earthscaper
New Member
Hi,
I have built a house here in the Blue Ridge Mountains of VA. I drilled one well in 2002. When I was flushing and purging my plumbing and hydronic heating lines last year, I found out that well had dried out.
Since then I drilled two more wells - neither have much flow - one is one quart/minute, the other about one third gallon per minute.
My in-laws live 2500 feet from the house. They have said we can tie into their water line (pressurized with a pressure tank in their house).
Their well lies at the bottom of the driveway, down a slope. It is about 6-8 gpm, water hit about 80 feet, depth of the well 200 some feet. Near the well is a hydrant and a barn. When you (fully) open that hydrant by the barn, there is terrific pressure there. Reportedly, there is also a drop in pressure at the house at the top of the hill.
I guess this makes sense as the hydrant down below is pressurized not only by the pressure tank but also the volume of the water in the line between the downslope well and the upslope house.
In the past I have asked whether there is anything we can do (check valve) that could solve this. Their well man said no, short of putting an independent system (independent pump, wire, pipe, pressure tank in the barn) to the hydrant at the barn.
My concern is that my house too is downhill from their house. It is not near the barn, however. The shortest route to my house is via a road, the same road which leads from the barn to my in-laws. From my in-laws, you go through the woods, continue to ascend a little, then start descending the ridge, away from my in-laws', down the opposite side of the ridge from where their well is located.
My in-laws' well guy said if I tie into their line I would have to put a storage tank (1000 gal) with a float valve in it to prevent me from stealing pressure from my in-laws. (I'm not sure exactly how this would work - I guess because I would draw from it rather than continually calling on their pump - but eventually the tank would have to be filled from time to time.) He suggested at the high point between our houses. But he doesn't want to do the project at all, now, because he was going to plow a pipe in, and the ground is too rocky. He also said there wouldn't be enough elevation drop from that storage tank to our house to alllow my house to be gravity fed to the top floors.
So I am thinking of ditch witching the line in myself. I can do that kind of work but just don't know about the pressure situation - whether we will rob my in-laws' of their pressure (a la the barn hydrant) or whether we will have too much pressure.
Getting long here in this description so I'll stop. If you want more info let me know. Any help you can give to help me out would be appreciated - there is really no other good place by our house to drill another well, and my wife wants to move in soon! But there is no water there now of course.
Thanks in advance.
earthscaper
I have built a house here in the Blue Ridge Mountains of VA. I drilled one well in 2002. When I was flushing and purging my plumbing and hydronic heating lines last year, I found out that well had dried out.
Since then I drilled two more wells - neither have much flow - one is one quart/minute, the other about one third gallon per minute.
My in-laws live 2500 feet from the house. They have said we can tie into their water line (pressurized with a pressure tank in their house).
Their well lies at the bottom of the driveway, down a slope. It is about 6-8 gpm, water hit about 80 feet, depth of the well 200 some feet. Near the well is a hydrant and a barn. When you (fully) open that hydrant by the barn, there is terrific pressure there. Reportedly, there is also a drop in pressure at the house at the top of the hill.
I guess this makes sense as the hydrant down below is pressurized not only by the pressure tank but also the volume of the water in the line between the downslope well and the upslope house.
In the past I have asked whether there is anything we can do (check valve) that could solve this. Their well man said no, short of putting an independent system (independent pump, wire, pipe, pressure tank in the barn) to the hydrant at the barn.
My concern is that my house too is downhill from their house. It is not near the barn, however. The shortest route to my house is via a road, the same road which leads from the barn to my in-laws. From my in-laws, you go through the woods, continue to ascend a little, then start descending the ridge, away from my in-laws', down the opposite side of the ridge from where their well is located.
My in-laws' well guy said if I tie into their line I would have to put a storage tank (1000 gal) with a float valve in it to prevent me from stealing pressure from my in-laws. (I'm not sure exactly how this would work - I guess because I would draw from it rather than continually calling on their pump - but eventually the tank would have to be filled from time to time.) He suggested at the high point between our houses. But he doesn't want to do the project at all, now, because he was going to plow a pipe in, and the ground is too rocky. He also said there wouldn't be enough elevation drop from that storage tank to our house to alllow my house to be gravity fed to the top floors.
So I am thinking of ditch witching the line in myself. I can do that kind of work but just don't know about the pressure situation - whether we will rob my in-laws' of their pressure (a la the barn hydrant) or whether we will have too much pressure.
Getting long here in this description so I'll stop. If you want more info let me know. Any help you can give to help me out would be appreciated - there is really no other good place by our house to drill another well, and my wife wants to move in soon! But there is no water there now of course.
Thanks in advance.
earthscaper