Colder Than a Well Diggers ...

[Handy Don 14,535]

I had a summer job for a well supply retailer back around 1970. Some customers were still using the BE pounders, like this one, and others had switched to rotaries. One day I got sent to troubleshoot a huge rotary drill. The drill engine was no start.

Me, a college kid in a VW bug with a couple boxes of tools, had never worked on anything like this. I could see the skepticism in the customer’s eyes when I pulled up.

In about 20 minutes, I traced the problem to incorrect wiring--there was too-small-gauge wire and a fuse in between the ignition switch and the coil. Toasted, of course. Rewired it in about 10 minutes with some heavier wire and new connectors and it ran like a honey.

“My boss says, ’No charge', sir” (huge smile lights up customer’s face!).

Of course I wrote it up, including photos from my 35mm camera, and my boss billed the drill manufacturer for my time and travel costs.

Cool experience. 

[ebinmaine 74,343]

12 hours ago, 953 nut said:

That is nothing compared to grinding through 100 feet of solid granite, that sound can be heard for a mile or more.

 

Agreed.  

Because I work in the construction industry I've been around a few. 

You can YELL as loud as you want next to the rig. 

No sound gets to the next pair of ears.  

[Wayne0 1,333]

I live on a power line right of way. A couple years ago they put up some new steel poles. When that 36" drill hit bedrock, it shook my house!

 

Edited September 5 by Wayne0

[Wayne0 1,333]

Pretty interesting watching them string the wires. A helicopter would drop a guy off on the pole, dip down to the ground, pick up the wire on a pulley, bring it up to the guy on the pole who would attach it. Pick the guy up and move to the next pole.

Bet he makes big bucks!

[Handy Don 14,535]

1 hour ago, Wayne0 said:

Bet he makes big bucks!

The ‘copter sure saves a lot of climbing.

I’d love to hear him describe his job!

“Same old same old. Up the pole, rig the cable attachment, attach the cable, next pole.” 😁

 

[Wayne0 1,333]

I watched them replace the static line on the big double poles. This was a 30 degree day. I can't imagine what the temp was in the rotor wash!

 

Edited September 6 by Wayne0

[wallfish 18,592]

43 minutes ago, Wayne0 said:

I watched them replace the static line on the big double poles.

The high tension lines are about 2-300 yards behind our house and not really visible. When they were working on them about 10 years ago, the wife calls me in a big panic saying they are dropping people off out of helicopters. She thought it was a Russian invasion or something! LOL

[Handy Don 14,535]

On 9/5/2025 at 8:09 PM, Wayne0 said:

Notice the counterweight on the aft end of other landing skid to balance the chopper--makes it a lot more predictable to handle. Normally, the “outside” worker stays in their position throughout the flight. 

Edited September 8 by Handy Don

[Beap52 1,591]

1 hour ago, Handy Don said:

Notice the counterweight on the aft end of other landing skid to balance the chopper--makes it a lot more predictable to handle. Normally, the “outside” worker stays in their position throughout the flight. 

 

I hadn't noticed the counterweight before.  Makes sense.

 

I thought it was his lunch bucket!

[oliver2-44 10,948]

On 9/5/2025 at 7:09 PM, Wayne0 said:

I watched them replace the static line on the big double poles. 

 

In the late 90,s The utility I retired from replaced a lot of static wires with new statics that had bundles of fiber in them. They were on the early side of leasing fiber to outside customers. 

[WHX?? 52,808]

Now that you clowns got properly ...  EB would say it's all good... 

Casing down to 245 ft. with the screen. It was interesting that he put the screen down to the bottom then pulled the casing back up so the screen hangs out the bottom of the casing. Would have liked to see how he cut off the pipe and drive coupling to final grade but had a doctors appt. 

He said it not a great well but not a bad one. Water up in the casing to about 14 ft. from the top. Today I noticed water dripping out of the conduit power connection and at times a decent stream. Maybe they did hit a artesian ?? 

Gotta like their custom caps! 

Now to wait on the pump installers.

Can't wait for seat time on the FEL to move the dirt he pulled out and put the lawn back together. 

[SylvanLakeWH 29,232]

57 minutes ago, WHX?? said:

Now that you clowns got properly ... 

 

Wha...??? 

 

Squirrel!!!

[ebinmaine 74,343]

4 hours ago, WHX?? said:

Now that you clowns got properly ...  EB would say it's all good

 

 

 

 

 

 

[c-series don 10,483]

 @WHX?? Can you please have another well drilled? I was really enjoying this thread 😂

[WHX?? 52,808]

13 hours ago, c-series don said:

Can you please have another well drilled?

Certainly as long as it doesn't go three weeks and no water pumping yet!

Maybe not with this outfit tho. The crews know what they are doing that's fer sure but communication with the front office is P poor. Me thinks the office gal is related to the owner and is working ther just for that fact. Certainly not for her planning skills or knowledge of well drilling. . 

[pfrederi 18,895]

To get back off topic that helicopter electric line work is dangerous.  Crash killed two while working on electric lines.

