Water wells?

[Aloha8]

7 hours ago, runco said:

Still a no brainer on well vs. city water if you have good water and are making $$$ comparison.

Thanks runco. Still a toss up in many respects, and still some great info here.

[Aloha8]

6 hours ago, pitt2magic said:

when the power is out so is your water

A definite consideration, as noted by someone earlier too.

On another note, we were thinking to look around Ooltewah in our property (back in the '70s, that was mostly rural area) but quickly found that everyone is moving there and it seems like, as someone said, "the Marietta of Chattanooga" (with Marietta being now just a suburb of Atlanta).

[macville]

I will say that if you are on a well you can have a really nice lawn. I tried starting some grass in my yard two years ago and the first month of watering was $100 more than normal. Let's say my lawn is more "natural" now...

[pitt2magic]

6 hours ago, ALoha8 said:

A definite consideration, as noted by someone earlier too.

On another note, we were thinking to look around Ooltewah in our property (back in the '70s, that was mostly rural area) but quickly found that everyone is moving there and it seems like, as someone said, "the Marietta of Chattanooga" (with Marietta being now just a suburb of Atlanta).

When i moved here 13 years ago I thought we were in the middle of nowhere.  Now it's max density cookie cutter neighborhoods everywhere.  Luckily I live on top of White Oak Mtn so I have a buffer.

[xtriggerman]

I converted to a new drilled well 3 years ago and ditched the leaky city run to my house. The research I did said, the shallow wells will typicaly give better water above 100" than water found at deeper depths.  We hit 1.5 gpm at 35' and nothing more for the total of 260'. The water is very good and only is slightly above max in iron so there is some red coating in toilets. I bought filters to take that out but have yet to find the time to put them in. I installed a 275 gallon glass lined storage tank that I had to get from a NY visit I did. Not any of the plumbing outfits around here even carry 275's in their catalogs while its a stock item up north.   With a large storage tank, I allways have water even in power outages. In that case, if the pressure gets low, I fire up the generator, bang up the tank to its 68 psi cut off and turn the generator off. That gives me some 3 days of water use with no electric if I need to be in the black. I do need to shock my well since I'v not done that yet. That entails taking pool chlorine of 12% concentrate and put 2 gallons into the well if its 250-300 feet of water in a 6" caseing. run every faucet in the house untill you smell chlorine and then let the chlorinated well & plumbing sit over night. The next day, run each faucet hard and you will see alot of dead blackish bacteria blow out of your system. Its a good idea to do that every 3 years to keep the well clean. In a SHTF situation, don't expect their will be pressure in city lines in the long haul. 

[Aloha8]

12 hours ago, pitt2magic said:

... max density cookie cutter neighborhoods everywhere.

Exactly what we found once we starting actually looking. Even the few properties that were 5 acres or more were smack dab in the middle of that mess... not to mention the price per acre being a joke.

[Aloha8]

12 hours ago, xtriggerman said:

I converted to a new drilled well 3 years ago...

Some good information in your post. Thanks.

[Randall53]

I’ve lived in a rural house with only well water for 2 years now. It’s great tasting water. It’s hard for me to drink water down in the valley anymore. Even in restaurants I can literally smell the chlorine now since I’m so used to pure water. It’s crystal clear and pretty darn cold out of the faucet.

[xtriggerman]

I had well water my whole life and if you get a good well, you will never want city water.  The funny thing about wells up north and here is up in the northern mountains where I'm from, the water table strictly flows in veins. Anyone drilling a new well without it being dowsed (located) first is a fool with more money than brains. Down here I dowsed my spot and put a stake in the exact spot. The old guy that drilled it scoffed at drilling on a dowzers find and said it was just as likely to find a coal patch than water. Here on the plateau, the lime stone thats everywhere is so fractured, that the driller would just pick any ol depression where there's a water run off.  I watched more than a few wells being drilled in the north and thats the last place a driller would drill only if the dowsing rods said no water in the area. We had Donald Wood (nationaly renouned) dowse a couple wells and I had the chance to pick his brain on how he finds out things like How Deep, How many GPM and what quality the water is going to be?  He's dead now from old age but I got some jewels from him that day.... God bless him.

[xsubsailor]

2 hours ago, xtriggerman said:

I had well water my whole life and if you get a good well, you will never want city water.  The funny thing about wells up north and here is up in the northern mountains where I'm from, the water table strictly flows in veins. Anyone drilling a new well without it being dowsed (located) first is a fool with more money than brains. Down here I dowsed my spot and put a stake in the exact spot. The old guy that drilled it scoffed at drilling on a dowzers find and said it was just as likely to find a coal patch than water. Here on the plateau, the lime stone thats everywhere is so fractured, that the driller would just pick any ol depression where there's a water run off.  I watched more than a few wells being drilled in the north and thats the last place a driller would drill only if the dowsing rods said no water in the area. We had Donald Wood (nationaly renouned) dowse a couple wells and I had the chance to pick his brain on how he finds out things like How Deep, How many GPM and what quality the water is going to be?  He's dead now from old age but I got some jewels from him that day.... God bless him.

[Jeb48]

3 hours ago, xsubsailor said:

You may be joking but at our previous house after the contractor came up with two dry wells someone suggested getting a water witch to tell me where to drill. So happened I knew the guy they suggested, just didn't know he witched water. Never believed in such a thing. He stopped over walked around with his witching wires for a few minutes and said drill there, should have plenty of water around 30 feet. They drilled and hit water at 32 feet. We were only getting 1.5 gal/minute. Contractor wanted to go deeper because the bank wanted 4 gal/minute, I was warned that neighbors had hit salt and sulfur below 40 feet. Driller suggested we let it set for a few days and see if the veins opened up. Came back in 3 days and we had 4.5 gal/minute. Good water but high in iron. Rented a water softener and iron filter. Iron filter plugged up after a few months and the company refused to replace/service it, just took it out. Softener seem to take out enough iron that it wasn't a problem, company had to service it more often than normal. They kept trying to sell it to me and I kept telling I liked the set rental fee and free service.

[pop pop]

I had bad experiences with water wells so I don't like them.  The pumps may have improved, but in my experience, several years ago, ours was on the blink every storm the blew through it seemed. I had 2, one in the well and one on top of the ground from a cistern. Both were problematic. I have a drilled well at my house now and it has water within 15 FT from the top and it is 95 ft deep. I have never put a pump in it. 

Edited to add; My daughter just purchased a horse farm and she has 2 wells on it. One, at the house, can be pumped dry in 15 min. She is forced to do her activities over a period of time, It also has Sulfur in it. The other runs constantly and feeds the horses and horse barn and Trailer. It got cloudy during all the rain we just had, so that tells me it is stream fed. She purchases bottled water to drink and cook with. Both froze up this year so we have had to put heat bulbs in the well houses and keep them lit 24 hrs per day during the winter. Both have excellent well houses. Like I said I don't like dealing with wells at my age.  

Edited April 1, 2021 by pop pop