Pump won't prime after foot valve repair.

[PhobosTau]

The well is about 40 years old, and is 48 feet deep. There is about 45 feet of horizontal line running to the pump, unfortunately the buried line has two right angles in it, and goes downhill (not uphill like recommended) to the pump, nothing I can do about that. The pump is a newish (10 months old) 1HP jet pump installed at the end of the horizontal line and mounted to a tank. The system was working before replacing the foot valve. The house has had decreasing water pressure for the past few years, and it has gotten to the point where the shower was a trickle, so we replaced the entire foot valve assembly (ejector, venturi, foot valve) to fix this.

Unfortunately it would not re-prime. What happens is it jumps up to 10-40 psi (seems to be random each time) on power up and the pressure needle points around all over the place, then as soon as you turn the pump off (or open up the valve on the regulator), it falls back down to zero. After two days of attempting to get it to prime, we pulled the foot valve back out and cut the hoses off the ejector, the smaller of the two (the 1" pressure pipe that sends water back to the ejector) had about 1 ft of densely packed sediment jammed onto the bottom where it meets the foot valve, and the larger hose had a little bit, but not much. Clearly we were getting sediment that clogged everything. So we cleaned out the vertical lines, reinstalled the foot valve, and tried again. A few hours of priming with no success later, we pulled it back out, and once again, about a foot of sediment clogging the bottom of the small hose where it meets the foot valve.

So we called a well expert to clean out the well, $400 later the well is now 5' deeper, and free of sediment. We hooked everything back up, went to prime it. Nothing. Tried about 40-50 times to prime it, maybe more, and I'm not getting a thing. I'm about to pull the foot valve back up again, because I'm assuming it's clogged, but my question is, where is all this sediment coming from?

My only theory is that the horizontal lines have caked in sediment which has built up the past four decades, and that the loss of pressure when we replaced the foot valve caused it to come loose. And then when we re-prime, it breaks it up and the pump shoves it all down the small line to the foot valve where it gets compacted and clogs up the whole operation. But I have no earthly idea how to get those horizontal lines unclogged, we've run a garden hose through using the neighbor's water, and we're getting crystal clear water out the other side! Where is all this sediment coming from, and how can we fix this?

Thank you for reading this novel of problems, I'll appreciate any help I can get.

 

[Valveman]

A high spot in the suction line makes it almost impossible to prime. If you are sure the lines are clean, then you must be picking up sediment from the bottom. Check the depth again, it could have filled right back in.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Gary Slusser]

You may have a water leak in one or both of the underground lines. I'd bet you do and that's where the dirt is coming from. It's probably why you can't prime the pump too unless, the lines go up hill elevation wise from the pump to the well.

So taking the lines open at the well and backfiling them to teh pump and then down the well may be the only way to prime the system but, if there is a leak, you won't prime that way either.

Replacing the 40 YO lines with new may be the easiest and quickest way to getting water and proper pressure.

 

[PhobosTau]

We checked the depth, the well didn't fill back in with sediment. A leak may be possible in the underground lines, but very unlikely as they were just working a few days ago with the old foot valve.

The underground lines most likely aren't picking up dirt, as they are encased in a larger pipe as well. I've looked down into this encasing pipe and listened for air leaks and water and I don't hear anything, so I'm doubting there's leak in the horizontal lines.

We have tried backfilling the lines and they are full of water as far as we can tell, as soon as we pop them off at the top of the well, water comes out. The problem is the 1" pressure hose gets clogged with dirt at the bottom where it hits the foot valve. I doubt it's coming from the well especially since it's just been cleaned, and this is the pressure hose returning from the pump.

Replacing those lines would certainly not be easy, it would require a lot of digging through dirt/rocks and ripping up the driveway. The well was installed before fill was put into the property, so the well cap is below ground, the hoses run across the front yard to the other side where the garage is, as the pump is installed right under the garage door.

Thanks for your help so far.

 

[Gary Slusser]

You originally said; "The system was working before replacing the foot valve. The house has had decreasing water pressure for the past few years, and it has gotten to the point where the shower was a trickle, so we replaced the entire foot valve assembly (ejector, venturi, foot valve) to fix this.".

