[HN Gopher] How to drill your own water well
___________________________________________________________________
How to drill your own water well
Author : jacobmarble
Score : 290 points
Date : 2023-08-25 03:06 UTC (19 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (drillyourownwell.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (drillyourownwell.com)
| jplona wrote:
| For folks interested in the standard process, I highly recommend
| this channel: https://youtube.com/@h2omechanic. Very informative.
| h2odragon wrote:
| "Mother Earth News" is a good resource:
|
| (1984) https://www.motherearthnews.com/homesteading-and-
| livestock/d...
|
| > Some people ... got their rig stuck three different times in
| their first well! As they wrote, "We recognize that many of our
| problems are due to our inexperience .... But our inexperience is
| not much different from yours."
|
| They have many other articles on the subject; but I'm fond of
| linking to this one in particular.
|
| I helped dig that well. And several others. The fellow in the
| middle of the picture there is my dad.
|
| Using the gantry rig pictured in the article was much easier than
| just the engine unit (much like a post hole digger they sell in
| stores now). One of our crew was a gifted machinist who ran that
| up after we bent the several pipes trying to dig without bracing.
| athenot wrote:
| Thanks for posting this; I have Georgia granite under my feet
| in random and unpredictable quantities. I've noticed most of
| the "success stories" in the submitted article happen to be in
| sandy areas, or with softer ground.
| yencabulator wrote:
| Over here it's sand, sandstone & clay, but I can't even dig a
| big enough hole to plant a bush without hitting rocks the
| size of my head. To anyone wishing to drill into the ground
| like this, good luck!
| irrational wrote:
| > Orville and Dot Synoground of Pine Mountain, Georgia, drilled
| through 35 feet of solid granite with a Hydra-Drill and a
| diamond coring bit. They hit the rock layer at 18 feet and kept
| drilling -- cutting about six inches of granite an hour --
| until they broke through. After three solid weeks of work,
| Orville and Dot struck water at 165 feet.
|
| I honestly don't think I'd have that level of determination
| unless I was truly desperate.
| h2odragon wrote:
| we were "back to the land" hippies (and had the monthly
| newspaper targeted toward people like us)... "self reliance"
| was a goal for many, as well as "can't afford to pay
| professionals to do it."
| pravus wrote:
| This is interesting. Part of my life was working with a water
| well driller running a rig for my grand-father's business a long
| time ago. The technique is virtually identical but with a
| hydraulic lift for running the drill and uses compressed air to
| clear the bore.
|
| The first step was to find the location and park the drilling rig
| so it wouldn't sink once the well was dug. Then you'd raise the
| drill arm, attach a section of pipe and the drill head. You'd
| lower it down into a round flange that had an opening to one side
| where all of the cuttings blew out. My job was to shovel the
| cuttings into a trench to direct water flow once you hit the
| water line. It was critical to keep water from getting under the
| tires of the rig.
|
| Each section of pipe is 20 feet long and as you drill in you
| detach the rig head, raise it, get another section of pipe from a
| rotating carousel and then start grinding again. Once done you
| pull all the pipe by basically doing the reverse and then perform
| a similar operation to push casing down into the hole. When the
| rig pulls away you have a round hole in the ground ready to have
| another truck come in to insert an electric pump with all the
| wiring. Then you box everything up at the top and say job done.
|
| Oil field drilling is pretty similar as well but the rigs are
| vastly larger and move way more earth much faster. My dad worked
| on a rough necking crew and I've been exposed to the oil and gas
| industry most of my life so this is an interesting tangent.
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| Curiously, you have to already have water
| kozak wrote:
| I suppose you use a gasoline water pump if you don't. Unless
| you are in a desert, of course.
| kuon wrote:
| I live in Switzerland and my house is build on a rock, some of
| the foundation is actually rock and not concrete but it's old
| from 1750. So that drilling technique is not for my yard.
|
| But, this lead me to think, is non rock ground frequent in
| urbanized area? Is rock ground like my place more like the
| exception? I'm used to it so I thought it was the norm, but I
| guess it is not.
| naikrovek wrote:
| never in my life have I read a more positive landing page about
| drilling your own well.
|
| this guy has me convinced that i can drill my own well.
|
| i don't need to drill my own well, but if i ever do, i am sure
| that i can do it, now.
| RajT88 wrote:
| The house I live in has a well. 400 feet deep (why? long story).
|
| The thing to be aware of is that there's a few different kinds of
| additives you might need for well water.
|
| The most usual is water softener. Ours isn't too hard, but what
| we do have is hydrogen sulphate from bacteria in the soil - it
| requires hydrogen peroxide to make the water smell neutral and
| palatable.
| bluGill wrote:
| Water softeners are common, but they are regional. In some
| places the ground water is naturally soft and you don't need
| one. In others you need them. One house I lived in you needed
| an iron filter, but most people have never heard of such a
| thing There are lots of other devices in the water treatment
| catalog that you might or might not need. Only a real water
| test can tell.
| SteveNuts wrote:
| Where do you add that? into the water softener?
| RajT88 wrote:
| There's a pump which feeds into the water softener tank. We
| don't use softener, so peroxide is the only thing which goes
| into it.
|
| To the other guy - we drink the well water. It's fine after
| the peroxide treatment.
| kylebenzle wrote:
| Why do you need any conditioning for irrigation water?
| adrianN wrote:
| You might ruin your soil over time.
| technothrasher wrote:
| I had an issue with hydrogen sulfide bacteria in my well water
| system. If I didn't run any water for a couple days (like, say,
| I went away for the weekend), I'd get a terrible sulfur smell
| to my water. When my well pump failed, I took the opportunity
| while the well head was off to dump a bunch of bleach down the
| well. Haven't had a problem in years now.
| RajT88 wrote:
| Interesting! I had wondered if that would be viable.
| BrandoElFollito wrote:
| In my days of fighting paranormal activities and beliefs
| (homeopathy, wells witchers, ...) we were usually told that we do
| not have open minds and do not accept anything outside of our
| limited science.
|
| For one, you need to have an open mind, but be careful to not
| your brain fall off
| (https://youtu.be/RFO6ZhUW38w?si=1Snzh3lhFJ6d381g&t=12)
|
| Then, we were very much interested in seeing these unusual things
| happening. As I mentioned it in a previous comment, I declared at
| the radio that I would immediately switch my PhD topic (in
| physics) to study them. Because, you know, Nobel prize. I did not
| get to see anything unusual, did a uneventful PhD and, well, do
| not have said Nobel prize.
|
| But the important thing was: I wanted to measure. To have an
| experiment where what was unusual would be measurable. This means
| that tests with well diggers were a complete failure when they
| were asked to find water in controlled conditions.
|
| OTOH, they were good when in the wild because (probably) they
| could read the landscape and see signs of water (conscientiously
| or not).
|
| Same with homeopathy: when I have a headache I get an aspirin and
| before it had time to reach my stomach I feel better. I also once
| swam away from what I thought were sharks and I probably broke a
| swimming record because my arms were moving like a blender.
|
| This is to say that scientists do not limi themselves - they just
| want to see and measure something to say that this is a thing.
| Unfortunately as soon as they do it the whole paranormal things
| fall apart. But we are still hoping.
| praptak wrote:
| In Poland it's quite common for people to just hand dig their
| wells, using concrete rings for the reinforcement of walls. It's
| legal up to 30 meters depth and up to 5 m^3/day water yield.
|
| Article (in Polish but there's pics):
| https://darmowyporadnik.pl/artykul/36/budownictwo/kopanie-st...
