# well digging



## stayingthegame (Mar 22, 2011)

Has anyone hand dug a well ( not actually using a shovel) but using pipe as a casing and an insert of a sucker rod and a foot valve and a pump. I am curious as to how to use galvanized 2" - 2 1/2" metal pipe for casing and continuously keep this casing dropping without friction from the sides of the hole. I live on a sandy soil that has a layer of clay about 2 1/2 feet below the sand, then more sand. the water table is about 50 - 60 feet but in some portions of the area, you can hit irrigation water in as little as 25 feet. I thought of having a 4 inch PVC pipe placed upright in the ground and have a garden hose and pump to erode the water and suck it back again for reuse; but i am not sure how to sink the 4 inch or the galvanized pipe in the casing. Again, If it gets stuck, how do you pull it up. Most lengths of pipe are 21 feet long and if you cut threads on the end, when you pull it up, the pipe separates at the connection of the joint.
After you reach your depth, how do you eat out enough space so that water collects and you can pump enough up? :dunno:


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## Tirediron (Jul 12, 2010)

hydo digging is a process similar to what you describe, a pressure sprayer is used to loosen the soil and the spoil is vaccumed up, 
to answer your reservoir question :the bottom section of casing is most times drilled full of holes or slotted with a saw to make a sort of screen and is dug past the water table depth to provide some reserve volume.
you may also want to research sand point "drilling"


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## VUnder (Sep 1, 2011)

Use a fine screen if you are in fine, silty sand. I am from Louisiana, and it will silt in if you don't have a fine enough screen. We drilled a well with a gas post hole digger. Made a little derrick, put a 12v winch on top, and started going down. Your pipe is going to touch the sides, that is why they have to repair oil wells so much, the rods rub the casing. I have a real water well drilling rig now, so things are better.


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## VUnder (Sep 1, 2011)

You are doing a cheap hand well? I saw one dug with a home made bit on the end of a piece of pipe and they had water pressure in the middle and turned it with pipe wrenches. Get you some 2 3/8" oilfield pipe, it is upset tubing, and the threads are as strong as the pipe and the collars are thick. Shorten it down to five or ten foot lengths. Drill with the male end down. It would be a whole lot better if you have a water swivel so the pipe can turn with a water hose pressuring it up. Dig you two pits about the size of a kiddie swimming pool. Dig a ditch from the well hole to the first hole, from the first hole to the second hole. Put your pump in the second hole. Some Bentonite Clay, drilling mud, helps keep the well from caving while you are drilling, until you get your casing set. Make sure to make or buy a screen for the bottom of the well. You need at least a 6" hole for a 4" pipe. If you make a screen, the slots need to be as small as you can make them. Smaller than a hacksaw blade. If the sand is fine, you will get sand in your casing all the time and be pumping sand when you get water. Lots of people don't like grit in their teeth. Any more questions of how or explain better, just ask, I will answer as best I can.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

VUnder said:


> It would be a whole lot better if you have a water swivel so the pipe can turn with a water hose pressuring it up. Dig you two pits about the size of a kiddie swimming pool. Dig a ditch from the well hole to the first hole, from the first hole to the second hole. Put your pump in the second hole. Some Bentonite Clay, drilling mud, helps keep the well from caving while you are drilling, until you get your casing set.


The hardest part is finding a pump that can handle that mud!!!!


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## VUnder (Sep 1, 2011)

LincTex said:


> The hardest part is finding a pump that can handle that mud!!!!


I have seen it done with a water hose, and it works, if you keep things going slow. My brothers dad in law just did one with a post hole digger on a little 10' derrick, and a harbor freight 12v winch on top, and the cheapest water swivel I ever saw on the bottom of the phd. Made a fine well. They borrowed my air compressor, 12hp, and used that to blow on it a while. He is a colorful fella. They were setting the casing, had the 20' pipe tied off to the front end loader, cause the derrick was only 10' and was in the way. Then he forgot and backed up and was still tied to the casing, and snapped it off way down in the ground. So, then a 25 mile trip to get the backhoe and did a huge hole to get back down and saw it off and put the rest of the casing on. Some adults have ADD too, I guess.


