Artestian Well

[tbascom]

From a long time reader:

At my parents summer home on a lake our neighbors put in a well a few summers ago. They hit an water very shallow and ended up with a well that brings water to the surface. They live uphill of our dock and the excess water used to flow down the regular rainwater trench into the lake. The added water started to erode the shoreline and the family was nice to pay for it to be piped all the way down to the water. (About a 150 foot run downhill of black 1 1/2 pipe.) The fridgid water from the well makes the water around our dock even colder. My father and I extended the pipe down about 25 feet into the water. Now since it the water is not consistent all the time the pipe is not filled about every 10 minutes the air and water from the pipe come to the surface in a loud series of large bubbles. (It takes a little bit away from the tranquility.) Is there anyway way for this to not happen? Thoughts of venting the pipe, drilling holes down the 25 foot run, or some sort of a trap have crossed our minds and I was wondering if you could come with any ideas?

Thanks,
TAB

[ToUtahNow]

Boy what a shame you are not broadcasting the water to put it to a beneficial use. If your neighbor treats his well at all he could be breaking some fish and wildlife laws as well.

It sounds like the overflow piping is getting air locked for some reason but without pictures it would be hard to tell for sure. I do have a few questions for you:

Where does the overflow start and is vented at that point?

How much water is flowing in the pipe?

Does the flow fill the entire pipe?

Were vents added at locations where you created air locks due to negative grades?

Mark

BTW: I'm not sure very many of the members of the site deal with this type of thing.

[freddy]

you could install cap with holes at end of pipe, to cause the air bubbles to be smaller less noise. :)

[boytyperanma]

Tell you neighbor to stop running their water. Whats happening is when they draw water it brings the water level of thier well down bellow the level of the drain. This air to get into that line. When the well refills up it forces the air out at your end. I'd need more infor on how/if they put an airgap or backflow prevention. In theory they should not have piped directly into the lake as it poses a risk of contaminating the well.

[ToUtahNow]

I have two overflows on my Artesian spring/well system. The current system is an open system but will soon have to be change to a pressurized system. The original overflow is piped 60-feet from my first storage tank and about the same distance from my creek. Because I have a small battery operated piston pump adding Chlorine to the first storage tank I was afraid the trout would be in danger if an overflow ever made it to the creek.

The furthest storage tank is 3-miles away but quite a bit lower than my spring. With a GPS and a little trial and error I found the perfect elevation which would allow the secondary overflow to flow before the primary overflow would flow. I then piped the second overflow up the hill to the correct elevation and it irrigates the hill all the way down to the river which is far enough away (half-mile) to lose any Chlorine before running back in to the river.

Mark.