Well problems

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Mar3232

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Having a problem with pooling water around my well, actually not around the head of the well but from the area of the pipe feeding the house -- there isn't any standing water near the well head actually. I remember in my other home, had pooling water and it was the pitless adapter but it was around the head of the well.

Do all wells that have a below earth incoming pipe use a pitless adapter?
But isn't the pitless adapter on the well itself?

So if the water that starts pooling is about 4 - 5 feet from the well (I turned everything off, let the water drain and noted where it started to pool), what could that be?

The pipe itself ? (I did plant a boxwood bush close to it last year).
Maybe a check valve or something?

The water pressure is fine in the house and the water isn't "dirtier" (at least not to the naked eye). The pressure tank cycles between 30 and 50.

Another question --
If by chance it would be the pipe itself leaking (I see it coming into the basement and it's metal -- cast iron?), could you possibly fit a new plastic pipe INSIDE the old one and pull it out to the well? Can that be done? (wishful thinking no doubt).

For the time being, I'm doing all of my water things in the morning and then turning the breaker off to the pump and pressure tank.

THANKS for any clues.
 

LLigetfa

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How deep does the frost go in your area? I cannot imagine the pipe being buried too deep. Dig it up and replace it.

You don't say anything about the well and pump so we cannot surmise whether or not you have a pitless or a buried wellhead.
 

Mar3232

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the wellhead is above ground about 12" -- 30" is the frostline -- so you think it's the pipe? house was built in 1961. If it is no way I can dig it up because of an outbuilding built near it. I would have to dig a new trench and cap off the old one. I assume that can be done.
 

Reach4

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>Having a problem with pooling water around my well, actually not
>around the head of the well but from the area of the pipe feeding
>the house -- there isn't any standing water near the well head
>actually. I remember in my other home, had pooling water and it
>was the pitless adapter but it was around the head of the well.
>
>Do all wells that have a below earth incoming pipe use a pitless
>adapter? But isn't the pitless adapter on the well itself? Part of the
pitless is inside of the well casing, and part is outside of the well casing.

I could pretty much say that all wells in Indiana that do not have a heated
well house over the well should have a pitless adapter.

>So if the water that starts pooling is about 4 - 5 feet from the
>well (I turned everything off, let the water drain and noted where
>it started to pool), what could that be?

It could be the pitless adapter. It could be the pipe to the pitless adapter.
It seems to me that the pitless gasket is the most probable problem. It
is possible that tightening fastener(s) on the pitless could compress the
gasket better, but it seems likely that you will have to have the pump
pulled to replace at least the gasket and maybe the whole pitless.

When that happens, you are met with a question. Do you replace the pump
since it is pulled, or do you put it back. When I had my casing extended
I had the 14 year old (12 years since install) pump put back into service.
I will know in 4 or 5 years whether I made a good choice. Note that the
markup on pumps is substantial.

If the pipe to the well is steel, the well folks may suggest switching to
threaded PVC. I would tend to switch to PVC. I am presuming your well pump
is set between 50 and 250 feet down. If your well pipe is PVC with PVC
couplers, the well folks may want to replace the couplers with stainless
steel. I went along with that, although in retrospect I think I would have
asked them to reuse the PVC couplers.

>
>The pipe itself ? (I did plant a boxwood bush close to it last
>year). Maybe a check valve or something?

No check valve should be there. Your only check valve should be atop the
pump, although some have a check valve before the pressure tank. Nobody
would put a checkvalve where your leak shows.

The point of the pooling could just mark a low spot. The water could have followed the
outside of the pipe into your basement.

>Another question -- If by chance it would be the pipe itself
>leaking (I see it coming into the basement and it's metal -- cast
>iron?), could you possibly fit a new plastic pipe INSIDE the old
>one and pull it out to the well? Can that be done? (wishful
>thinking no doubt).

As long as the galvanized pipe is big enough, you could have a poly pipe
pulled through, using the galvanized as a conduit. My well has that. It was
done before I bought the house.

Its time to call a well service, but you could start with some DIY if you
like. August would be be a good month for that. Start digging. See where
the leak is. However after doing that, you will probably need to call the
well service anyway. Unless you are a good digger, I would look to raise
the money. I am guessing $1000 if you reuse the pump and pipe, and a lot more
if you don't. Think of mentally "amortizing" this over 10 years or so. Think
of the $30 to $80 per month that you don't pay for a city water bill. My mention
of numbers are just guesses. Prices vary, and we don't know what your
problem will turn out to be.
 

Mar3232

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Hey thanks. Yes, I've dug down before myself in the old house when the adapter went bad and saved a lot of money. I had it exposed and made it easy to get to and called a pro to fix it. I may be posting more to this thread as I work on it and post some photos -- usually I can get things done myself but we'll see. I'd like to learn more about the possibility of just running a plastic pipe through the old one but I'll wait till I've dug and post photos. Probably will end up just putting in a new PVC pipe to the house and luckily already have an opening going through the cinder block in another location.

