Rural well pressure variance.

[Picasso]

New here. bear with me,,,
I have a well, Rural MT
depth 550
we feel it has collapsed at a bout 330, but we had a water lever of 50 feet below surface. Well, renters called and said water not working. So I called the well guy, he checked, reset the pump switch and said it was working at the well head. Renters came home, no water, called water well guy, he went back out, made a couple more adjustments said it was working.. renters came home, no working.

so, in the end, we put in a new pump, considerably lower as we figured it was pumping off due the collapse in the line. So a new, bigger pump put in to handle the load, turned it on, it worked!! for about 30 min. then to a trickle, no pressure. SO,

today, we shut of the valve to the houses. pressure got to 60 and pretty much held there. so I shut off one house and opened other house, turned on line, it worked but the pressure dropped and didnt recover. Well, I went into house and the damn toilet had been running day and night for days, more than likely draining the well. SO, I turned off the toilet, and the well pressured up, to 60 and would SLOWLY drop to about 42. pump would kick on, and it popps back to 62 or so.. then SLOWLY, like 45 min, drops to 42, pump comes back on,,

my question is,, is that normal, or do I still have a loss of water in the lines somewere? I mean is that the most likely reason it slowly drops? I cant imagine water falling backwards down the hole but im no water engineer.. Does that slow drop mean water I coming out the lines at a slow rate. Should I try t isolate the other house from the one that had the toilet leak and see if it has some small line leak. ,, my options if its truly a collapsed well problem on fixable is another 500 foot wet at 8.5 a foot, or, a 2500 gal system, as required by a recent permit granted for another reason. so any thoughts on,, 1) the slow draw down, is that normal, or should it be stable. ( I have a tank).
any other thoughts regard all of above would be appreciatied.. iim trying to figure this out wihtout getting the well guy back out
SINCERELY

 

[Reach4]

Not normal. There is a leak somewhere. Close the valve after the pressure tank, and see if pressure holds. Both houses should be without water during this test.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Picasso]

Okey-dokey,, will give it a try tomorrow. thanks

 

[Valveman]

With static water at 50' and the pump set at 300' you have close to 400 gallons stored in the well. That should be plenty for a couple houses as long as you stop the leaks. A 1 GPM leak is wasting 1440 gallons a day and draining your well.

 

[Picasso]

yes,, I did that math,, and felt we had water, and finding the leak was required.
My next question,, is there any way to equate pressure loss with water loss,, i.e. I you lose 10 lbs of pressure over a 15 minute period,,, how much water are you losing.. is there an equation for that??

 

[Valveman]

yes,, I did that math,, and felt we had water, and finding the leak was required.
My next question,, is there any way to equate pressure loss with water loss,, i.e. I you lose 10 lbs of pressure over a 15 minute period,,, how much water are you losing.. is there an equation for that??

Yep can do. Just need to know the size of the pressure tank since we already know you are using 42/62 on/off pressure on the switch.

 

[Picasso]

I will look tomorrow, however, I think we found the issues.. house one,, had a running toiler as I already alluded to.... house two, also had toilet leak/run..THANKFULLY, isolating the two houses, there was no pressure loss in the ground line!! Plumber fixes all but one, small leak, couldnt find under the house, but we are pulling insulation soo and re plumbing w pex so feel sure we will find then.. in the end, the renters just didnt tell me thy had running toilets, they were draining the well water,, and they just say sorry,, and I get the bill 5000k vs 200.00 if they had just told me,, it really pisses me off, I will get that tank size for future reference so get a loss rate,, thanks for the help

 

[Valveman]

I will look tomorrow, however, I think we found the issues.. house one,, had a running toiler as I already alluded to.... house two, also had toilet leak/run..THANKFULLY, isolating the two houses, there was no pressure loss in the ground line!! Plumber fixes all but one, small leak, couldnt find under the house, but we are pulling insulation soo and re plumbing w pex so feel sure we will find then.. in the end, the renters just didnt tell me thy had running toilets, they were draining the well water,, and they just say sorry,, and I get the bill 5000k vs 200.00 if they had just told me,, it really pisses me off, I will get that tank size for future reference so get a loss rate,, thanks for the help

Even 5K would be a lot but 5000K? Oh My Cow!!!

 

[Picasso]

Even 5K would be a lot but 5000K? Oh My Cow!!!

I was double thinking!!!

 

[Valveman]

Even 5K is unbelievable. A 1HP should not be able to use more than about $100 a month even when running 24/7.

 

[Picasso]

I re read this, and what I meant was the bill from the water well guy having to chase down a hole problem that was essentially Non existent as the problem was located in the toilets. not the running water bill from the power to the well, sorry for the confusions.

 

[Valveman]

A pump man should have known to close the ball valve to the house. It should have taken less than 3 minutes to find out the leak was in the house, not the well.