|
| Edit: Or maybe I should say "it was" - most new wells are just a
| vertical steel pipe with a submerged electric pump rather than
| big concrete rings. These are obviously much more convenient and
| safer.
| jeffrallen wrote:
| The first week I came to live in Guatemala from the USA 3
| brothers from a nearby village dies of asphyxiation at the
| bottom of a hand dug well which had a generator running too
| close up above.
|
| Don't risk it. Confined spaces are dangerous.
| bluGill wrote:
| I have a large well for my water (machine bored - wells here
| have terrible recovery), when the pump went out a few years
| back I looked down the hole and decided no way will I climb
| down there. I bought a pump and used hoses and extension
| cords to lower it into the well from above, then a week
| latter hired someone to come out and do the proper install.
| They had the proper safety gear so they couldn't fall down
| the hole. More importantly they knew how to use the - I know
| where to buy the gear, but that is one case where improper
| usage will kill you before you find out you were wrong.
| bbarnett wrote:
| This is terrible, but the same thing can happen in a
| basement, and even has happened in low laying areas of land.
|
| Would you suggest we stop digging basements?
|
| There are far more issues with just walking outside,
| lightning strikes hitting people, are more common.
| jeffrallen wrote:
| I'm going to declare a new law, a la Bettredge's Law: "When
| a small probability is claimed, without evidence, to be
| less than that of death by lightening strikes, it is safe
| to assume the small probability is in fact higher than the
| risk of death by lightening strikes".
|
| Find me the evidence and I'll admit that my new law is
| invalid. :)
| InitialLastName wrote:
| I don't need evidence to know that the odds of casualties
| falling into a modern well (that is a few inches in
| diameter) such as the one being drilled here are less
| than being hit by lightning (assuming lightning is
| possible).
|
| I won't rule out the possibility of an ankle sprain.
| praptak wrote:
| The biggest risk of construction comes from handling the
| concrete rings. I haven't heard of a suffocation accident.
| These are much more common when people maintain their
| sanitation tanks.
| praptak wrote:
| I think it will solve itself as people move to steel pipes
| which are generally less labor intensive to drill. They also
| eliminate the danger of falling into the well.
| msrenee wrote:
| These wells are a few inches across. There's no risk of
| falling in.
| nemetroid wrote:
| You are responding in a comment chain about hand-dug wells
| in Poland, which are significantly wider.
| beardedwalleye wrote:
| That's >1300 US Gallons, which is a little more than what we
| use in a week as a family of 5.
| faangguyindia wrote:
| My family of 4 uses
|
| 500 gallons of water here in Himalayan foothills.
| erlenmayer wrote:
| [dead]
| moooo99 wrote:
| Wait, that is per day?!
| OfSanguineFire wrote:
| With the recent legislation that every Polish village has to be
| connected to water and sewage even if the homeowner wanted to
| remain off-grid, I would expect not expect well-digging to
| remain popular.
| jcarrano wrote:
| It still makes sense to have a well because it is a waste to
| water the lawn with drinking water.
| moooo99 wrote:
| > It still makes sense to have a well because it is a waste
| to water the lawn with drinking water.
|
| Watering the lawn is just a waste of water, period. Ground
| water is commonly used as the primary source of drinking
| water, so even if the water is being extracted from a well,
| it is pretty much drinking water.
| OfSanguineFire wrote:
| This very much depends on the place. There are plenty of
| areas of Europe where groundwater at ordinary well depth
| is no longer potable and the community relies on a
| reservoir with a different source. So, if your property
| has an old well, all it is good for is watering a lawn or
| orchard, washing your car or bicycle, etc.
| eric-hu wrote:
| I'm curious: if the water isn't considered potable, would
| you want to be watering plants with it? Is the
| contamination more often bacterial than chemical?
| cj wrote:
| My friend has a condo in the Virgin Islands where water
| isn't in high supply (majority of water is sourced from
| rain)
|
| The HOA where the condo is has an on-site water
| sanitation facility which recycles toilet, shower, sink
| water.
|
| They don't consider the recycled water potable, but I
| guess they consider it safe enough for watering plants,
| for re-use in toilet water, etc.
|
| TLDR: in the above case, it's bacterial risk or the use
| of a water sanitization facility that doesn't provide
| guarantee around portability.
| eric-hu wrote:
| Yeah that seems reasonable enough to me. I've seen parks
| and green spaces in Southern California that have warning
| signs about not drinking irrigation water.
|
| My earlier comment was motivated by a concern that
| tapping a non-potable water source for one's own family
| might bear health risks without more analysis of the
| state of that water. For all you know, even if you only
| use that water for plants, maybe you're growing food with
| water high in arsenic and it's accumulating in the food.
| OfSanguineFire wrote:
| People all over the world water plants with water that is
| not potable itself due to bacterial or viral
| contamination. This is where the old traveler's adage
| "Boil it, cook it, peel it, or forget it" comes from.
|
| If the groundwater is not potable because of e.g. arsenic
| or pesticide contamination, I think that homeowners are
| usually aware of that and therefore are more likely to
| use the water only for washing purposes.
| eric-hu wrote:
| Right, I could have stated more explicitly. Watering
| possibly edible plants with pathogen polluted water seems
| okay. Watering them with chemically polluted water seems
| like maybe a way to ingest toxic stuff. Washing dishes
| seems dicey too.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| OfSanguineFire wrote:
| It is not as common to water one's lawn in Poland. It's not
| like the country doesn't get enough rain, and most
| villagers don't feel the need to show off perfect lawns to
| their neighbors as e.g. in the USA.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| Don't water the lawn (or fertilise or roundup etc.) in
| Australia: for some reason it stays green without it:
| buffalo grass is as tough as nails! Sometimes it goes
| yellow but it always comes back!
| moooo99 wrote:
| Lawns in the US consume as many resources as they do
| because the typical lawn you see isn't a species native
| to the US, instead it was imported from Europe. With the
| soil being different etc., it is not surprising lawns,
| especially when they're as big as in the US, require so
| many resources.
| peterleiser wrote:
| What is the species that is not native?
| eesmith wrote:
| Kentucky Bluegrass - Poa pratensis - is a common lawn
| grass which despite its name is not originally from North
| America. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poa_pratensis
|
| Another is Perennial Ryegrass - Lolium perenne -
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lolium_perenne .
|
| A third is the common bent - Agrostis capillaris -
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agrostis_capillaris .
| bluGill wrote:
| Many lawns in the US do use grass native to that part of
| the US. Not all, but many. However grass goes dormant
| when it doesn't rain for a couple weeks and people don't
| like that brown look so they water even though the grass
| (either native or imported) doesn't need it. Likewise
| people don't like flowers and other weeds and so they
| apply a lot of chemicals to the lawn - but the grass
| doesn't need them.
|
| TL;DR: lawns in the US do not need any resources. It is
| "perfect lawns" that need a lot of resources.
| yarpen_z wrote:
| We don't really have suburbs like the one in the US. Having
| a perfect lawn that requires constant watering and
| meticulous care is not common.
| boppo1 wrote:
| What is the landscaping around single family homes like
| then? Or do you just have urban & rural without an in-
| between?