I need to learn about the actual well construction so I'll post soon what it looks like.

The "head" (I guess you call it) is a cast iron? piece maybe 12" above ground with a lid (4 screws) and a gasket. The electrical connections are on top and when I pull out the wires, (as I have done before) there is some sort of metal baffle or something (that I guess you can take out?) Anyway -- will post more in a few days.

(Just went outside and it says "Merrill mfg co." on that iron lid.) ?
 

Reach4

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That casing is probably steel. Measure the OD of that pipe. Expect 5 inch to have about 5.5 inches OD.

This would be the kind more commonly used today.
http://www.merrillmfg.com/product/02-PitlessUnits/Pitless-Adapters/features.php

I have a Merrill SMCK pitless on my 4 inch casing. That was installed recently when I got my pit demolished and my 4-inch casing brought above ground. MCK is the same, except it is brass. http://www.merrillmfg.com/product/02-PitlessUnits/MCK-Kit/features.php These have the advantage that you can put a 3.75 OD pump, like mine, (or even 3.875 pump in theory) into a 4 inch ID casing. If you have one of these, there will be a support bar across the top of the casing under the cap. You could leave the the pump and drop pipe in place inside and replace the washer outside. That is a special large rubber O-ring that is pressed against the outside of the casing (there is a another inside). Make sure you use silicon grease or anti-seize. Anti-seize is like the grease, but it is thinner. I like the grease because I am slow, but the pros like the thinner compound.

Anybody who works on the MCK or SMCK needs to apply more care than with the classic trapezoidal drop-in pitless. The alignment must be maintained. pit_120k113s.jpgPicture is my well top before I cleaned it and sanitized the well. My aluminum well cap is not Merrill brand, but it was selected to have enough room for the support bar.
 
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Mar3232

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Thanks -- going to try and do some preliminary digging and post some photos tomorrow or by the weekend anyway -- maybe you guys can talk me through it.
 

LLigetfa

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Unless the pitless seal or pitless to casing seal is bad, there is no reason to disturb it. More than likely the pipe that goes between the house and the pitless is what is leaking.

If you can chisel around the pipe where it goes through the wall and if it is a straight shot to the well, you might be able to get a pipe through with only daylighting parts of the run provided they didn't tape the wire to the pipe but rather put it into its own conduit. Think horizontal boring.
 

Craigpump

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@Reach, how come your well cap isnt grounded or is it and it doesnt show in the picture?

@ Mar You didn't say how old the house is, but if there is steel pipe coming through the wall, it's probably an older home. Steel doesn't last forever underground and it's possible that pipe might look like a flute with all the holes in it...... You may also find a brass pitless with steel pipe screwed into it, and it's leaking there but percolating up in another spot. If by chance you find a steel pitless, now would be the time to change it as well.

You could try sliding a smaller diameter pipe inside, I've used coil Pex with a fair amount of success. A little trick is to tape a marble to the nose of the pipe so it won't hang up in any shoulders where the steel is coupled together, it also keeps a lot of crap from getting into the pipe.
 

Mar3232

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Okay. Yeah, I'm a novice but my first thought is that I may be able to put another pipe inside it. And yes, I suppose it's steel coming into the house (built in 1961). Here are a couple of photos of pipe coming into the basement. The outside circumference of the steel? pipe coming through the block is 4 3/4" which math will make 1.5" diameter, not accounting for wall thickness -- which is? Inside diameter then must be?

Few questions --
So if I put plastic pipe inside, the idea being to make it a very tight fit so the water will not continue to do what it's doing now? (or do you put in something that fits easily with the hope it will decrease flow into the leak and ground?)

Or do you run the new plastic pipe, looking for the end coming through at the well and and seal the end someway?

For my pipe, what pex should be used?

Is pushing it through a bitch? Do you lube it? Or do you try and run a fish tape from the well and pull it?

I'll remember the marble idea.

Maybe this should be my first approach because like I say the groundwater is pooling about 5 feet from the well head, right above the pipe going into the house. But I guess I cant rule out the pitless adapter also.

I think though it would be smart to try this first.

At least from the inside all I would have to do is cut that PVC, push the pipe through and then put on a new PVC coupling.
 

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Reach4

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@Reach, how come your well cap isnt grounded or is it and it doesnt show in the picture?
Can we all agree, except for jwelectric, that that the 190 ft steel casing is grounded? :rolleyes: If so, then I still don't know for sure. I don't know how that well cap connects to the casing. I could hit it with the milliohmeter I guess.

Now code-wise, it might be lacking. The UF from basement has 3 conductors and that's it. The red, black, and green that are in the picture are spliced to those 40 inches underground. The non-hot wire in the house currently floats. It used to connect to the control box because the pump was 3-wire earlier. I don't know if that green wire hooks to anything down the casing. It is there in case it is ever needed. I was happy not having to run new UF. Did it get un-grandfathered for not running an equipment ground to the pump because the wires were cut and re-spliced during the bringing the casing above ground? I don't see that this endangers anybody or anything.

