hand well pumps

[dhnorris]

I've bought two and am repairing the best one back to original. Does any body know if pvc will survive as a sucker cylinder or not. I'm thinking of trying to make a lightweight takedown pump. There will be millions of good wells with sterile (reasonably) water that will be useless should the grid fail. A working pump should easily be worth a lot.

 

[IndyGunworks]

GOOD JOB!!!

 

[TylerB]

Interesting, I've got a couple old wells in my yard that are just capped off from before the property was converted to city water. Might have to consider getting a hand pump for one.

If your trying to make it light weight, compact, and easier to travel with, would a hose work better than PVC? I would assume anything that water transfers through would work just fine, although you'd have to get a hose that didn't cave in when you put it under negative pressure.

 

[CountryBoy19]

Just a note of caution, those hand pumps will only work on very shallow wells. I can't remember the specific depth but I think its around 20 feet. Anything deeper and the suction will actually cause the water to turn to vapor and you won't pump anything. For deeper wells you need a submersible pump so that it creates a higher pressure at the bottom of the well rather than a vacuum at the top.

 

[03A3]

I'm looking into buying a pump and spare parts myself. I have 2 old wells on my place that haven't been used since city water came in.
The local hardware store doesn't carry pitcher pumps anymore, but can order them. They have replacement suck and check parts in stock.
These wells aren't very deep and I intend to use pipe for the suction.
I have a plan in mind to fab a bracket to mount the pump to the top of the 6" casing.

 

[MarkR]

Try this: A lot of useful info on this site

Bison Hand Water Pumps

 

[CountryBoy19]

Try this: A lot of useful info on this site

Bison Hand Water Pumps

Wow, I hadn't heard of them before. Those look like some great pumps. I think the guy at the top of the photos page is either on arfcom or snipershide, I remember him posting the photos.

 

[dhnorris]

The bison pumps look like an excellent product but, it's priced to match. I'm going for the >$100 pump. I believe it can be done. Two months ago I had a sense of urgency which has waned somewhat. I'm still employed, the garden is in, arms are adequate for everyone in the family. "wolverines"

 

[caneman]

I know they have hand pumps and all the valves and pipe at Rural King. I imagine any of the farm supply stores have them or can get them.

Last time I checked a couple of years ago they had pumps and other hand powered stuff at Lehmans.com which was set up with stuff for amish farms.

They used to have (don't know now) gas powered (propane) refrigeration.

 

[smokingman]

This is something I need to look into. With the water table so high in my area what would be needed to run a 25ft well?I do not have a well on our property at all,but would like to.

 

[inxs]

Average lift is said to be somewhere around 23.8'. I've seen a draw down to about 27'. There are ways of going down farther that involve different equipment.

I would think PVC would wear rapidly from the leather...

 

[Pamcake]

Consider a "Bucket" well.

Lehmans.com has supplies for hand well pumps, and they sell a video/CD for $20 that really explains EVERYTHING. Buy the video/CD & they will credit you that cost to your well/pump purchase too. (wish we would've had it a long time ago)

We got ours from Lehmans 10 yrs ago when there was a local "drought" and many wells went dry and ours developed a slight sulfer taste, so we had a second well drilled ( a wide, "bucket" well does best in our area according to the well drillers) & Lehman's best pump installed by the "old guy" at the local plumbing/HVAC business.

From C&J Well Drilling website:
Bucket wells: No you can’t lower a bucket down into a bucket well. We break out the “big hole” when you’ve got issues finding water. What we do with this thing is drill a forty inch diameter hole to create an in ground storage system. As we go down through the small “streams” of water this system ties them all together. When we get a good flow of water,or 85ft. ( whatever comes first) we set a casing in the center. Then we put in a tri-axle load of or 2 of clean pea gravel. We then put a barrier between ground level and the gravel called bentonite. What we end up with is a huge reservoir of water when we are done.

 

[Bull]

I liked the deep well hand pump but at that price I will have to stick to my old hand dug well that is down the hill.