More on my well pump

[Tony Miklos]

After being shown how a check valve can break and stick up preventing water flow the proper direction, I was sort of 2nd guessing the replacement of my pump. I asked them if they powered it up after getting it out, no they didn't. Then I started thinking, they did replace 1 check valve. I wondered could that have been the real problem? Did I really need a new pump? I separated the two halves of the pump and powered up the motor. It ran, but it spitted and sputtered going off and on. I shook the pump half, it rattled a lot. I put them together again and powered it up. The pump made a hell of a lot of noise and the motor still sputtered.

Now I feel comfortable that I definitely needed a new pump. I'm glad I told them to leave it here for me to dissect it.

[hrhofmann]

I always ask for the old parts, whenver I have work done. But, that is quite infrequent as I am an inveterate diy'er.

[RBM]

I'm curious as to how you connected the motor. Is it a 2 or 3 wire motor?

[Frank]

I mentioned my motor had failed. Plumber found it drawing twice the amperage that it should have. I have an ammeter and probably could have tested it myself. Same thing had happened last time but they replaced whole unit but this time just the motor. They did take it back to the shop to test both.

[Tony Miklos]

It's a 2 wire with ground and no control box. Being 1.5HP I held on good when I turned it on, but there was no need to hold on tight, it hardly jumped.

[RBM]

I hope that the new one is a 3 wire with a control box. This way if a start capacitor blows, it's replaceable without pulling the pump

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[Tony Miklos]

No the new one is a 2 wire also. It would have cost about $1500 for new

8 gauge 3 with ground about $1000 for 10 gauge. At that price I could have them pull it 5 or 6 times and still be ahead then if I went with 3 wire. And that's a quick wire price looked up online, I don't know what kind of markup the well company has on wire. Hmm. Add another 50 feet of wire to the house, and about $65 for a control box. Two wire will suit me just fine.

[Tony Miklos]

I opened up my old motor as far as I could without a torch, there is no capacitor to replace. Listening to it when it comes to a stop makes it sound like it has the centrifugal actuated switch to change from the start winding to the run winding but I can't say for sure.

[RBM]

I think that whatever starting mechanisms are used on the two wire units, they've got them hermetically sealed, so it's more a matter of pulling the pump and replacing the motor section