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Old 08-04-2011, 01:03 PM
 
373 posts, read 634,318 times
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Has anyone made thier own well? If so how did you do it?

At one time this was a rather common place thing to do.


Did you do drill it by hand or use a motor? or another method.

I am also interested in ideas of how people have repaired of mantained existing wells?

I used to see alot of old hand pump wells in Penna and from time to time also see them in Texas.
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Old 08-04-2011, 01:30 PM
 
Location: Backwoods of Maine
7,487 posts, read 10,460,988 times
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Yes, I have taken part in a dug well over at my brother's place on a lake. We didn't have to dig too far, as the lake was nearby and I guess the water table was pretty high. But it was a lot of work. We had to put in an electric pump and run the wires down, and it was pretty dark down there. It was a cheaper way to go, but all manual. At the lake, my bro and his family do not drink the water; they bring bottled water and use the well for showers, dishes, etc.

In my own case with a future rural property, we will be using rainwater. Urban wells often have prescription drug residues, while rural ones often have nitrates from fertilizer runoff. We have decided that well-filtered rainwater is the way to go. There are folks who'll tell you that rainwater has bird droppings and tree sap mixed in with it from the roof, but there are ways to by-pass this stuff. Rainwater is free, clean, abundant in the east, and has no lousy chemicals in it.
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Old 08-04-2011, 02:04 PM
 
2,878 posts, read 4,622,127 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Nor'Eastah View Post
Yes, I have taken part in a dug well over at my brother's place on a lake. We didn't have to dig too far, as the lake was nearby and I guess the water table was pretty high. But it was a lot of work. We had to put in an electric pump and run the wires down, and it was pretty dark down there. It was a cheaper way to go, but all manual. At the lake, my bro and his family do not drink the water; they bring bottled water and use the well for showers, dishes, etc.

In my own case with a future rural property, we will be using rainwater. Urban wells often have prescription drug residues, while rural ones often have nitrates from fertilizer runoff. We have decided that well-filtered rainwater is the way to go. There are folks who'll tell you that rainwater has bird droppings and tree sap mixed in with it from the roof, but there are ways to by-pass this stuff. Rainwater is free, clean, abundant in the east, and has no lousy chemicals in it.
Rainwater is acidic and is far from clean. Unfiltered I would not drink it unless I was dying of thirst in a desert. I have no idea if you can ever filter rainwater to a point where it is safe.

A shallow well is no good either - too much runoff that can include pesticides, fertilizer, metals, manure etc. The key point in a well is that it has to be deep enough for the water to be naturally filtered by the layers of soils. rocks etc. Your brother is absolutely right not to drink the water from his shallow well.

OD
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Old 08-04-2011, 02:07 PM
 
Location: Between Seattle and Portland
1,266 posts, read 3,218,284 times
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I was interested in this same subject late last year and got LOTS of interesting feedback here:

//www.city-data.com/forum/self-...yard-well.html
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Old 08-04-2011, 02:11 PM
 
Location: Between Seattle and Portland
1,266 posts, read 3,218,284 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ognend View Post
I have no idea if you can ever filter rainwater to a point where it is safe.OD
Australian study:

Rainwater Safe To Drink Untreated Or Filtered

And from "Ask a Scientist:"

NEWTON, Ask a Scientist at Argonne National Labs
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Old 08-04-2011, 02:40 PM
 
Location: A Nation Possessed
25,482 posts, read 18,618,666 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Nor'Eastah View Post
In my own case with a future rural property, we will be using rainwater. Urban wells often have prescription drug residues, while rural ones often have nitrates from fertilizer runoff. We have decided that well-filtered rainwater is the way to go. There are folks who'll tell you that rainwater has bird droppings and tree sap mixed in with it from the roof, but there are ways to by-pass this stuff. Rainwater is free, clean, abundant in the east, and has no lousy chemicals in it.
I have been researching this for awhile now. It really is a good way to go in many cases. I'm planning the same, and even though my area only gets from 10 to 13 inches of rain annually, that's plenty if the rainwater system is properly designed.

For those who didn't know, the natural process/cycle of evaporation/rain IS a filter system. So unless you live in a toxic waste site with clouds of deadly poisons looming over you, chances are your rainwater is just fine to drink. Many people do it right now and they haven't turned into a colony of Toxic Avengers yet.
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Old 08-04-2011, 07:56 PM
 
Location: Nebraska
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"A typical house has a roof area of 1,200 square feet and four downspouts that will each drain about 300 square feet of roof. That means a rainfall of 0.3 inches will fill a 55-gallon rain barrel placed under each downspout." from Stormwater Management - Rainbarrels

I have found this to be very true. Our rain barrels (we have 4) will fill to overflowing with only an inch of rain. We purposefully bought the type that has: 1) a screen on top to screen out the "big stuff"; 2) a hose/drain plug attached at the bottom, and 3) an easily-removable lid if we want to scoop the water out. Is it clean and potable? No. But it can be made to be so with a minimum of effort.