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| Trees, hedges, native grasses and shrubs: the kinds of
| plant you'd probably consider "weeds" in US suburbia.
| Within cities, there's
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terraced_house, and there
| are villages in amongst the fields and forests of rural
| areas.
|
| Places like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gaeltacht_
| Park,_Whitehall... are the closest I've really seen to US
| suburbia, and it's _always_ been within walking distance
| of a food shop.
| cogman10 wrote:
| I'm the EU, most homes are terraced. There may be a back
| and front yard, but they will be tiny compared to a US
| home.
|
| Single family homes are both expensive and uncommon as
| land is generally more of a premium.
| seszett wrote:
| Even in Belgium, one of the highest density countries in
| the EU, most existing and newly built houses are semi-
| detached, with about twice as much semi-detached +
| detached houses as there are terraced houses.
|
| In France, terraced homes are rather uncommon outside the
| North close to Belgium, and old city centers. In fact, I
| don't even know if we have a name for detached houses, as
| far as I know they're just called "a house" while a
| terraced house is a "city house".
|
| So I don't have the numbers for all of the EU but I don't
| think most homes are actually terraced homes in the EU.
|
| And people do have grass lawns, but only where grass
| actually grows without too much care needed. Where I come
| from on the coast grass doesn't grow well on the sandy
| ground and lawns are uncommon, but a few kilometres
| inland if you don't do anything you get a mostly-grass
| lawn, with a lot of clover, daisies and often orchids
| growing in it.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| > I'm the EU
|
| Wow, sounds large. But fitting dropped word for such a
| big generalization.
| OfSanguineFire wrote:
| Google Street View will let you look at plenty of Polish
| homes.
| mozman wrote:
| I have care for my lawn and put a lot of effort into it,
| with most of my prop being grass with a small portion
| that is gravel
| fakedang wrote:
| I think we'll see a similar scenario as what happened in many
| rural and semi-urban areas of India. Most folks use well
| water for their daily use, but still maintain an
| urban/central water connection in case of emergencies
| (especially as droughts are becoming more of a reality
| worldwide).
|
| Well digging is still going strong - actually stronger, since
| people are now digging deeper wells as the water table is
| shrinking.
| badtension wrote:
| You could bypass that with a domestic wastewater treatment
| plant.
| OfSanguineFire wrote:
| That does not appear to be the case. A friend of mine spent
| a considerable amount of money a few years ago to build a
| wastewater treatment system on his property. Then the
| _gmina_ told him that, under new legislation, he would
| still have to connect his property to the common sewage
| system. This is something that he and many of his
| neighbours were reluctant to do, because it brings new
| monthly service charges. He tried to argue his case and
| managed to stall for several months, but eventually he was
| forced to do so lest he be fined.
|
| I have heard villagers in Spain and Italy complaining about
| the same thing, so I assumed there was a new _loi
| communitaire_.
| Animatronio wrote:
| A sewage system doesn't work well without periodic
| flushes. Having too few houses connected to it means it
| is at risk of drying and clogging. Most probably when it
| was designed they took into account the number of houses
| is was supposed to collect waste water from. Anything
| less then that number would be risky for the whole
| system.
| momirlan wrote:
| you also have to consider the price to pay for metered
| municipal water. i would still prefer free water from my own
| dug well.
| OfSanguineFire wrote:
| I did consider that price: it is negligible in Poland. The
| now-obligatory water and sewage connection in all villages
| brings service fees that people sometimes grumble about,
| but water itself doesn't cost very much.
| gibspaulding wrote:
| This is really interesting, though I unfortunately don't read
| Polish.
|
| For each ring deeper, do you dig out under the bottom ring
| until it slides down and another can be added to the top of the
| stack? That sounds terrifying having a whole stack of concrete
| shifting around above you.
| schobi wrote:
| I built such a well... The concrete rings will just sloooowly
| slide down once there is room under them. If you dig evenly,
| they will just go down straight. Only a few centimeters at a
| time. This part does not feel dangerous. As a bonus,you can
| buy concrete rings with steps included, so you don't need to
| buy a 5m long ladder.
|
| In historic well digging the walls needed to be secured with
| wooden planks or bricks and such after digging straight down.
| Huge risk of the walls falling in. This was a problem just
| generations ago... And all of the family had stories of
| grandfather's digging wells that collapsed and that the
| historic approach was dangerous.
|
| With concrete rings, there is no danger of collapsing. And
| certainly, when placing a ring, noone should be standing
| inside!
|
| But yes... - It becomes a little claustrophobic when this
| becomes deep. I stopped at 4.5m and got used to it by the
| time we came that deep. - I put a pipe in to blow fresh air
| to the bottom. This helps with the uneasy feeling of a
| possible bad smell - there is a risk of dropping a bucket on
| the head. Use a proper rope, a proper knot, a proper bucket
| made for lifting and stop when the guy above needs a break
| 303uru wrote:
| Heh, water table here is at about 350 feet with nothing but
| boulders and clay between ground level and there. Good luck.
| schobi wrote:
| It is nice to get that many details on a single drilling method.
| But keep in mind - there are many more techniques for making your
| own well. Some might be better suited depending on the
| conditions.
|
| There are hand operated drills, 150mm diameter with extension
| rods up to 10-15m long. If it works for your soil, then this is
| less messy.
|
| I went with digging and a different type of dug well
| "Schachtbrunnen". I laid a pre-fabricated concrete ring on the
| ground and started digging inside until it sank into the ground.
| When it was level, I put the next ring on top. No special tool
| needed, a shovel, a bucket, some rope, patience and certainly a
| permit.
| marmakoide wrote:
| I helped my Dad doing just that ! It was fairly easy, it just
| need patience. It's South West France, in an area with sandy
| soil. All it took was ropes, shovels and buckets. We connected
| it to drain pipe buried in the garden, to capture the winter
| rain water. The water is used for outdoor cleaning, gardening.
| mongol wrote:
| How did you dig? With a shovel? Or some other equipment? How
| many rings did it take?
| nightfly wrote:
| > No special tool needed, a shovel, a bucket, some rope,
| patience and certainly a permit.
| schobi wrote:
| Yes - shovel and bucket. I took 50cm rings each, for a total
| of 9 for 4.5m. They weigh about 300kg each and could be
| rolled into the garden. I got some scaffolding pipes and
| built a "gantry" over my hole. We could lower them by
| attaching a small chain operated pulley.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| How deep can that go? Can you fit yourself and shovel in the
| ring to go deeper? Is there any danger of collapse?
| schobi wrote:
| I went to 4.5m - the rings did not slide easily any more as
| we paused for a year. If you work on it right away, you can
| go much further
|
| I went with an inner diameter of 1m, this is fine for a small
| shovel, a pump, a small jackhammer.
|
| Concrete rings are used all the time in road construction
| work. I don't see a risk of collapse with those when stacking
| carefully. Even if one ring were to get a crack, where should
| it go? I felt safe in this regard
| XorNot wrote:
| Huh. This is ingenius in that "obvious once you hear it" way
| that I wouldn't have thought of. I practical want to try it
| just because of that.
| ltbarcly3 wrote:
| I tried this years ago and it ended in failure. From what I
| learned it seems like your soil down to the level you want to
| drill to has to be basically 100% silt/sand/clay. In most areas
| there are various pebbles, some up to the the size of a dime or
| so, and what I found was smaller particles would wash up and out
| of the hole, but these pebbles would accumulate on the bottom.
|
| I switched from using low-volume water sources to a 1.5HP well
| pump pulling from a swimming pool. The pool would empty in about
| 20 minutes, and I would then have to wait for it to refill from a
| regular hose. However, while this very high water volume was able
| to clear the pebbles (which is how I know the floor of the hole
| was covered with pebbles at all, it was maybe 12 feet down at
| that point), there was diminishing returns and eventually the
| pebbles no longer cleared the top.
|
| I'm sure I was doing something completely wrong, in the end if
| you have sandy/silty/clay soil you can just buy a sand point (aka
| driven point) and sledgehammer it down as deep as you need to go.