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## hedgeliving (Nov 12, 2011)

We put in drive point wells, but you have to live in an area where there aren't a whole lotta big rocks or you can't do that. A drive point well is a special pipe that has a point to it. You pound that into the ground with a fence post driver, then you put on another few feet of pipe and drive that down, then another few feet...and so on until you hit water. I have 17 hand pumps on my farm that I've put in this way. You can usually buy a drive point at most stores that sell plumping supplies. I get mine from Menards but I think that is a regional store. 

If you dig your own I'd love to know about it. With my livestock I am always wishing I had another well somewhere else so I could use that as pasture.

Rea


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## alergyfree (Feb 15, 2011)

LincTex said:


> The hardest part is finding a pump that can handle that mud!!!!


It's called a trash pump, just about any equipment rental place carries then.


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## VUnder (Sep 1, 2011)

We will be drilling a few here directly. I will try and do my first video when we do it. I have done some without the correct equipment and got by, but now we have a real water well drilling rig. It has a 3" trash pump, a chiksan joint on the top, and the whole thing is hydraulic operated. Pipe joints are 10' on the drill stem. I just picked up a 7" tri cone rock bit at a yard sale for 20 bucks. We are going to drill two at my dads farm first, then one for my brother and one for me.


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## VUnder (Sep 1, 2011)

stayingthegame said:


> Has anyone hand dug a well ( not actually using a shovel) but using pipe as a casing and an insert of a sucker rod and a foot valve and a pump. I am curious as to how to use galvanized 2" - 2 1/2" metal pipe for casing and continuously keep this casing dropping without friction from the sides of the hole. I live on a sandy soil that has a layer of clay about 2 1/2 feet below the sand, then more sand. the water table is about 50 - 60 feet but in some portions of the area, you can hit irrigation water in as little as 25 feet. I thought of having a 4 inch PVC pipe placed upright in the ground and have a garden hose and pump to erode the water and suck it back again for reuse; but i am not sure how to sink the 4 inch or the galvanized pipe in the casing. Again, If it gets stuck, how do you pull it up. Most lengths of pipe are 21 feet long and if you cut threads on the end, when you pull it up, the pipe separates at the connection of the joint.
> After you reach your depth, how do you eat out enough space so that water collects and you can pump enough up? :dunno:


Yesterday a fellow dropped off a compressor for me to work on. He lays cable for the phone and power company. He also bores under roads. The boring tool was with the compressor, he said it would drill a 100' well for sure, as he knew from experience.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

alergyfree said:


> It's called a trash pump


I didn't know if trash pumps had enough outlet pressure to work.... 
the trash pumps I have used have always had good volume (flow "rate") BUT the discharge end was wide open (not restricted) so I don't know how well they work with the discharge blocked off and the flow rate cranked way down.

How much actual pressure is needed to drill? The observed flow rate doesn't seem to be very high... but I am not an experienced driller and I am wanting to learn all I can.


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## VUnder (Sep 1, 2011)

LincTex said:


> I didn't know if trash pumps had enough outlet pressure to work....
> the trash pumps I have used have always had good volume (flow "rate") BUT the discharge end was wide open (not restricted) so I don't know how well they work with the discharge blocked off and the flow rate cranked way down.
> 
> How much actual pressure is needed to drill? The observed flow rate doesn't seem to be very high... but I am not an experienced driller and I am wanting to learn all I can.


The last one I had anything to do with was drilled with water hose pressure. We had a small water swivel with a water hose connected. We had an old gasoline post hole digger and had the water swivel on the bottom and attatched our pipe there. Made a little junky derrick out of some pipe and took a small 12v winch off of a 4wheeler to run the motor up and down. Drilled a 7" hole using black gas pipe for drill stem and a home made bit. All went well.


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