However, our current town water system taps directly into the Ogallala Aquifer, as do most of the wells around here. Since we live in an area known as the Sandhills, the water has to travel through over 50 feet of sand which pulls out most impurities. Since we have no contamination from runoff, our water is pure - leave a glass sit out and it has no floaters, let it sit out overnight and there is no sediment at the bottom or rings around the top. Local windmill-driven pump wells cost no electricity to operate, and as long as you don't pump over 49 gallons an hour, they are not inspected or regulated. Oh, there is a LOT of wind here - what folks worry about more is shutting those dang windmills DOWN when the tanks are full or the wind blows over 30 mph (which it does, a LOT).

In all of the places I've lived, and in all of the places I've visited, I could never stand the taste of the water, and never drank it unless it was in coffee or tea. Here I drink it by the gallon - it is WATER, nothing else.
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Old 08-04-2011, 09:53 PM
 
29,981 posts, read 42,859,282 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ChrisC View Post
I have been researching this for awhile now. It really is a good way to go in many cases. I'm planning the same, and even though my area only gets from 10 to 13 inches of rain annually, that's plenty if the rainwater system is properly designed.

For those who didn't know, the natural process/cycle of evaporation/rain IS a filter system. So unless you live in a toxic waste site with clouds of deadly poisons looming over you, chances are your rainwater is just fine to drink. Many people do it right now and they haven't turned into a colony of Toxic Avengers yet.
In my part of the country, outside of city limits, it has only been in the past 40 years that cisterns were not commonplace. "City water" wasn't available to many rural areas until the late 1970's. As far as I know no one died from drinking it. Cistern is my back-up source should "city water" fail. Likely I'd filter and maybe even boil it just to be on the safe side but I know my grandparents never did.

The OP is more adventurous than I. If I decide to have a well drilled I'll leave it to the professionals.
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Old 08-05-2011, 05:59 AM
 
1,337 posts, read 1,518,380 times
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Never dug a well. That is one of the few areas I'd very reluctantly leave to professionals (mainly because I don't have the equipment, more so than a lack of knowledge, which I suppose I could learn on my own). I probably would not use a shallow "hand-dug" well for anything more than grey water to water crops.... and at most, maybe for showering. I wouldn't view a shallow well as being desirable for potable water.

Rainwater catchment on the other hand, I'd have far less reservations about, as far as potability. Have already done it, and would continue to do so. I've done it unfiltered while camping and hiking many times (it also saved my ass one time while hiking when I ran out of water on an 80 mile dry stretch of trail), collecting it off of clean tarps, and would continue to do it, filtered (1/2 micron, minimum... preferably... though reverse osmosis would make me feel better... R.O. filtering is problematic, however), for off-grid drinking, in lieu of a well. Boiling it would render it largely safe..... but that's not a very practical long-term solution. Treating the cistern regularly with chlorine dioxide or pool shock would also be a practical supplemental treatment in conjunction with filtering.... but that's persona preference. Some people strive to get away from water that tastes like chlorine. Many people have had a lifetime of that crap with city water that tastes like pool water... but nonetheless, the option is there, if one is overly concerned about pathogens.

Rainwater does, and can, have assorted pollutants in it. It does both in practice, and in theory (and the irony there is that some of the most cleanest and untouched places on the ground theoretically sometimes have some of the dirtiest air, because it gets carried from elsewhere [from the filthy cities] due to prevailing wind patterns).... but I'm not overly worried about it. With the amount of crap people ingest nowadays as a matter of routine course, including all the garbage that passes for food.... I'm not really going to obsess over what is theoretically in rainwater.

If people want to obsess over what's in rainwater, one might as well obsess over radon, especially if you live in the northern rocky mountain region of this country. I won't be obsessing over either of those things. It's a calculated risk of life. Man has lived with radon since time immemorial and survived well enough. I'm sure he can do the same with drinking rainwater. Neither one of those things is likely going to turn you or your progeny into genetic mutants.

Last edited by FreedomThroughAnarchism; 08-05-2011 at 06:09 AM..
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Old 08-05-2011, 07:22 AM
 
Location: Nebraska
4,176 posts, read 10,668,567 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by lifelongMOgal View Post
In my part of the country, outside of city limits, it has only been in the past 40 years that cisterns were not commonplace. "City water" wasn't available to many rural areas until the late 1970's. As far as I know no one died from drinking it. Cistern is my back-up source should "city water" fail. Likely I'd filter and maybe even boil it just to be on the safe side but I know my grandparents never did.

The OP is more adventurous than I. If I decide to have a well drilled I'll leave it to the professionals.
Yup, I'll pay to have my wells dug; professionals with the right equipment can tag potable water. Expensive? Yup. Worth it? Definitely.

MOgal put me in mind of an experience related to me - when my parents lived on the island of Bermuda, the only potable water there came from cisterns. Every house had one on the roof, and it was piped down to the house.
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