Tips requested for driving a sand point. Mistakes were made.

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Rslaback

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Long post: bring a sandwich.

I have a property in my rural subdivision on which a single RV storage garage was built. I purchased it for the shop space and my farm girl wife has claimed the lot area for a small orchard area. From what I have been told the nearest clay vein is 10 miles away. To give you an idea of the soil conditions. It is a lake front subdivision, water level in my main home well is 15 feet down and no one in the area has basement sump pumps and all of the septic systems are conventional. It's sandy.

We've been hauling water to the trees for a couple years now 250 gallons at a time. I'd like to automate the tree watering and also potentially plant a sweet corn patch next year. After dropping over $8000 last fall for a new house well I figured I would try my hand at a sand point. I did some research and talked to some people. I opted for a 2" diameter primarily because I could not find a 1 1/4" slot screen but also to ensure that if I need a packer jet I can drop one in.

Yesterday was supposed to be well driving day. At the recommendation of a friend I rented a "sand point driver" and air compressor to run it from a local rental place, gathered my stuff and set to work. Being an idiot I figured that with a pneumatic driver, digging a starting hole wouldn't be necessary. The drive cap also wouldn't fit into the driver so I just used the extra drive coupling that I had purchased. The driver turned out to be a Rhino PD-55 and it did drive the first section and point. Slowly, but it got there. In the midst of the drive I did stop to fill the pipe and point up a couple of times with water. My theory was that the water leaking down would make it drive easier. The results were inconclusive. The pipe did start moving faster at the end but not immediately. The speed up happened probably 6 inches later and lasted for the last 20 inches or so. The driver had mushroomed the drive coupling a bit so I cut that off so that it couldn't get stuck in the driver. I believe this was another mistake. I didn't get the coupling cut perfectly straight.

Nevertheless I threaded on a second section, resigned myself to the fact that I was going to need the tools for more than a single day and went back to work. The next 5 feet drive slower than the first section. Eventually it did get done but upon taking off the driver I found that I had a couple of major problems. The coupling had mushroomed significantly and wouldn't be able to be used again. Having only a single extra coupling I knew I wouldn't be able to get done without more supplies. However, the worse news was that as I removed the coupling from the now buried 13' of pipe and point, the threads on the second pipe section were toast. My cheap electric threader only goes up to 1 1/4" so I was stuck.

I returned the compressor and driver and on that trip picked up a couple more drive couplings. I have a lead on a Ridgid No65 ratcheting threader (silver lining: I get to buy more tools) that I plan to use to rethread the second section after I hack it off.

As I continue I find myself wondering a few things:

Is renting the driver again really worth it? I have the skills needed to weld up a driver, a steel supply shop down the road and over 500 pounds of cast iron weight plates from an old all in one gym machine. With the 2 inch pipe size, my T post pounder is too small to use it so I would have to find/make something larger.

Is there any benefit to filling the pipe with water? Based on the well reports in the area, I should hit the water table in another 3 feet or so if that matters.

How do I clean the inside of the pipe out? The pounder peed a good amount of oil/water nastyness down inside as it was working. Is there a good way to clean out the inside? Should I just not worry about it?

Do I keep going with my plan or pull it out and start over. I don't have a water source available to wash it in other than my 250 gallon tank and a small pump. Should I try to find a better way to get it in the ground?
 

Valveman

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Sounds like terribly hard ground to be driving a sand point? Adding water is not going to help. If you can get the screen down in the water then adding water will let you know what is going on as a well that won't take water also won't make water.

Sounds like an area where drilling would be better than driving.
 

Rslaback

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It definitely seems like that but the weird thing is that when installing the T posts for the fence around the garden, I literally just drop my driver once and the T post is 8 inches in the ground.
 
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