Artesian well with sudden iron sulfide issue

[bk82388]

I posted here a while back when I first bought my house because I hadn't seen a well that looked like mine before. You all helped my identify it as a true artesian well. The picture with the water coming out of the top is how it was set up when I bought the house. I never had a issue with freezing or anything, it just flowed on and off throughout the year depending on the water table.


This last year I did a big lawn project at my house which meant I wanted to find a solution for my well head. I didn't want the lawn around the well to be soaking wet all the time in the spring, just wasn't feasible if I wanted to be able to mow the area. I had a well company come out and they told me they could dig a trench to daylight, and tap into the well casing a couple feet down. They would use a fitting to tap into the well casing, put a swing check in, and run a 1" pipe to drain the overflow into the woods. I had them do this as it seemed like the best way to solve the issue. That 1" pipe runs about 20' into the woods, then with an adapter changes to an 8' section of 4" pvc that it ultimately drains out of.



Everything was good, until this winter I noticed the well head didn't have snow around it like the rest of the lawn. I went outside and water was bursting out of the well cap and no water was coming out of the pipe. Had the guy come out, he believes the iron sulfide clogged up the swing check when the water wasn't flowing much. We blew out the line and it started working again.

My issue is that before I noticed the issue with the water coming out of the well head, I had noticed my water pressure sucked. I checked my whole house sediment filter and it was absolutley caked with what I believe to be iron sulfide. I usually change the filter every 6 months, and it was about that time...but usually when I change it, the filter is just discolored, not caked with stuff. So I change the filter and then I notice the well issue. Thinking if I fix that it would fix the issue with the iron inside I went ahead and checked the filter the day I fixed cleared the drainage pipe. This was 2 weeks after changing it originally...it was caked on again. Today has been 12 days since I cleared the drainage pipe. I was hoping when I checked the filter it would be ok, but once again it is caked with iron sulfide. The ground around the drainage pipe is covered in iron sulfide too.



Sorry for the book....just curious what could be causing this sudden influx of iron sulfide and if there is anything I can do about it. I never had an issue in the previous 3 years, and my fears that by changing the well setup, I created this issue somehow. See pics attached for reference. Any help is appreciated!

-Bryan

 

[Valveman]

Just guessing but the new drain pipe may have increased the Artesian flow rate. Water could even becoming from a different strata or exposed to more oxygen.

 

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[Reach4]

Everything was good, until this winter I noticed the well head didn't have snow around it like the rest of the lawn. I went outside and water was bursting out of the well cap and no water was coming out of the pipe. Had the guy come out, he believes the iron sulfide clogged up the swing check when the water wasn't flowing much.

Interesting. In sanitizing my well, I recirculated water through a cartridge filter I happened to have available. It had stuff of the same color and appearance on my cartridge. I was speculating as to what it might be. One of my ideas was a mix of iron oxide and clay.

I had pictured iron sulfide as black for some reason. I think that was because of the fine black junk at the bottom of my WH before I cleaned it. But I have no reason to think that what you and I saw on our filters was not iron sulfide. I have iron. I have H2S.

My iron +H2S backwashing filter cleans my water nicely in front of my softener.