Electrical - what's wrong with this?

Bob Engelhardt fired this volley in news: snipped-for-privacy@news6.newsguy.com:

ALL the properties within a 10 mile radius north and east and 28 miles south and west are on wells. Tens of thousands.

The cited problem is NOT a problem unless you're pumping sand or have been sold tinfoil tubing in replacement for "pipe".

Lloyd

The company I work for every morning insures a lot of "well people", as well as a lot of "alternative health practitioners." They both have about the same level of "real" knowledge, on the whole. They are all "good people" - the well people drill a lot of good wells, and the alternative health practitioners - RMTs in particular, give a lot of people pain relief - but their explanations of how things work generally have very little scientific basis.

Is it possible to get glass-lined pipe, so the holes won't appear? I know that there are very short ones for going between a hot water heater and the lines, to minimize electrolytic damage.

Looks like a clone of the Kill-A-Watt which has been sold for some time now. I have one, but the maximum current is 15A, and your pump motor may well draw more than that -- since it has a lot of work to do to get the water up to usable level.

And -- the KWH readings would be off by a factor of two, as it is assuming 120 VAC not 240 VAC.

And the manual for mine suggests that there are 240VAC versions as well.

O.K. Here is someone who had them, but is currently out of stock:

This one, however, can handle 240 VAC and current up to 50A.

This is a bit of a kluge, and rather dangerous as it would interrupt only *one* side of the 240 VAC when unplugged.

However, the second one which I pointed to is still sold, and is two parts -- one part in the breaker box (where you can clamp it on the leads for your pump breaker's output only), *and* you can read it from elsewhere in the house.

It is somewhat more expensive, but I think worth it over time.

I don't have the manual for it, but I suspect that you will want to do something like reset it once a month after noting that month's usage and perhaps keep a log of how much, too. Probably not a bad idea to change the receiver's battery just after noting your reading and before resetting.

An alternative might be to have a relay sensing the current drawn by the motor and starting a timer, and if the pump runs more than a certain pre-set time, to sound an alarm -- or, (with another timer started when the current drops out) sound an alarm if the pump re-starts too soon.

I hope that these will be helpful.

Good Luck, DoN.

Here is the relevant corrosion mechanism those articles omitted:

"Concentration cell corrosion occurs when two or more areas of a metal surface are in contact with different concentrations of the same solution."

-jsw

"Jim Wilkins" fired this volley in news:mn7cqm$2di $ snipped-for-privacy@dont-email.me:

Jim, First, the phenonemnon you're referring to almost never happens in a 'mixing' environment. Second, the degree of 'concentration' must be significant -- not horribly high, but higher than what you'd get from differences in the stream in a well.

Third... nah... not in a well. You don't see those sorts of things going on in a water well intended for human consumption.

This case is pure-and-simple mechanical abrasion from particulates. I'll bet there's a 4' deep 'sand pack' in that lift pipe before it turns on, which gets veritably BLASTED against the side of the pipe for a second or two every time the them pump comes on.

Lloyd

The 120 volt one won't work It needs to measure line to neutral - and the 240 volt pump does not use the neutral. You need a 240 volt kill-a- watt or clone. They are readilly available in the UK and Europe where 240 line to line is atandard

O.K. Less than 5 Amps then (except perhaps during starting surges).

But the typical Kill-A-Watt both measures the voltage (across the neutral-to-hot span) and the current delivered through the hot. The latter could be with the current fed through a shunt, or the hot wire threaded through a current transformer. But it *does* have to measure the current as well as the voltage to calculate the watts load.

Presumably, the power comes from the breaker box in the house, so a relay could sense the current and turn on a lamp -- or a clock. And the lamp doesn't have to be a big 100W one, a small LED light could be sufficient to see. Mount it where you look when sitting down a lot. Perhaps over a TV if you watch a lot of TV.

Best if you control it with a relay, so it can be in the house where you can see it frequently -- and perhaps reset it to 00:00 every night.

Good Luck, DoN.

The software that comes with the Radio Shack PC-interfaced meter

220-0087 auto-scales the graph of its readings on a computer, so you can connect it to a clamp-on amp probe or split-core current transformer

on the pump lead and record the pump cycling on and off.

Try it in the store, they don't have the best quality control history.

Did you notice this: "On the other hand, as corrosion in a well casing may be local to the usual top of the static head in the well, the repair sleeve approach may make sense." That's the outer casing where water meets air, not within the delivery pipe.

