Need advice

[tolupo]

A 6" 250 ft borehole for a water well. Casing pipe 3.5" outer diameter. Installing the casing pipe all went well 2/3 down. Wanting to have a small gravel pad underneath, in my infinite wisdom I pored about a gallon of gravel around the pipe at that point. Size, give or take, up to 0.5". I thought I had sufficient clearance but now the pipe is stuck. This is all done DIY with no professional equipment present at this point.
Any ideas? Pour water, lubricant of some type, etc?

 

[Reach4]

Casing "stuck"? Normally you don't remove casing.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[tolupo]

Casing "stuck"? Normally you don't remove casing.

It won't go further down. Only 2/3 is done.

 

[Valveman]

You should have room in the annular space between a 6" hole and 3.5" casing for rock like that. But it all falls in bunches and bridges off on one side of the casing. Have to pour it REALLY slowly to make if fall all the way. But should never be added until the casing is on the bottom. Can be a real bear to get unstuck. If you have a big enough mud pump you maybe able to pump mud down the casing and get the gravel to float up. But even if you get the casing out the gravel will fall to the bottom and be really hard to pump out. Would need thick mud and high flow to bring gravel to the surface.

The casing is most likely wedged in place and moving up or down just makes it tighter. Probably best to cut the casing, plug the well, and move over. Had to do it many times learning what not to do. Also, the gravel should be more like sand. The gravel should be sized to be barely larger than the perforations in the casing.

 

[tolupo]

You should have room in the annular space between a 6" hole and 3.5" casing for rock like that. But it all falls in bunches and bridges off on one side of the casing. Have to pour it REALLY slowly to make if fall all the way. But should never be added until the casing is on the bottom. Can be a real bear to get unstuck. If you have a big enough mud pump you maybe able to pump mud down the casing and get the gravel to float up. But even if you get the casing out the gravel will fall to the bottom and be really hard to pump out. Would need thick mud and high flow to bring gravel to the surface.

The casing is most likely wedged in place and moving up or down just makes it tighter. Probably best to cut the casing, plug the well, and move over. Had to do it many times learning what not to do. Also, the gravel should be more like sand. The gravel should be sized to be barely larger than the perforations in the casing.

Thanks. Just to be clear- the gravel falling to the bottom is what the intent was. I wouldn't need to bring it up.