air blowing OUT of well

I have a fairly new well of a high rated capacity. Its 6" with casing 40' all in hard rock, local greenstone and fractured quartz. 165' deep. 50 GPM, about 40 feet to water.

1hp submersible pump, maybe 15-20 GPM. I fitted a small sintered bronze air filter to a 1/2" hole in the well cap [NOT pitless adapter] for make up air during drawdown.

Incredibly, the well blows air out through this filter when pumping, make a sort of whistle at times - you can feel a breeze at this pipe.

I have no logical explanation for this occurence and hoping someone might know what in the world is going on down under.

Does this only happen when the pump is running?

I see this only when the pump is running, but then I cant say that I stayed with it for any amount of time after the pump was off.

We do not have a water table here, wild, all mixed up geology in the mountains. It is in a remote location so neighbors activities have no bearing.

Maybe this happens often but since most people dont vent wells or spend much time noticing any vents present, it passes unnoticed.... [?]

I suppose the earth must breathe as the tides must flow, but its a mystery that I would like to see explained.

Maybe an engineering student looking for his thesis theme?

None of the wells around here are vented. They are all sealed up (as well as can be) with Well Seals. When they draw down from pumping air is let into the well through the leaky seal. Then when the pump shuts off the air comes back out. Another place the air goes is through the electrical conduit to the pressure switch/control box. But it only happens when the pump is running or right after it switches off.

Your well is a new one on me.

bob...

There's a water table everywhere on earth. It is the depth at which you find water, however deep that is in the Arctic/Antarctic or the oldest driest desert or deepest ocean. If there was no water table, you wouldn't have water wells...

There may be a strata allowing free flowing air into the well or much more likely is that the recovery rate (up to the GPM the pump is moving) is simply displacing air in the well and it has to vent and the vent is only 1/2" so you feel the breeze. The well stores water, a 6" @ 1.47 gals/foot of water and as that water is removed, the recovery water flows into the well and since the recovery is higher than the pump's output (so it should be equal to the pump's output at all times), would air ever flow into the well through this vent? I suspect that there is little to no drawdown and the pump is air cooled or this air isn't air, it's a gas like natural gas, methane, H2S etc.. Now THAT is something to wonder about. lol

Raucina said:

Incredibly, the well blows air out through this filter when pumping, make a sort of whistle at times - you can feel a breeze at this pipe.

Click to expand...

You will hear a whistle and feel a breeze also if it is sucking... try this trick, use a barbarque lighter, or a "BIC" and as it's whistling put the flame near the vent, you can tell the air direction that way, also if it's methane you will instantly find out...

Rancher

Confirmed outflow of air, removed the filter, finger over pipe - air out with a definite velocity. No action when pump is off. pretty weird.

No methane in these parts, the place has a well documented gold mining history and it was never found.

There is no water table. I have drilled a well on the very edge of a cliff [steep drop about 1,000' into a canyon] and got good water at 100'
The neighbor about 400' in from the edge has 3 dry holes and finally one at 1 GPM at 400' . I have another well 500' from the neighbors bad holes producing 60GPM at 45' of hole. From this hole I look up at a house I built on a ridge 100' higher in elevation and 600' distant. That well is 120' deep and thus the water table in that ridge is above mine in the valley.

The whole neighborhood is well mapped underground by mining activity, and a dry mine could suddenly become a very wet hole if one cut into the wrong crevice in the rock. Around here its all about cracks, not depths.

The term water table is used in many cases to define the static water level. It doesn't matter where water is discovered in depth. It simply defines the distance down to the top of water in the well from ground level. In most formations, this level will be the same throughout the entire aquifer except where it is held down by the forces of nature. Kind of like sea level. It's all the same depth to the top of the water no matter how deep the bottom is below.

bob...

All of those wells have very different static and pumping levels. In the big valley below there is a definite water level, and its exactly 3,400' below me. Not drilling to that one! Looking for a good crack to drill into around here. My well driller has a quite rude T-shirt about that.....