How to drive your own shallow water well

This is ridiculously simple.... as long as your not trying to drive your pipe through bedrock... then you'll need a mechanized rotary drill but for most a sledge hammer will suffice...

first you need 2-4 ft sections of standard galvanized steel water pipe talk to the locals and your neighbours to see how deep they had to go... as for the pipe itself, they do come in longer sections but as a DIY project don't buy those... you'll be hitting the end of this pipe with that sledge hammer I mentioned and you don't get a good swing if the pipe is a few feet above your head...

Hopefully by now your guessing at the process...
typically the first section is the drive point... on the base of that will be a steel point... behind that is the pipe... that first section of pipe will have lots of small holes drilled in to let the water into the pipe...

next you'll need a Drive Cap.. this screws onto the open end of the pipe... this is what you hit with your sledge hammer... it serves two purposes... one it protects the threads and in a small way cushions the blow so you don't damage the pipe...

Lastly you'll need a drive coupling... this goes between each section of pipe to connect them all together... every time you add another section of pipe you'll use a Drive Coupling so when you sit to figure out how much pipe you need remember to order one less Drive Coupling than you order pipe...

One of many sites that sells the parts were talking about here

once it's in the ground you just need to add a hand pump and vola you just make your very own water well..
now if you can... go watch the vid so yoiu can see it done

If you want to save some time and a little aggravation, get a manual post driver (google it), they are available online and at supply houses for as little as $36.

They weigh about 20 lb. You slide them over the end of the pipe, lift them up and slam them downwards. They work very nicely and you don't have to worry about missing with the sledge hammer when you swing it.

Nice idea for a thread, S&F!

reply to post by DaddyBare


These shallow wells are great for sprinklers and outside water spigots as well. The shallow water is not usually as clean and drinkable as a deepwater well, but it is great for other uses, and it can serve as a backup.

Also, people should be careful to not drive the pipe past the water. Driving it too deep is just as bad as not driving it deep enough.

I have never done one myself, but I plan to do one at the end of this summer and hook it up to a lawn pump to water the yard and fill the pool.

Great Thread again!

reply to post by getreadyalready


Where I am many folks use these shallow wells for drinking water... I set one this past spring just to have water closer to the garden.... No, I didn't us a hand pump but got me a little solar well pump works great as long as the sun is shining

butcherguy

Glad you brought up the slide hammer.. or post driver.. personally I don't like em... I'm a lot faster with a sledge... I prefer a 6 pound myself... I can swing that puppy fast and keep that pace for quite some time... I tired quickly with an 8 or 12 pound... The a small 4 pound is just to light

reply to post by DaddyBare


The "driving point" you are talking about used to be if not still is called a "sand point" or "sand trap." Besides being the penetrator, it must have holes or a mesh area for the water to get into the pipe as well as some of the material in the immediate area that had been pushed to the side as the point went down.

Back in the 1950s my father and uncle had a little commercially purchased rig that they used with a small B&S ;motor on it. It was simply a framework that took the manual labor out of manually lifting the weight that drove the pipe. They were only good for soil or sand and limited to about 25 feet. I can still hear the clank of that thing!

With today's falling water tables, only a few parts of the country could make such a device practical. And if water is that close to the surface, more than likely a stream or body of water would be fairly nearby.

But the system, as simple as it sounds, it does work.

Perhaps the Mother Earth News still advertise such devices. In the old days, ads were in the back of Popular Science and Mechanics Illustrated magazines.

reply to post by Aliensun


nowadays they come two ways... one is as you say that first section of pipe has the perfes and perpetrator...
but you can also buy just a screw in cap perpetrator that gets attached to perf pipe and used when you think you'll need a longer run of perfs for poor water flow

edit to add... "Perf Pipe" means it has pre-drilled holes in it...

If you live in sandy soil area an easier way would be to run a hose down the pipe and well head and hydrodrill your well.

Pounding with a post driver ruins the pipe threads and if they have worked their way lose through twisting or vibrational rachteting you are not in a poition to get that wellhead back out

Ask me how I know.

I can't wait until I have my own property to mess with. It's going to be a self sustaining twisted version of Alice and Wonderland. Secret passages and checks from the electric company. And just for reference, a .pdf of some manual tools. www.braveproducts.com...

~Glu

Good topic. Like the video too. I did that on my property. I have sandy/clay type soil with natural springs everywhere I didn't have to go that deep. Nothing like knowing you have the main component of sustainability if the world imploded.

I'm looking in on ways to hook a solar panel, charger controller, and battery bank up for my electric well.

I already have built a cinderblock/rebar reinforced pump house around it, would love to have a panel on top for hurricane season so I don't have to pump water all day by hand.

Vital stuff, and not something you find info on just anywhere.
DB, you've got the market cornered on old school my friend.
From me, that is a true compliment.

reply to post by DaddyBare


there's a bunch of 5 minute videos regarding the art of sinking a well for potable water on YouTube,
most i seen were done by what seems Mexicans for a group compound or village type of place...

dirt cheap, but they use water pressure along with a pounding- hammer type of force to sink the well head in a short time from start to finish...

the basic costs seem like pocket change (etsimate under $200.) for 100' pipe & well point

shallow wells under 50 feet are likely done in a day


its best to get/build/purchase a 'cistern' to keep water too... thats if the local permits will allow you to put a cistern in...
i'm going to start one this fall... probably covertly here in a golf/residential community subdivision here in S.C.
and there's plenty of snitches, & eyes-&-ears for the bureaucracy

reply to post by DaddyBare


very good topic and info, thanks.

reply to post by butcherguy


Thats what I was thinking too, we use ours all the time.

reply to post by St Udio


Agreed.
I am a retired plumber and I was amazed with what you could do with a piece of jagged 4 inch pvc and 2 hoses.
Those Mexican guys made that process look easy.
They even made their own runing water for the drilling process, using a marble for a check ball.
Mother necessity rocks.

reply to post by DaddyBare


Thanks again DBear for another interesting thread.

Will watch these videos right now.

This sounds like something everyone needs to be aware of.

Thank you for the information.

It is awesome that you made this thread. I just helped a friend of mine drill his own well. He saved up the money and got a small drilling rig with a 8 or 9 foot derrick. It is awesome and we drilled 60 feet. He plans on drilling them for a living. It was really an interesting time. i got to shovel million year old slop.

Thanks again.

Oh goody i like science and whatever this is

Originally posted by Asktheanimals
Vital stuff, and not something you find info on just anywhere.
DB, you've got the market cornered on old school my friend.
From me, that is a true compliment.

Looks who's talking about old school you old Flint Knapper...
Dont let Asktheanimals fool you folks... hell he's already half wild caveman...

Fascinating, but I can't help but think it would taste awful! I rather like my mountain run off water. Although I would think it is always good to know how to do this, just in case of.. well I don't know what.

reply to post by MaMaa


your not far off in your assumptions...
lets look at septic systems... Did you know in most parts of the country once the water from a septic system leaches down 15 feet it is filtered enough to be considered river quality about 98% clean... I bring that up because the earth is a marvelous filter... still even that can become over taxed with too many pollutants

there shouldn't be any taste color of smell from wells driver deeper than 20 feet... if there is you need to find another location to sink your well