Re: check valve in old well?

Posted by jackinok on July 28, 2012 at 07:53:39 from (68.235.142.39):

In Reply to: Re: check valve in old well? posted by jackinok on July 28, 2012 at 05:45:52:

another thing you could have is a driven well if its not cased. In that scenario what you may be hitting is the well point. It is basically a piece of pipe made in a point to drive in the ground but it has a fine wire mesh screen around it to keep out sand.If you ruin this screen or break your well point your well is going to pump a lot of dirt and your pumps wont last long.
If this well is cased,you can tell basically what you have on your mill by simply dismantling your pump head.a well with the cyl below ground level MUST have rods running down the center of the 11/4" pipe to operate the the cyl which is a mechanical pump. if it doestnt have these rods running below ground level you have a whats known as a PITCHER pump. they wont pump much over 25 ft simply because the leathers in the cyl cant hold the suction and they collapse and leak by.BUT a pitcher pump will have a check valve built into the bottom of the cyl itself to stop water from draining back and losing prime. this is most times two pieces of metal with a leaher flapper sandwitched in between.this works more or less like a flapper in your toilet tank. the bottom piece of metal is tapered and sits often times in a tapered seat to hold it in position. If thats what you have thats your problem..two problems with a pitcher pump.one is that they are not self draining because of this flapper so they either freeze in cold weather or they must be left running constantly.OR if someone removes this flapper they must be primed each time its used to wet the leathers. the advantage of a pitcher pump is simply that it all can be serviced above ground.
if you dont have a pitcher pump ,you will have rods running down into the well below ground.these rods help you when you pull the pump simply because even if your drop pipe is rusted in two above the cyl the rods hold it,so your fairly safe pulling your well.as far as pipe breakage goes above the cyl. to decide what you have and how to proceed,start by putting a rope around the pump RODS at the top of your well head and start dismantling pump.NEVER EVER turn loose the pump rods untill your 100% certain your drop pipe is not broken below the pump base. if you do and pipe is rusted in two somewhere youll lose it all below the break if you have a cyl below ground. best and easiest way to pull the pipe is to lay a plank through your tower near the top, haung a double pulley on this,and run TWO ropes through it.one rope attatches to the rods,(thats your safety line) the other to the pipe. theres vices available to hold your pipe as you pull it. but if you dont have one or cant find one.two heavy pipe wrenches put on the pipe andlaid side ways will often hold it.or you can simply use another rope snubbed off to the tower and tied around the pipe so it wont slip. AGAIN let me say NEVER EVER turn loose the pump rods!!! Regardless of what people tell you here, you cant simply cut it and be done if your intending to use the mill ever again. due to you having a cyl in the equasion thats usually ten to twelve inches long you must unscrew or cut the drop pipe at each joint raise it this amount and unscrew rods. now in your case as i understand it your going electric so you could just cut it off, but when you do your LOSING your hold on your pump rods thats VERY often the only thing holding the whole mess together.. anither reason you really dont want to do this,, just fyi,, you can sell these parts very often for more money than it costs to drill anew well and install a new pump!
once you get to the cyl,and it can be ANYWHERE below ground your going to lose your safety line on the rods. dont let it bother you anything rusted in two below that point is allready gone anyway.its simply fell to the bottom of well.just be care full and dont break it yourself and lose a piece.before you unscrew or cut pipe make sure you have a good grip on the pipe below.i personaly use both lines with one alternately holding and one pulling. it sounds hard but its relly not all that difficult to pull one,and heres atip.once you get to the cyl if the pipe has water in it everything below that level is intact.no reason to pull it unless like in your case you need it out of the way.if it doesnt youve either got a bad foot valve or a hole in the pipe. i hope this helps.without pictures or something its nearly impossible to know what you have,theres a thousnd different pump jacks and just as many ways to rig them up for different uses ,but this is the basics.

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