| It's a lot more heavy labor but it is also almost certain to
| work.
| kylebenzle wrote:
| I'm doing a hammer driven well point right now, been pounding
| for 3 weeks nearly everyday. I get about 1 inch per day
| exhausting myself. I'm maybe 9 feet down, no water yet. I am
| getting a lot stonger and it gets eaier everyday. Probably have
| 20+ hours into this stupid thing already :(
|
| Well point is NOT easy.
| housemusicfan wrote:
| This sounds like a terrible idea, along the lines of "How to
| perform your own knee surgery"
| EgregiousCube wrote:
| Perhaps, but a really cool thing to know, and you're much less
| likely to hurt yourself. I enjoyed the read :)
| msandford wrote:
| Its pitched as just for irrigation, not drinking water. Not
| nearly as dangerous as a result.
| Ariarule wrote:
| What exactly is so terrible as long as you're willing to take a
| small to moderate risk of getting a PVC pipe stuck in the
| ground and keep in mind the presented cautions -- consider the
| water irrigation-only/non-potable until tested (possibly even
| if tested, although that's not what the site says)?
| ooterness wrote:
| Badly dug, uncapped wells can also exacerbate groundwater
| contamination, making the problem worse for everyone else.
| alexo67 wrote:
| Maybe for use as drinking water, but for watering flowers etc.
| it is perfect.
| seahorserocker wrote:
| I tried to use this to drill a well some years ago on the west
| coast of Florida near the ocean. Worked great through the sand
| about 20 feet. Then we hit a shale deposit. There was no getting
| through it. Some pro well drillers came and couldn't make it
| through either. The neighbor drilled his own well a couple years
| prior and told us the secret. Blasting caps. We gave up.
| YeBanKo wrote:
| Blasting cap on the drill bit?
| Arrath wrote:
| Usually you pull your spendy drill string out of the ground
| then lower a charge down the hole to fracture whatever layer
| is giving you trouble. Turning your drill bit into a
| fragmentation grenade tends not to be overly productive.
| tomcam wrote:
| The good news is that the shale was determined to be frackable,
| so you were able to sell hundreds of thousands of barrels of
| oil and drive to Beverly Hills in your ancient jalopy
| dalke wrote:
| I don't think it would be worthwhile to make your own hydraulic
| drill if there are rental alternatives.
|
| More specifically, around 1981 my Dad rented a drilling rig to
| supply the irrigation pump for our yard in Miami.
|
| See, the city was phasing out septic systems, and had installed
| sewers to our neighborhood. They charged for sewer based on water
| consumed. By drilling a well he could avoid paying sewage fees
| for irrigation water.
|
| I think he hit water at 8 feet, and put the well down to 12. This
| was Miami.
|
| It also drilled through some limestone.
| bragr wrote:
| >if there are rental alternatives.
|
| That's good advice for almost all tools. The average weekend
| warrior may never have been to their local tool rental shop,
| but it's worth checking out! You can rent just about anything,
| for very reasonable prices, and it tends to be pretty high
| quality/industrial stuff. For all the tools you only use one a
| year, it probably makes more financial sense to rent than buy.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| But you can often buy cheaper than renting with the caveat of
| getting a cheaper brand. For most DIY I find the cheaper ones
| good enough, as long as you get some online wisdom first to
| avoid the occasional turds being sold. Example: chainsaw,
| drill, jet wash, pruning equipment etc.
| bluGill wrote:
| Sure, but when I rent I get a better quality tool, and I
| don't have to store it until next time.
| moooo99 wrote:
| > But you can often buy cheaper than renting with the
| caveat of getting a cheaper brand.
|
| that heavily depends on the kind of tool and what the
| likelihood of you using this thing more than twice a year
| is. A chainsaw, drill, jetwash - very reasonable. Anything
| more specialiced, you're usually better off renting -
| especially as one could often use the instructions provided
| by the experts.
| adrianmonk wrote:
| Where I live, they base the sewage fees off water usage during
| the winter. Since few people water their yards then, it mostly
| takes irrigation out of the equation.
|
| Bonus: it spurs you to think about conservation. When your
| 3-month wastewater averaging period starts, you know that any
| water you save will cut costs for the whole year.
| fred_is_fred wrote:
| Same here and I've thought about this, but the cost savings
| of doing less winter laundry for example are in the end
| miniscule. We pay way more for water than for sewer.
| h2odragon wrote:
| Yeah, well, Florida. You don't need much to hit water table in
| FL. High heels will sometimes do.
| dalke wrote:
| Yes. Isn't that the point of the web site?
|
| When the water table is shallow, but deeper than your
| Louboutins - which is much of Florida - you can drill a well
| yourself, at low cost.
|
| After all, the technique only works for down to about 20 feet
| (there's another page on how to extend that to 30 feet), and
| 7 of the 26 listed success stories are from Florida.
| bluGill wrote:
| In most of the world you can drill down 20 feet and find
| water. It might or might not be safe to drink. It might or
| might not be a lot of water, but even in deserts you
| commonly can find it that shallow.
| jcampbell1 wrote:
| Many places allow for dual meters: one water meter that is used
| for irrigation and another for water that ultimately goes for
| waste treatment. In places with abundant water, e.g. places
| where this drilling technique would work, the water is
| typically practically free and the "water bill" is mostly a
| sewer bill.
| aaron695 wrote:
| > Many folks think they have to dig or drill their well into an
| aquifer.
|
| My concern here is ground water will have septic contamination,
| don't know if that's stupid or not.
|
| Hand dug wells are fun to watch on TikTok, most on the tag are
| old ones, but a few are people digging them -
| https://www.tiktok.com/tag/handdug%20well
|
| This one scared the shit out of me -
| https://www.tiktok.com/@smithalayamrajeev/video/723999758509...
|
| I was looking at this Polish Company selling augers, but I
| checked local bore records and they were 80m for the aquifer and
| they were hitting rock pretty quickly in their samples even if I
| went for ground water -
| https://www.ebay.com/str/drillpartnerofficialstore
| [deleted]
| bluGill wrote:
| Fortunately most dirt is an excellent filter for septic waste.
| The law requires 40 (double check this number for where you
| live) of distance between a septic system and a well because at
| that distance the water that gets through is safe to drink
| without any more treatment. It doesn't matter how bad your
| septic system is installed, the 40 feet distance makes it safe.
|
| Note that I said most dirt above. There are types of soil that
| act more like pipes and so raw sewage from a leaking septic
| system has been found many miles away. Check with a local
| expert to see what soil you have to deal with.
| gregmac wrote:
| > My concern here is ground water will have septic
| contamination, don't know if that's stupid or not.
|
| It's not just that, dug and shallow wells are also getting
| surface water run-off -- basically anything on the ground in
| the immediate area or uphill. There's actually an acronym for
| this: GWUDI (Groundwater under the direct influence [of surface
| water]). They're highly susceptible to seasonal changes and
| rain. The worst ones are people that in a lower-lying area than
| nearby farms -- nitrates (from animal feces and fertilizers)
| and pesticides are all extremely expensive to remove from
| water.
|
| When you do a drilled well, the annular space (the hole around
| the casing) actually has to be sealed (with bentonite) to
| prevent surface water from getting directly into the well and
| aquifer. I see no mention of this in the article.
|
| Where I live (Ontario Canada) there are environmental laws
| protecting ground water. Badly done wells can actually
| contaminate a huge area and affect other people's wells and
| drinking water.
| chewz wrote:
| > My concern here is ground water will have septic
| contamination, don't know if that's stupid or not.