If by chance it would be the pipe itself leaking (I see it coming into the basement and it's metal -- cast iron?), could you possibly fit a new plastic pipe INSIDE the old one and pull it out to the well? Can that be done? (wishful thinking no doubt).
pit_120k076s.jpg My well has the water line from the pitless reduced to a 3/4 inch poly pipe that is run inside of the old galvanized. That was done while the pit was a pit, and the pipe and UF feed through one of the 2 walls that were not totally demolished. The removed blocks were stacked in the pit as a means of disposal.

Edit: http://products.anssteel.com/viewitems/steel-pipes/galvanized-standard-steel-pipe your measurement puts the pipe between 1 inch and 1-1/4 inch pipe. You might want to re-measure. (now where did you put that caliper?)

That marble trick sounds useful. How far would you be pushing your PEX? I wonder if there is a good way to pull with an electrical snake.

I think my line is HDPE I don't know if code still permits new HDPE for coming into the basement from the well. PEX may be the better choice for code or availability reasons. If the common CTS sizes of PEX are not a good fit, there are other sizes that are less common. Since this line will be before your pressure switch, there will not be any observable effect on the water pressure in your house by dropping down to 3/4.

Remember to round off any sharp corners on the galvanized.

What to do first regarding digging? Either way, you are digging a hole at the casing. That will serve whether you are repairing the pitless connection or putting PEX/HDPE through the galvanized pipe.

But before that, how about a picture looking into your casing?
 
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Mar3232

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I took a cloth tape measure and the outside circumference was 4.75" as I don't know the typical wall thickness, don't know the ID. Plain math gives 1.5" diameter, so 1.25" ID perhaps?

I'll post a photo with the lid off later looking down.

But here's a photo I just took that shows where the water starts to pool (after 20 minutes or so) -- as you can see it's a considerable distance from the well head (it's to the right where i put that green spike in the ground).

Based on that, probably a leaking pipe?

No water at all pools near the well head and the ground is pretty level also.
 

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Mar3232

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and here are 2 photos of casing --
having problem with 3rd photo
 

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Reach4

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I think that is the predecessor of mine. Click on Parts and installation instructions.
http://www.merrillmfg.com/product/02-PitlessUnits/SPP-Pitless/installation.php
SPP-Pitless-04.gif
I don't know how part (L) "Pipeolet" is attached. I am suspecting it gets welded to the casing, but I don't know. You might want to ask Merrill.

I do see in http://www.merrillmfg.com/product/02-PitlessUnits/MCUandSSMCU/specs.php that they offer a section of " Steel Casing With Pipeolet Discharge Welded To Steel Casing."

If it was welded but the weld failed, possibly you could replace that outer part with the outer part from mine. It would take some serious smoothing of the pipe. There are other possible options that might involve doing some casing work such as replacing the top part of the casing with 5 inch casing and putting in the more common type of pitless. It sounds as if broken pipe is what we are rooting for.
 
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Mar3232

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so, you think I should try the pex first?

again, if I do that, do I just do a tight fit and push it through looking for the end to show in the casing? or will I have to seal the end of the pex at point L? (meaning digging around the casing?)

based on my pipe diameter what size pex should I use you think? I see you used the 3/4

damn, it would be great if I could slide another pipe in there and be done with it -- looks like it's pretty much a straight shot
 

Reach4

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I think you should first dig the hole at the casing. See if the water is coming from the pitless, or elsewhere. See which way the water flows. You might need a utility pump to drain your hole. Even if there is a leak 5 feet away from the casing, you would still need a hole at the casing. You are not going to keep 5 feet of steel pipe connected to the pitless; you would, I would think, run the PEX right to the pitless.

3/4 is sure to fit. It may be that 1 inch would fit. Craigpump or others who have done it will be able to make good recommendations on the tubing and fittings.

Are you looking to push 50 ft? I would give preference to stuff that comes off of large diameter rolls locally so there is less tendency to make small coils. I would experiment with a piece to see if I can make a tapered end for pushing by applying tension and using heat to stretch the tubing at a place to make it narrow. Then cut at the narrow point to lead the way into the hole.
 

Craigpump

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@ Reach the NEC states that casings and well caps are to be bonded and grounded back to the breaker box. The theory is that should the wire become damaged, the breakers will trip and not energize the casing or cap.

The Pex I use comes in 100' rolls or straight 20' lengths. I have pushed probably 70' with no problems.
I would not heat and shape the Pex into a point, I like a round nose that won't catch in the joints. I have pushed pipe through insert couplings by using a round nose like a marble or ball bearing.

You can seal the annular space between the two pipes with a good grade of silicone, we have been using Lexol with good results.
 
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