Mounting a borehole pump?

My water supply comes from a borehole, about 4m deep I think, with a submerged pump. The pump seems to be on the end of a galvanised steel pipe that carries the water up. It works but the water coming out (I've just restarted it after a couple of years disconnected) is full of rust and about as transparent as cream of tomato soup.

It seems to me that the pipe must be terribly rusty. It is about 20 years old and I want to replace it before the pump drops off the end and gets stuck down the hole.

What should I replace the pipe with? Copper, stainless steel, plastic? - or just hang the pump from a rope and use a flexible hose for the water?

Thanks

Roger

Reply to
Roger Moss
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If the last section of galvanised pipe lasted twenty years whats wrong with some more of the same?

Reply to
John

I like the thought of "permanence" (house has been there for a couple of centuries, & apparently there was a pele tower there before that). I don't want to be wondering in years to come whether it's all rusted away!

Roger

Reply to
Roger Moss

I can appreciate your desire for permanence, but I presume you also want cost effective! You could end up with a pump that's rusted away on the end of a permanent pipe! Pumps (and wells) are engineering not architecture - they expect tlc and regular maintenance.

Galvanised steel pipes are fairly normal for putting submersible pumps down holes. I certainly wouldn't use copper. Putting a pump down on plastic pipe is also fairly common, in a shallow well the mechanical strength of a plastic pipe is likely to be acceptable, in deeper wells plastic may not be strong enough to support the pump and its pipework. A problem with plastic pipe is how to make up the joints - as you need to be able to extract the pump for maintenance - but as your well is shallow handling a 4 metre length of pipe is probably acceptable.

I can't see anything other than properly engineered flexible hose giving you the long life you would require (think stretch, think connection corrosion) - something like

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do, but I have no idea what it will cost.

If your well is really only 4 metres deep you could use a surface mounted suction pump, which would make a plastic rising main much easier to engineer (although I somehow doubt it will last 100s of years).

Andy McKenzie

Reply to
Andy McKenzie

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