|
| It isn't stupid concern for drinking water. You could have
| neighbours with septic tanks leaking, cesspools or using crazy
| amounts of roundup for their lawn.
|
| But for watering flowers, washing and cleaning ground water is
| usually OK. You can always make a test of water quality at
| local authority...
|
| Aquifier water is of good quality but getting to it might be
| expensive.
| zigzaggy wrote:
| My grandfather was a "well witcher" (Appalachian roots here).
| Many believe that's woo woo or some kind of super power. The man
| was incredibly intelligent and resourceful and he had a
| reputation for finding water every single time he dropped the
| drill into the ground.
|
| When I was a kid I used to go to sleep listening to stories of my
| dad and his dad driving around on a 2 ton truck with a 3 ton
| drill and how the brakes always went out. Somehow they always
| lived to tell the tale.
|
| Haven't thought about this in a long time. Good memories.
| MisterBastahrd wrote:
| .... Your grandfather knew that he needed to find soil that
| wasn't covered in a stone slab and how deep he needed to dig to
| hit the water table.
|
| That's not woo woo or some kind of super power. That's simply
| having the experience of having dug a deep hole in the ground a
| few times.
| presidentender wrote:
| My dad drilled water wells in the US after spending many years
| working on oil wells overseas. His clients would often hire
| witchers (water witches, water witchers, well witches - I think
| the distance from Appalachia to Montana clouded the specific
| vocabulary). You'd have this very old man dodder around the
| property with a pair of sticks, and when the sticks magically
| chose to pull together and cross, that's where you'd dig the
| well.
|
| I do not recall whether the magical approach was any more
| successful than the traditional approach.
| johnloeber wrote:
| It's called Dowsing and there's no evidence that it works.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dowsing
| bluGill wrote:
| In most cases you can drill just about anywhere and find
| water. So any approach from random to looking at geological
| features (which you can gather from seismograph data, if
| needed set off an explosion in controlled locations...) will
| find water. The latter approach may find a specific place
| where a less deep well can work, but in most locations there
| isn't that much a difference (at least not among the
| reasonable places to drill your well - if you are willing to
| pay for miles of pipe you can maybe have a useful choice of
| location).
| runjake wrote:
| I was shocked to randomly drive by a local water utility
| company and a guy walking in a field holding what looked like
| dowsing rods in his hands.
|
| I didn't stop to ask, but it wasn't a locate antenna (I am
| familiar with those, and he didn't have any wires or
| electronic equipment on him).
|
| I was pretty surprised they were messing around with dowsing,
| knowing it's scientifically unproven/disproven.
|
| Then again, people still use lie detectors and chiropractics.
| earleybird wrote:
| Might not have been dowsing but a geoelectric survey of the
| inductive/capacitive/resistive variety. The BBC Time Team
| folks occasionally use these for non invasive surveys.
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lU9aRZK4j84&t=663s
| dreamcompiler wrote:
| When I built my house in the country, the well driller
| insisted on witching. He said "we should drill right here." I
| said "No, move it 100 feet that way. Your spot is right in
| the middle of my future driveway."
|
| "I can't guarantee we'll hit water there" he said.
|
| "I paying you. Just drill where I said" I said.
|
| And of course we hit water.
| bombcar wrote:
| _Finding & Buying Your Place in the Country_ has a whole
| section on wells. The main key seems to be onsite when it
| is drilled, because otherwise they'll just leave after
| drilling one, even if it is dry.
| stickfigure wrote:
| It's shocking how many people still give weight to astrology.
| mbivert wrote:
| Slightly tangential but I've found it insightful: there are
| studies, e.g. [0], showing correlations between lifespan
| and date of birth. Causal factors could include for example
| seasonal viral infections, lesser amount of vitamin D in
| the winter, etc.
|
| Of course, this tells nothing about well-witching, but
| illustrates that at least _some_ old beliefs aren 't as
| unreasonable as one might think.
|
| [0]: https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.041431898
| stickfigure wrote:
| Even without evaluating the quality of the study, I don't
| have a hard time accepting the notion that the season of
| your birth may affect your average lifespan by a few
| months. It is a very modest claim.
|
| The claims of astrologers are not at all like this. They
| are _vastly_ more specific.
| [deleted]
| cman1444 wrote:
| I consider myself a pretty cynical person, but I tried it
| myself to prove someone else wrong and I couldn't help but
| feel like it actually worked.
|
| We were looking for a water pipe, not just sitting
| groundwater. The only explanation I could come up with was
| that for some reason a magnetic field was being created by
| the pipe underground. I don't remember if the water was
| flowing or not when we did it.
|
| I feel silly even commenting this, but we truly did find
| the pipe exactly where I was standing when the rods pointed
| together.
|
| Of course it's very possible that I unconsciously tilted my
| hands in the spot where I suspected the pipe would be. Even
| though I did make a conscious effort to not do exactly
| that, I wonder if there is some psychological factor in the
| phenomenon.
| stickfigure wrote:
| It's possible you just got lucky. That's the problem with
| N=1 experiments, and why you should be skeptical of your
| limited experience.
|
| Feynman put it this way: _The first principle is that you
| must not fool yourself--and you are the easiest person to
| fool._
| [deleted]
| benoliver999 wrote:
| In _The Traveller 's Tree_ by Patrick Leigh Fermor, a
| travelogue from the Caribbean, he gives an account of water
| divination. He initially sees it as some voodoo myth, and is
| taken aback when they repeatedly find water.
| digitalsushi wrote:
| Ok, if I point at a random spot in the ground in an area that
| generally has water, and I said, "dig here and you will find
| water", and you put 1/5 a mile of pipe down into the earth
| and water comes up, am I some type of miracle? Would those
| people work in the desert? I think it's a lotto ticket that
| always wins.
| benoliver999 wrote:
| "These people" are generally called upon when the community
| is struggling to find water.
| finnh wrote:
| I think there is a more functional and charitable read of
| this: not all of our senses are plumbed all the way through
| to our conscious mind at all times. small little hints
| (like minor changes in smell, relative humidity, maybe just
| pattern-matching on the lay of the land) are down in the
| noise, and pulling out your trusty sticks gives your
| subconscious a way to send a signal to your awareness.
|
| Kinda like acupuncture - does my pulse really have seven
| levels that mean different things? I doubt it.. but a
| successful acupuncturist might still be able to diagnose
| "what hurts" using said technique, when really they've
| already picked up on other clues from your gait, posture,
| etc.
|
| "subliminal" and "subconscious" are over-used and vague
| words, but we've all had the experience of wearing a new
| clothing item and receiving an uncommon number of
| compliments, including from strangers who wouldn't know
| it's new. I've always assumed we are unconsciously
| presenting the new thing with a bit of flair, and that
| equally-unconsciously draws the eye.
| stickfigure wrote:
| This is far too charitable. The first question we should
| ask is "does it actually work?" and the answer is NO.
|
| The wikipedia page lists quite a few scientific studies
| that establish this. The net summary is:
|
| _The scientific evidence shows that dowsing is no more
| effective than random chance. It is therefore regarded as
| a pseudoscience._
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dowsing
| the_fury wrote:
| You have to be careful of what you mean by "does it
| actually work".
|
| Does the dowsing find water hidden in a random spot or is
| the dowser tapping into subconscious knowledge about the
| land to find it. The parent is talking about the latter.
|
| Look up "Ideomotor phenomenon" in your source. It's right
| above the pseudoscience bit.
| eesmith wrote:
| It's not like subconscious knowledge must be _valid_
| subconscious knowledge. The ideomotor phenomenon is an
| expression of internal belief, which may be little
| different than a wild-ass guess.
