Jet pump vs piston pump

[Chucky_ott]

Hi,

I have a shallow well with a jet pump at the cottage. It's working well but is always a pain to set up at the start of the season. To prime it, I have to fill the entire suction line (50ft of 1-1/4" poly pipe) with water. If there is air in the suction line for whatever reason, the pump loses prime and I have to re-prime. If it loses prime during the season, I have to make sure there are no leaks before re-priming.

I'm the only one who knows how to resolve these issues and no one else who uses the cottage (wife, daughters, brother in law, nieces, and nephews) appear to have the interest or technical knowledge to learn how to do it.

Anyways, my cousin has a cottage next to ours and her husband recently passed away. I set up her well this weekend. It is a shallow well piston pump. Probably at least 50 years old. All I did to set it up was remove the priming plug, add a bit of water, and turned it on. Water pressure built up in the pressure tank within two minutes. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy.

So now I'm thinking of eventually replacing the jet pump with a piston pump to make it easier for anyone else to maintain and set up.

Other than what appears to be the piston pumps' ability to self-prime, are there other advantages of one pump type over another? This is for a shallow well only.

Thanks

 

[Bannerman]

Replace with a submersible pump and no one will need to prime whatsoever.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[WorthFlorida]

There are self priming pumps, irrigation, pool and jet pumps. My experience with pool and irrigation pumps is it usually takes a little water to get the prime started. It may take a minute or two to get full prime. If the pump is dry it will take several minutes. If your jet is at the pump its a simple swap, if the jet is in the well then as Bannerman suggest, a submersible is the best way to go if your well casing is wide enough to fit one.

 

[Bannerman]

Water pumps are designed to pump water not air. A jet pump utilizes a centrifugal impeller so any air before the impeller will be less prone to be pulled through the impeller since the water behind the air will be extremely heavy and will overcome the impeller's ability to pull/push the air forward .

A piston pump on the other hand uses a positive displacement piston which is more likely to continue to draw air through while overcoming the weight of the water behind.

I recommended a submersible pump as no priming will be required. Since you are the only one in the family that is prepared to prime the pump, what will happen if you are for any reason, not there to do that?

 

[Chucky_ott]

I recommended a submersible pump as no priming will be required. Since you are the only one in the family that is prepared to prime the pump, what will happen if you are for any reason, not there to do that?

Agreed for the submersible, but that require getting a well dug. I already have a sandpoint, hence why I still want to continue using a shallow well pump . With the piston pump being really simple to operate, i'm sure I can teach the next generation to take care of it.

 

[Valveman]

Piston pumps build a lot of pressure and have other problems, but they are better at sucking out the air during priming. They are also not very efficient, but if you don't use a lot of water that won't make much difference.