-jsw

So why haven't you put a rubber baby buggy bumper around the pipe there during one of these repair sessions, Dave? This would head off the repair instead of just letting you know when it wore through. I have seen bumpers you can install on the flexi poly line so it doesn't wear through. (Where the hell did I see that?) Googlit.

Wattmeters are great. I have a 3P Kill-a-Watt and check every new toy I buy with it. It's interesting that all of the 9w LED bulbs are only taking anywhere from 4.5 to 6w of draw, but they're bloody bright, so it's a moot point to me.

I'd rather fix the problem NOW than just see it developing sooner. How about you?

This is an INTERNAL abrasion? OK, forget what I already wrote.

If it's flex, why can't you lift it yourself? Between the drop pipe, wiring, and safety rope, "it shouldn't be too hard" , especially with a hole at the bottom, allowing all that water weight to go away.

G'luck.

I'm considering installing a pitless adapter so I can sink the manual pump into the well casing alongside my submersible drop pipe. I already have the new lead-free brass foot valve, PVC pump, and PVC pipes. Water level is 18 or so feet.

It's micro-sand in the water, vs. granular.

Probably but as water is, what? 1/3rd oxygen. "Dihydrogen monoxide", which is terrible stuff. I read somewhere that everyone that consumes even tiny amounts is either already dead, or will die.

Yes, Yes. But the common "crevice corrosion" that effects stainless stuff below the water line on a boat is something different. It is a dissolving of the protective coating on the surface of the "stainless". See:

I suspect that finding a body of water that varied in concentration of the same solution within the length of a boat might be difficult. Certainly the ocean is never still :-)

John B. fired this volley in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

Some chemists say that the correct term is not "dihydrogen monoxide", but for specific reasons, Hydrogen Hydroxide.

H(OH), in sufficient concentration, will also prevent oxygen from being absorbed by the lungs. Many people have died from H(OH)'s effects on oxygen absorption.

It's dangerous, damaging stuff! Hundreds of Billions of Dollars worth of damage to property and infrastructure can be attributed to exposure to it.

It's even been known to wear holes through iron well pipes.

Lloyd

Why would you not run at least Sch40? The well here also pumps some micro-sand but has never come close to ever wearing thru a wall and has only had one (corrosion) pinhole leak in the time since it was drilled in '64 and that wasn't until mid-80s or so. Typically used here is Sch

80 PVC now with the top joint galvanized for the strength at the upper connection...

At the location you're talking, sounds to me like missing a snubber as somebody else mentioned and it's more than likely not the water causing the wear but the flexibility and the pipe is rubbing on the casing when it starts from the starting torque reaction...

Either way, there certainly ought to be a solution other than monitoring for leaks and replacing so frequently...

That quite a deep well if I am reading it right. I've running 80' of schedule 80 PVC with a pump hanging off the bottom. (averages 30'sof head above the pump) I did have to replace the cheap pump the home owner installed when they built the house after about 10 years give or take, but the pipe looked perfect top to bottom. I pulled the pump and replaced it myself using a couple wood worker clamps and a scissor left to pull it up

20' at a time. It was more tedious than anything. And of course I had to learn about replacing well pumps and wiring them up so the connections were water proof.

Years ago I helped a buddy pull a deep wind mill pump with steel pipe to replace the leather gasket. We used a lever, some chains to grab the pipe, and and a couple pieces of steel bar bolted together around the pipe to secure it between lifts. We unscrewed each section as we got it above the sleeve. It wasn't hard particularly. Like pulling my pump it was just tedious manual labor requiring a little muscle.

"Bob La Londe" fired this volley in news:mn9pu3$3dh$ snipped-for-privacy@dont-email.me:

I pulled 180' of sch-80 steel with a 5hp submersible on the end of the string -- myself, alone, without a well rig, much as you did.

I erected a short derrick of wood and used a chain tackle. As you say... just tedious. It took me several hours, but the only time I broke a sweat was trying to loosen some of the couplings. (gotta get some longer pipe wrenches! )

With the same 8-ton chain tackle, I can't imagine it being any harder to lift a 360' string... just longer.

Lloyd

Even worse is H2S Hydrogen Sulfide.

It is as small as water, can't mechanically filter it. It can out gas from water and attack the lungs and blood system. Quick painful death. e.g. poison gas well.

The only filtration method is over silver metal. Or massive oxygenation. Banks of water towers that spray fine mist.

The Hydrogen is so small it > John B. fired this volley in