. I don't see it that way for several reasons. Firstly, that process is undoubtedly quite slow and I'm seeing too much silt to account for that. Secondly, I never got silty water with my old FV except occasionally under very specific conditions. The old well guy 30+ years ago told me that because there was insufficient casing in the well, I might see some silty water after a long dry period because the veins that feed the well would dry up, and then when they start to feed again they will carry silt with them and into the well.
Any plumber worth his salt will tell you this is true because if you let your water pipes dry out, you KNOW you get a lot of crap out of the pipe when you get the water flowing again. And that it continues coming out until the pipes stabilize and the loose crap is all flushed out. The crap is always in there, but you don't see any of it until you let it dry out so's it can flake off.
So I never saw any silt other than under those very occasional conditions. The old well guy was right, and I got clear water otherwise.
I frankly don't think that I got this kind of vigorous flow with my old FV. I have no explanation for that because it's the same pump and I've been pumping without a pressure tank for a few years. So everything is the same except for the new FV.
Anyway, your suggestion is a good one and it's basically my last ditch approach if I can't just get by for awhile with slow pumping, which I'd like to do until next summer. I'm about "done" with this f***ing well for this year since I've been f***ing around with it since January 12th. Maybe next summer I'll have renewed energy to take it on.
Of course, I'll have to figure a way to hang, or fix, or attach, the 5 ft length of pipe so's the jet body is vertically centered in it.
Hmmmmmmmmm. I may have just thunk of a way to do that.
Anybody who cares to chime in on that, feel free.
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