|
| There's no evidence that the dowser is tapping into
| subconscious knowledge in a way that gives results any
| better than - or different from - chance.
| darkerside wrote:
| Eye tracking probably plays a big role. We are hardwired
| to notice what other people are looking at.
|
| Also, you bought it because it looked good, didn't you?
| finnh wrote:
| The eye tracking explanation is a good one, thanks. I
| think it supports my hypothesis by providing a possible
| mechanism of action.
|
| To your second point: yes, of course. But three weeks
| later it looks (mostly) the same but stops drawing
| compliments.
| monkmartinez wrote:
| These people do work in the desert. I have a buddy that
| drills wells here in Arizona and he WILL NOT put a drill
| into the ground without a Witcher. I have a really hard
| time with "witching" from a logical POV, but my buddy and
| his $130k truck/equipment swear by it. I call that putting
| your money where your mouth is.
| gregmac wrote:
| The test would be finding a spot where a witcher says
| there _isn 't_ water, and then drilling there.
|
| There's water almost everywhere in the ground -- the
| questions are is there enough of it to meet the need? is
| it usable (ie: not contaminated with salt or toxic
| chemicals)?
| gallamine wrote:
| > There's water almost everywhere in the ground
|
| In Arizona?
| kip_ wrote:
| https://new.azwater.gov/aaws/maps-resources will give you
| a good idea of how far down wells have to go in various
| areas of Arizona.
| kip_ wrote:
| Particularly https://azwatermaps.azwater.gov/gwsiweb/
| soperj wrote:
| Yes.
| soperj wrote:
| > I call that putting your money where your mouth is.
|
| Others would say "A fool and his money are soon parted".
| naikrovek wrote:
| the depth of the water table is fairly well known throughout
| the world, and it is not like a series of underwater rivers
| which are easily missed; the water table is called a "table"
| because it is very large and very flat.
|
| if you are within 100 miles of a natural body of water, or in
| a flood plain, or anywhere that it rains semi-regularly,
| drilling will get you to a source of water.
|
| there's no magic or divination involved.
| candiddevmike wrote:
| If you dig deep enough anywhere you'll probably find water
| eventually.
| camillomiller wrote:
| This guide is great. Before reading it I was always chipping my
| water. Now I know how to do it!
| anilakar wrote:
| Step one: move to a place where the municipality does not claim
| ownership on the bedrock.
| killingtime74 wrote:
| This ignores the most difficult part...getting a permit
| oceanplexian wrote:
| I think the idea behind doing it yourself is that you don't
| need a permit. In the USA, while permits are technically
| required for a lot of things, the law is widely ignored, and
| enforcement is lax to nonexistent. Hell most of the licensed
| contractors I hire (electric, plumbing, etc) don't bother to
| pull permits, even for new work.
| bobthepanda wrote:
| The permits exist for a reason.
|
| If too many people start doing it, it becomes an issue of
| overdrawing groundwater. This leads to an arms race of
| digging ever deeper wells to reach the remaining groundwater,
| and on top of that starts leading to ground subsidence as
| ground formerly full of water dries out and compacts.
|
| Off the top of my head, there is massive groundwater
| subsidence in the Central Valley of California, Mexico City,
| and Jakarta due to this issue, at rates measured in feet per
| year. This makes the land prone to flooding, and also damages
| buildings and infrastructure since the subsidence is
| generally not evenly spread out.
| d00wgnir wrote:
| I was looking into this DIY approach and it is not allowed
| in my county. Some of the justification is that improperly
| cased wells can allow backflow contamination of the larger
| water supply, affecting other nearby water sources. I'm not
| sure how likely this is as I have limited knowledge of the
| subject.
| anakaine wrote:
| Importantly, in case it wasn't obvious to readers,
| hydrocompaction cannot be undone in any meaningful way.
| Once the compaction happens, water will no longer, and will
| never again, flow in the compacted area.
| KirillPanov wrote:
| At least in my state (Washington), electricians and plumbers
| licenses include an annual permit which covers all the work
| they do during that year. It's only the trades that don't
| have a licensing program (or are only licensed as "general
| contractor") that need a separate permit for each job instead
| of one big one that covers all their work for the year.
| throw9away6 wrote:
| Each individual job also needs a permit
| pbourke wrote:
| You will likely have issues if you ever try to sell property
| with an unpermitted well. FHA loans have restrictions on the
| well as do many local jurisdictions that may refuse to convey
| the property if the well isn't up to code. My local
| jurisdiction won't block the sale but will write an alarming
| letter to the seller. In the case of a new build or major
| remodel, you will not be able to get a certificate of
| occupancy without a state and county verified well here.
|
| > Hell most of the licensed contractors I hire (electric,
| plumbing, etc) don't bother to pull permits, even for new
| work.
|
| Yeah, it's your responsibility as a homeowner to get the
| permit (either get it yourself or see that the contractor
| does). Even if you don't think the permit inspectors are
| doing anything in terms of quality control, the permit helps
| you to pass inspections as part of the sale process and will
| limit your insurance exposure if there's ever an issue.
| There's probably fine print in your insurance contract saying
| that all work shall be permitted as required.
| bragr wrote:
| Yeah, it doesn't take a genius inspector to take the as
| built plans, the list of work permits, and see if that
| explains current state of the house. And then there's the
| whole issue of mandatory disclosure forms and how
| forthcoming you are on those and if whatever you put down
| aligns with the inspectors find.
| [deleted]
| ghaff wrote:
| That assumes there are as built plans. I live in an area
| of the US with a lot of old houses and there certainly
| aren't as built plans for 100-200+ year old houses or a
| string of permits for any substantial work.
|
| (Well/septic tend to get more scrutiny at a sale but the
| status of old renovations/remodels in general are often
| pretty opaque.)
| myspy wrote:
| We had the idea to drill one to here in Germany, but having
| drilled it doesn't mean you can use it as long as you please.
| Ground water levels are falling and eventually it will be
| forbidden.
|
| But we also have a 13k liter cistern and with drip irrigation
| it holds reasonably long.
| greenie_beans wrote:
| permits don't exist in the county where i want to do this.
| K0balt wrote:
| And today I am reminded that people in many places must get the
| state's permission to build, repair, or improve their shelter,
| to grow food, to collect rainwater, to dig a well.
|
| On property they "own".
|
| You're literally asking the states permission to have the basic
| things needed for human survival- shelter, food, and water.
|
| While this makes sense to me for a business or an organisation,
| it strikes me as unconscionable for a private individual to
| have to get permission from the state to survive.
| fouc wrote:
| > it strikes me as unconscionable for a private individual to
| have to get permission from the state to survive.
|
| It would be nice to be free of the state. But how do we deal
| with the Tragedy of the Commons? How do we make hidden
| externalities visible & accurately priced?
|
| It seems like the population is too high in most places to be
| able to tolerate people doing their own thing, with their own
| property. Not sustainable unfortunately.
|
| At this point, "private ownership" is fading away.
| Eventually, maybe a hundred of years from now, we'll all be
| leasing our land from the government, and perhaps even
| leasing our privileges.
| myshpa wrote:
| > how do we deal with the Tragedy of the Commons? How do we
| make hidden externalities visible & accurately priced
|
| We do (pretend to do) when it's easy enough. But mostly we
| don't. Some examples:
|
| - (micro)plastic pollution
|
| - climate change (greenhouse gases)
|
| - deforestation
|
| - biodiversity loss
|
| - overfishing, bycatch
|
| We even subsidize the sectors causing most of the damage.