 

https://www.wnep.com/article/news/local/carbon-county/deadly-helicopter-crash-in-carbon-county-maury-road-penn-forest-township/523-0f41452c-f2c8-4c8c-9076-2f697a38f2b6

[wh500special 2,331]

22 hours ago, pfrederi said:

To get back off topic that helicopter electric line work is dangerous.  Crash killed two while working…

Definitely dangerous.  Happened here too recently. 
 

https://m.riverbender.com/news/details.cfm?id=85349&

[wh500special 2,331]

Wells…

 

Those of you that have to drill hundreds of feet to get good water may find this hard to believe, but the house I grew up in had a well that was only 12’ deep.  
 

This was in Granite City, IL. 
 

Dad put it in by himself.  Chiseled a hole in the garage floor and pushed the pipe in at first by brute force and then with a sledgehammer.  Had  a sand point on it.  He hit water at right around 8’ down but sunk it to 12’ to be sure it wouldn’t pump dry when running. 

He cleared the point a time or two with a shotgun blast.  I guess they were blanks or something.

 

We had city water too and didn’t drink this water, but some of the neighbors did from their similar wells.  He used the well water for watering things…we had an amazing garden and yard as did almost everyone around there back then (maybe now too for all I know, I haven’t lived in GC for thirty years).  
 

These houses had full, regular depth basements too.  Most of the neighbors had leaky basements, ours never leaked while we lived there.  Just short of a miracle when you consider the house was basically floating in a pit of water.   There were homes about a mile away where eventually the owners just had their basements filled in as the leakage got too much to handle. 
 

A little north of us in Hartford and Wood River they also had the ground water just below the surface.  There (were) are petroleum refineries and storage depots there that have been slowly leaking gasoline and other things into the ground for 100 years.  In the spring it would occasionally make the local news that basements would smell of gasoline and you can actually light on fire soil samples taken from the ground.  And sometimes even the basement walls would support a flame from the gas floating on the ground water.  My cousin made a great living working for a company that had wells all over that recovered the lost gasoline and sold it back (as required by the EPA) to the refinery for reprocessing. 
 

these areas are Mississippi River floodplain so it’s no real mystery where that water was coming from. 
 

my two Indiana homes had wells that were 200’ + deep.  We had shallower water available, but they went below it to get through that which was contaminated with agricultural runoff.  
 

Deep subject these wells. 
 

Steve

[ebinmaine 74,343]

15 hours ago, wh500special said:

Deep subject these wells.

 

 

Oooooooooo 

[WHX?? 52,808]

Finally after almost two months ... boys showed up yesterday for hook up. Guys were real nice and knew what they were doing. Didn't work real fast but consistent. Lots of joking around and banter. Not so much after Cindy got their life stories. She's a people person ya know ... 

 

Welding on the pitless adapter. The welder was pretty cool mounted right in the truck and run by hydraulics off a pump that was PTO run by the truck diesel. 

 

 

 

 

Got real lucky and found the house pipe right away. Pretty deep but the excavator was big enough. I'd take one you was to give it to me. I connected on to the existing line to existing pump and brought it to the surface in case a possible future lawn sprinkler application. 

 

Getting ready to drop the pump on 140' of pipe. Caseing ended up at 240 ft. and water to the top so a minor artesian, He had to put on a water tight cap per code. Pump is a Grundfos 1 HP constant pressure. Only 3" in diameter. 

Edited September 24 by WHX??

[Handy Don 14,535]

All I can say is that you would never get me in a pit that deep in that soft soil without cribbing to keep it from collapsing. Whew!

[953 nut 61,858]

10 hours ago, Handy Don said:

All I can say is that you would never get me in a pit that deep in that soft soil without cribbing to keep it from collapsing. Whew!

Same thought came to my mind when I saw that picture.             

[SylvanLakeWH 29,232]

11 hours ago, Handy Don said:

All I can say is that you would never get me in a pit that deep in that soft soil without cribbing to keep it from collapsing. Whew!

 

1 hour ago, 953 nut said:

Same thought came to my mind when I saw that picture.             

 

Unfortunately routine... sad to say, but still hear about deaths / injuries every year from cave ins... it is so, so, so avoidable... 

[Treepep 793]

 

 

 

Wow, that was a great read.  Thank you sir!  Birth house had a shallow sand point in sugar sand in Nebraska.  Dad and buds pounded it around 12 feet.

 

Town of 500 that had a earthen viaduct around the entire town.

 

It was sandwiched between two shallow rivers that routinely misbehaved.  When it rained hard the river water was kept out by the earthen dam.

 

It also filled the bathtub so to say,  So,  folks house would still flood just not wash away.

 

After exterior flooding subsided the backflows situated periodically on the dam would open and bathtub would drain.  Wild.

 

My current house.  Retired diesel mechanic next door say well is 40 ft deep.  Water at 20 feet.    Knows because he replaced the pump himself.  

 

Entire neighborhood each person has an mostly flat acre, their own respective well,  and  best part,  NO H.O.A. holes

 

Long post .  Sorry.  this post dredged up some dusty memories

 

 

[Handy Don 14,535]

Important to consider with these relatively shallow wells in sandy soil: where is the septic field (or outhouse pit)?