Decreasing water pressure for the last few years, replacing the pump a year ago, and having to replace the foot valve now for some reason you haven't mentioned, says there has been a problem for some time. leaks tend t oget bigger over time.

The smaller diameter line is the pressure side and it comes from the pump to the well, through the j-body and into the return line (larger) back to the pump.

Any suction at a leak can suck dirt into the line.

Before replacing the foot valve, the water in the pressure tank was able to prevent the loss of prime. Now you can't manually prime, and maybe due to uphill lines from the house to the well, but the well has had the sediment air lifted out and you still get sediment from the pump to the well when you could prime the lines.

And if there is a hump in the lines, water will run out of them at the well when you open the lines. Making it look like there is no leak in either or both lines but, where is the sediment coming from if there is no leak?And if we think it's been from the well and the lines are full of it, why haven't you seen evidence of it when pulling the pump off last year and the foot valve off the lines?

And what has changed since you could prime the lines/pump when you put the new pump in last year?

It all sounds like a high proabability of a leak to me.

 

[PhobosTau]

Last year when the pump was replaced, the lines were not emptied. It reprimed on the first try. The foot valve was 40 years old when we replaced it, we replaced it because it was completely rusted and disgusting, after reading that a bad foot valve can cause a drop in pressure, we replaced it the whole assembly at the bottom of the pipes in the well.

I guess it's possible that the smaller 1" pipe has a leak on the horizontal, but why is it pulling dirt in since those two pipes are inside another larger pipe? There is no dirt touching the two horizontal lines.

Is there any reason to think it's just not years of dirt clinging onto the inside of the hortiontal pressure pipe just now coming loose? Not as if that would be any better, but I'm just curious. And why would this dirt have not gotten sucked into the pipe all of these years when it was running? I mean sure the pressure wasn't good, but you could still do things like run a garden hose to wash a car, use the dishwasher fine, etc now with the new foot valve it won't even prime.

We're going to try installing an inline filter at the elbow where the pressure line goes from horizontal to vertical above the well cap. This way we'll be able to re-prime several times and collect all of the crud without having to continue pulling the vertical line back out and hacking off the foot valve each time. I'll report back. Hopefully there isn't a leak! Crossing my fingers because that would be a huge mess to fix.

 

[Gary Slusser]

Most foot valves screw onto the j-body, so why do you hack it off?

If the underground lines are in a pipe and have been for 40 years in and on rocks, how do you know there isn't dirt in that pipe? And what material is the pipe?

You shouldn't put anything on either line that can block up.

Yes let us know the outcome.

 

[PhobosTau]

I guess I should've been more specific, we're taking the pipes off the ejector, I'm just generalizing and calling the entire bottom assembly the foot valve. We're cutting them because it's easier than prying them off, they aren't PVC, they're black plastic flex pipe, so they don't screw on, they clamp and it's near impossible to cut them off without a hacksaw or a dremel.

The pipe around the two horizontal pipes is some type of PVC or similar piping. We're only putting the filter on temporarily to catch the crud, and then we're uninstalling it. It will be 400x easier than pulling out and cleaning the ejector each time.

 

[PhobosTau]

IT WORKED! After several days with no water, the filter method worked. We just primed it a few times taking the filter out to empty the sludge each time. After about 5-6 tries, the water was running clear. We hooked the normal line back up, and got pressure in no time. The pressure is now stronger than it has ever been before. Woo.


Foot valve assembly.


Jet pump in basement.


The temporary filter installed at the well cap at the horizontal pipe elbow.

 

[Gary Slusser]

Good no leaks and good pressure. That thing is called the j-body. It is the correct one for the pump you have right?

The pipes in that conduit through the wall, normally the conduit/pipe quits a couple feet outside the wall.

 

[PhobosTau]

That conduit/pipe is about 45 feet long from the well to where it meets the house. It may be several connected sections or one long piece, I don't know, but it goes the whole length.

It's the same style J-body that was on there before, and matches what's described in the manual for the new pump.

Although we used the thinner venturi for 50+ ft instead of the wider one because of the long length of horizontal. The old j-body had the thinner one (maybe 1/4" opening), so we were just following what was there before.