| But for for a regular joe wanting to have water ... sure,
| that's easy enough.
| fouc wrote:
| yep, we're failing to price those hidden externalities
| big time.
| gottorf wrote:
| There's a philosophical question here, which is that as
| science and technology get better and our ability to
| measure things improve, the hidden externalities become
| less and less hidden. Nobody told Grok the caveman not to
| burn sticks in his cave for warmth, out of concern for
| releasing CO2 and particulate matter; but nowadays it's
| frowned upon to use a wood pellet furnace instead of
| electric heat, for example.
|
| Existence itself is an externality, since everything any
| living organism does affects every other living organism,
| however minutely. There probably exists some amount of
| externalities that we have to choose to ignore.
| nahuel0x wrote:
| We can stop destroying the entire biosphere first and
| then get philosophical with the remaining details.
| greenie_beans wrote:
| tragedy of the commons is a myth
| https://aeon.co/essays/the-tragedy-of-the-commons-is-a-
| false...
| fouc wrote:
| Not sure why you got downvoted.. thanks for the link
| Neil44 wrote:
| I understand the sentiment but when you have this many people
| living close together, somebody has to be the adult to make
| sure things continue to work for everybody.
| holoduke wrote:
| Because you alter things outside of your perimeter. If you
| extract a lot of water you might cause issues at your
| neighbour.
| myshpa wrote:
| Yet e.g. fracking or animal agriculture gets subsidized, no
| reasonable limits are being enforced, while doing most of
| the damage.
| voisin wrote:
| Groups that do those things have political clout. The
| average homeowner does not.
| itsoktocry wrote:
| > _Because you alter things outside of your perimeter._
|
| Indeed, but you need a permit for a lot of things contained
| within your property too. Technically, I need a permit to
| change my front door. Kinda silly, mostly ignored by
| people, which is probably a worse outcome.
| kube-system wrote:
| Homes can have neighboring properties and non-owner
| occupants and there are third-party fire risk concerns
| with both. It is not good if people build homes which are
| at risk of spreading fire to neighboring properties, or
| at risk of harming occupants in case of a fire.
|
| Building codes are a big reason we don't have nearly as
| many events called "the great fire of [city]" in the 21st
| century.
| JKolios wrote:
| Or, you know, people understand that their actions have
| consequences on others and living in an organized society is
| far better than the alternative. We're not endlessly settling
| an untapped frontier that exists solely in our heads.
| [deleted]
| EliRivers wrote:
| _On property they own_
|
| Ownership that is regulate and enforced by the state; if you
| own it according to the rules, you use it according to the
| rules. If you want to do something else, you can step outside
| the rules and best of luck to you.
| technothrasher wrote:
| > you can step outside the rules and best of luck to you.
|
| This is why I cannot understand how the 'sovereign citizen'
| nonsense is at all appealing to anybody. If I'm my own boss
| and not morally subject to society's rules, how is it not
| fair game then for society to completely ignore my desires
| and needs? Like, ok, lets say our courts have no
| jurisdiction over you, but then it also follows that we can
| just shoot you dead where you stand and move on with our
| society. I get that it feels unfair to be born into rules
| you didn't agree to, but a second's reflection makes it
| obvious the other alternative is not at all a good one.
| NoMoreNicksLeft wrote:
| > how is it not fair game then for society to completely
| ignore my desires and needs?
|
| Best I can tell, it already does this. Not saying I
| believe the lunatic sovereign citizen horseshit, about
| how if they spell my name in all uppercase letters on the
| paperwork, I'm not subject to courts of law...
|
| But yeh, they're definitely completely ignoring my
| desires and needs. Yours too. Some people are just slow
| to catch on.
| duxup wrote:
| That was the attitude of the dude down the road from me who
| started his own impromptu pig farm. The folks who are
| outraged by what they can't do on their own land often also
| are the folks who don't think beyond step 1 and don't care if
| their pig shit stinks and runs off everywhere.
| ghaff wrote:
| It does depend on location. My town, for example, is a
| "right to farm" community which--while it doesn't give you
| carte blanche to do anything you want that's agriculture-
| related on your property--does give fairly broad latitude.
| duxup wrote:
| It really depends on the setting.
|
| Local city allows chickens (just a few) and out by me
| some towns allow a lot more, but there's also proper
| space to do those things.
|
| Pig farm guy was right on the border and he did NOT have
| enough space for a bunch of pigs. Thankfully the town
| already had rules about pigs. Pig farms STINK.
| pjc50 wrote:
| It turns out that we live in a society. And these days the
| main risk to human survival before middle age is other
| humans.
| mattclarkdotnet wrote:
| Isn't ownership of land regulated by the state pretty much
| everywhere?
| K0balt wrote:
| Depends on what you mean by pretty much anywhere. Outside
| of the actual cities in Alaska for example you won't find
| many restrictions. Many countries in the developing world
| also are essentially unregulated.
| Tangurena2 wrote:
| The issue is "water rights". In Western states, somebody owns
| that water already. The rain might fall on your house, but it
| normally flows into some creek/stream/river where the legal
| and moral rights to that water belong to someone else.
| Capturing that water is legally considered theft. In
| Colorado, for example, every bit of river water was allocated
| to someone before Colorado became a state.
|
| One book that covers the history of water projects in the US
| is Cadillac Desert [0]. We have this cultural myth that all
| we need is a little more water to make the desert bloom. And
| as a country, we've wasted trillions of dollars diverting
| rivers for agricultural use. Agricultural users of water pay
| almost nothing for their water while using enormous amounts
| of taxpayer funding to do so. Utah and Arizona have recently
| had droughts where water consumption by private citizens was
| limited.
|
| There are several crops that use enormous amounts of water,
| the one receiving attention is alfalfa. 82% of Utah's water
| is consumed by agriculture. The UT governor owns a farm that
| grows alfalfa for export. Instead of cutting back on his own
| farm's water consumption, he's been on radio & TV telling
| Utahns to pray for rain. Arizona has had some recent news
| stories about Saudi companies growing alfalfa in AZ and
| exporting the hay to Saudi Arabia. Alfalfa consumes so much
| water that growing it in Saudi Arabia is illegal. Amusingly,
| `alfalfa` is an Arabic word. The issue with AZ & UT is that
| there is plenty of taxpayer subsidized water to grow alfalfa
| for export while simultaneously rationing residential water
| consumption.
|
| 0 - https://www.amazon.com/Cadillac-Desert-American-
| Disappearing...
| ajot wrote:
| Site must have received an HN hug of death, so not sure what
| method it reccomends.
|
| There's a (university research group?) called WOT that uploads
| videos to Youtube with different low cost/low tech techniques, my
| favorite one being with a hand drill:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQRhsoSCXvg
| photochemsyn wrote:
| Probably want to read this first, particularly if you live in a
| western USA state:
|
| https://waterfilterguru.com/is-it-legal-to-drill-your-own-we...
|
| Shrinking aquifers and neighbors drilling wells just a bit deeper
| than their neighbor's wells have contributed to a long-standing
| conflict over water access, see Cadillac Desert by Marc Reisner
| for the historical origins of conflicts.
|
| "Whiskey is for drinking, water is for fighting!" - Mark Twain
| oceanplexian wrote:
| If you live in a dry, western state, there's a 100% chance this
| won't work. I live in the Southwest, and outside of some
| exceptions wells go down a thousand feet or more. You ain't
| doing that without heavy equipment.
| bagels wrote:
| USGS has maps of water well depths. 250 feet at my house,
| definitely would be "ambitious" to diy that depth.
