Beach004
New Member
I have posted this problem, partially, on another Forum; but this group seems to be even more expert, so now I'd like to try again, since I have not gotten to the bottom of my well problems.
The title is a weak pun; I live in Orange County NC, and my problem is orange "mud". I've got a good well, 125 feet, 85 feet of water in it, delivers 25 gpm; had the water analyzed several times, there's about nothing in it--very soft, pH ~6.5, 0.1 ppm iron at first, maybe 0.3ppm recently. Had a new pump put in five years ago, soon after I moved into this now-18-year old house.
But about six months ago, I started getting discoloration in the water--very noticeable. Before that, there had been no trace of it. I hired a plumber who installed a Big Blue 10 inch filter. With a 30 micron filter, that helped a lot, but not enough; subsequently I went to a 1 micron pleated cellulose filter. Again, a big reduction; but the water, sometimes, is still hazy, and if allowed to stand will deposit a "scum" on the bottom of a glass. When I change filters, the housing contains a lot of orange "mud." So I installed a 0.5 micron String Wound PolyPropylene Filter; still the same problem. Interestingly, the hot water is not hazy at all.
So I called out the company that installed the pump. The specialist looked at my used, orange, filter, took a running water sample directly from the pump head (1 ppm iron, he said), and told me I had lots of bacteria living down in my well (my analysis had said "no iron bacteria", but unfortunately the county took the sample on water downstream from my 30 micron filter. Also, I don't see any slime inside the house fittings at all; there's a red coating inside my toilet tanks, but it's not slimy, and it dissolves entirely in dilute HCl, as also does the material my filters are collecting; so I think it's rust. I used to be a chemist...) and prescribed a metering apparatus to sit atop the pump and inject a dissolved pellet of chlorine/bromine every morning at 2 AM, to kill the bacteria. He is so sure that this will do the job that he guarantees it--my money back. But that's the rub--it's a LOT of money; not sure I'm supposed to mention prices here; let's just say I bought a car in 1970 for less! Reading on your Forum this afternoon, I think I found it--the HaloVac system. Your contributors don't seem to be big fans of it.
Before I spent that much, I decided to try shock chlorination; I don't think this was done when the new pump was installed five years ago. I've got about 125 gallons of water in the well I calculated, so I threw in three quarts of Clorox, and recirculated the water in the well for about 90 minutes; then I let it sit overnight, and let it run out into the woods the next morning. (At no point did I run the water through my house, since I don't think there's any iron bacteria in there--all I'm trying to do is remove the yellow color and the turbidity.) The water coming out was bright orange, then shaded over to very turbid yellow, then after about two hours and over 1000 gallons ( pump was putting out 12 gpm), it was nearly clear, and didn't smell of chlorine, so I turned it back into the house.
The faint turbidity, but not the color, remains, a week later; the filter is still collecting orange material, but less of it by far than before. I got some iron strips, that show essentially no iron in the filtered water; but I also got a chlorine kit, and there was 1.5ppm chlorine in the house water until Friday! Now it's gone entirely, and I still don't see any iron by my home testing; that to my mind suggests that in fact there was iron bacteria in the water, and that once I got rid of them, the remaining iron is all the insoluble ferric form, rather than the ferrous (clear water iron) that iron bacteria make in their life cycle.
Well! This is a terribly long first post, but I wanted to get all the facts I'm aware of out there; at this point, for the moment, my problem is that turbidity; if I could find some other filter that would go in my Big Blue casing that would remove the haze, I'd be content; then maybe I could shock the well annually or some such. Opinions differ as to how strong, how long, the treatment needs to be; I figure I had 200ppm in there for 12 hours. So! Suggestions? Please?!?!!
Beach004
The title is a weak pun; I live in Orange County NC, and my problem is orange "mud". I've got a good well, 125 feet, 85 feet of water in it, delivers 25 gpm; had the water analyzed several times, there's about nothing in it--very soft, pH ~6.5, 0.1 ppm iron at first, maybe 0.3ppm recently. Had a new pump put in five years ago, soon after I moved into this now-18-year old house.
But about six months ago, I started getting discoloration in the water--very noticeable. Before that, there had been no trace of it. I hired a plumber who installed a Big Blue 10 inch filter. With a 30 micron filter, that helped a lot, but not enough; subsequently I went to a 1 micron pleated cellulose filter. Again, a big reduction; but the water, sometimes, is still hazy, and if allowed to stand will deposit a "scum" on the bottom of a glass. When I change filters, the housing contains a lot of orange "mud." So I installed a 0.5 micron String Wound PolyPropylene Filter; still the same problem. Interestingly, the hot water is not hazy at all.
So I called out the company that installed the pump. The specialist looked at my used, orange, filter, took a running water sample directly from the pump head (1 ppm iron, he said), and told me I had lots of bacteria living down in my well (my analysis had said "no iron bacteria", but unfortunately the county took the sample on water downstream from my 30 micron filter. Also, I don't see any slime inside the house fittings at all; there's a red coating inside my toilet tanks, but it's not slimy, and it dissolves entirely in dilute HCl, as also does the material my filters are collecting; so I think it's rust. I used to be a chemist...) and prescribed a metering apparatus to sit atop the pump and inject a dissolved pellet of chlorine/bromine every morning at 2 AM, to kill the bacteria. He is so sure that this will do the job that he guarantees it--my money back. But that's the rub--it's a LOT of money; not sure I'm supposed to mention prices here; let's just say I bought a car in 1970 for less! Reading on your Forum this afternoon, I think I found it--the HaloVac system. Your contributors don't seem to be big fans of it.
Before I spent that much, I decided to try shock chlorination; I don't think this was done when the new pump was installed five years ago. I've got about 125 gallons of water in the well I calculated, so I threw in three quarts of Clorox, and recirculated the water in the well for about 90 minutes; then I let it sit overnight, and let it run out into the woods the next morning. (At no point did I run the water through my house, since I don't think there's any iron bacteria in there--all I'm trying to do is remove the yellow color and the turbidity.) The water coming out was bright orange, then shaded over to very turbid yellow, then after about two hours and over 1000 gallons ( pump was putting out 12 gpm), it was nearly clear, and didn't smell of chlorine, so I turned it back into the house.
The faint turbidity, but not the color, remains, a week later; the filter is still collecting orange material, but less of it by far than before. I got some iron strips, that show essentially no iron in the filtered water; but I also got a chlorine kit, and there was 1.5ppm chlorine in the house water until Friday! Now it's gone entirely, and I still don't see any iron by my home testing; that to my mind suggests that in fact there was iron bacteria in the water, and that once I got rid of them, the remaining iron is all the insoluble ferric form, rather than the ferrous (clear water iron) that iron bacteria make in their life cycle.
Well! This is a terribly long first post, but I wanted to get all the facts I'm aware of out there; at this point, for the moment, my problem is that turbidity; if I could find some other filter that would go in my Big Blue casing that would remove the haze, I'd be content; then maybe I could shock the well annually or some such. Opinions differ as to how strong, how long, the treatment needs to be; I figure I had 200ppm in there for 12 hours. So! Suggestions? Please?!?!!
Beach004