| tspike wrote:
| This is equivalent to people fretting over using plastic
| drinking straws when certain industrial uses are exempt from
| environmental laws. The vast, vast majority of aquifer
| depletion is for impractical crops that should never be grown
| where they are and wouldn't be if our water rights laws made
| any sense.
|
| You tapping in one of these wells means very little in the
| context of this important topic.
| DoingIsLearning wrote:
| > The vast, vast majority of aquifer depletion is for
| impractical crops.
|
| And collection at spring source from water bottling companies
| let's please not forget that environmental abuse.
|
| Not all aquifers start underground.
| enagrimm wrote:
| very insightful
| Joginda wrote:
| indeed
| tamimio wrote:
| The problem is if that leads to water contamination, all it takes
| some of these homemade drillers to contaminate it "by mistake"
| with gasoline, oil, or even chemicals, with all what it means to
| environment and people using the same water.
| 4gotunameagain wrote:
| Did you read the article? The method uses no gasoline, oil or
| chemicals.
| tamimio wrote:
| I did, but accidents happen, those are usually farmers and
| aren't trained engineers with all safety measures, someone
| could have an oil tank nearby and someone/car bump into it or
| similar scenarios.
| 4gotunameagain wrote:
| Someone could just as easily have an oil tank near a
| legally drilled well, and contaminate everything.
| amluto wrote:
| In California, that legally drilled well has a sealed cap
| and a concrete pad at the top. It's quite unlikely for
| anything to spill down it unless there is a flood higher
| than the cap.
|
| (Neither of these things is expensive.)
| NoMoreNicksLeft wrote:
| I think he's talking about mid-construction, before it's
| capped. That's when there is risk of contamination.
|
| I'm not sure I agree that there is a risk then, but let's
| at least be fair to the argument.
| kylebenzle wrote:
| So the concern is that a farmer will drill the well, pull
| up the drill head, then accidentally spill a tank of oil
| then the oil will go down the hole and... contaminate the
| hole?
| ooterness wrote:
| In short, yes. The hole for the well works both ways;
| it's a fast track for any surface-level pollutants to get
| into the groundwater, contaminating it for everyone.
|
| Local law may require barriers to prevent this, such as
| an elevated concrete pad at the top of the well. This
| how-to guide didn't mention anything like that. Permits
| help ensure that important steps aren't skipped.
| ufjfjjfjfj wrote:
| Drilling a shallow well is easy with basic "tools"... It'd be
| nice to be able to do a deep well though
| dbrgn wrote:
| I wondered how getting a permit in Switzerland would work.
|
| According to some sources I found:
|
| - You need to request a permit from your city and your canton's
| water and sewage department
|
| - To get a permit, you need a "proof of utility", so you can't
| just dig a well for fun, it needs to bring some benefit.
|
| - You need a written technical planning document as well,
| including an analysis on the energy- and cost-efficiency of your
| project
|
| - If you want to drill down to the groundwater (for drinking
| water quality), you need additional analyses being done, to prove
| that the project conforms to standards and causes no harm.
|
| It sure sounds fun to have your own well, but I think I'll stick
| to collecting rain water.
| finnjohnsen2 wrote:
| You're digging your own well to out society to begin with. It
| is a scratch in the pain for such a project to have proper
| paperwork in order.
|
| I'm joking ofcourse, but not 100%
| verisimi wrote:
| Just do it. Live a little.
| j-a-a-p wrote:
| Digging a well after dark also adds to the experience.
| moffkalast wrote:
| Oh well...
| VoodooJuJu wrote:
| Reminds me of this, _what boomers needed vs what I need_ :
| https://ifunny.co/picture/an-258534577-82-258535541-258535-1...
| mindslight wrote:
| I'm quite sympathetic to the overall trend. But nearly half
| those listed things are effectively optional things to
| protect himself or make his life easier - eg you do not
| _need_ an LLC, but you surely do _want_ one. Another near
| half are to protect others from himself as he is putting
| himself out there as a business, as he is employing workers
| or subjecting customers to his work. There could certainly be
| more small-business-friendly ways to handle these things [0],
| but earlier periods weren 't solving them and at least now
| there is an attempt. So this particular critique doesn't ring
| true for me.
|
| The proper comparison is looking at what it takes to do it
| for yourself or a friend. Of that list, that's probably just
| permit/inspection, which is hard to talk about generally
| because it's going to vary per locale. Although you really do
| want the backhoe.
|
| [0] just spitballing an example, worker injury insurance
| could be provided more by the state from the general fund.
| poulsbohemian wrote:
| Where I work as a Realtor, it's generally possible to drill a
| well for domestic use. It will typically run about $20K and as
| we have a high water table, they generally hit water around 60
| feet and will take the well down to around 250 feet if they
| want to "future proof" it. Deepest well in our area that I've
| heard of is around 900 feet and that was considered really rare
| / extreme.
|
| Where homeowners become conflicted is that well gives them the
| rights to domestic use and to water a basic yard, but nothing
| beyond that. You are quickly in to "water rights" which can
| become complex and limiting. More and more we are seeing water
| masters (a state role) take away rights from landowners who are
| not fully using their water rights. For example, if the land
| was previously farmed but has now gone fallow and the water
| right has not been used, the state will revoke it - and there's
| a 0.0% chance of ever getting it back. This sometimes leads to
| cases where people (farmers) overuse their water to ensure they
| are demonstrating usage, but then of course that can lead to
| fines for overuse. No question water is going to be a defining
| issue in the American west for the foreseeable future.
| solomonb wrote:
| Is this at all viable in Southern California? My gut says no, but
| I would love to be wrong.
| thih9 wrote:
| Is this for drinking water? And what depths can be reached with
| this method? I wish these were stated more clearly; I'm guessing
| "not drinking", based on:
|
| > It is great for saving money on watering your lawn and
| irrigating a garden.
|
| Off topic: as a non native English speaker, the title made me
| pause. As in, why would I want to drill my water and do it
| well?... oh, water well, right.
| NotYourLawyer wrote:
| No, the website says this is generally non potable water.
| bluGill wrote:
| They state it is for irrigation only. You can use the same
| technique for drinking water in some places, but it really
| depends on local soil conditions (meaning even if your neighbor
| has safe water you might not get safe water!) and the care
| taking when drilling the well. If you do try this, after
| drilling and sealing the well you chlorinate the water (to kill
| anything you introduced), wait a week, then have a proper lab
| test, if the lab says it is safe to drink you are fine. The lab
| test should be repeated every 3 months (almost nobody does, but
| that is what the labs tell you)
|
| You can sometimes work around this by installing filters (RO
| and otherwise), and UV lights. However you need lab results to
| tell you what filters to install, and you need to keep those
| filters maintained.
| friend_and_foe wrote:
| The quality of the water depends on the location.
|
| This particular method of drilling a well works in sandy soil
| or clay where the water table isn't very deep. If you're in
| mountains or on any topology with bedrock you'll need better
| equipment, particularly a carbide or diamond tipped bit. And
| you'll be drilling potentially hundreds of feet. Something like
| this would most certainly not work in Colorado, it would
| probably work in Florida or Louisiana.
| AngryData wrote:
| I certainly wouldn't drink water out of a shallow well most
| places. It is worth every penny to get someone to drill a 200
| foot well and not have to worry about contamination for
| drinking.
| bochoh wrote:
| My 5 year plan includes building a shed with power, then adding a
| self driven well and adding the capacity to switch irrigation off
| city water to the shed source (tm). In the northeast so no real
| water concerns here
| stedman wrote:
| Hella ASMR from listening to this guy
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