Well Question

[wyld thang]

A few weeks ago we went camping for a long weekend. We swap with the neighbors for pet/plant/chicken sitting...I had them water the pots and the chickens, and the hose was left on for three days. Sooo when we came home there was no water(um, we'd been looking forward to showers ). Hubby assumed the well went dry since it is late summer and the same neighbors have drained their new well(as well as their first and that--we suspect-- of another neighbor) with their water use(they leave their hose on...etc etc--I should have realized the pattern would continue if they came over here). I went around looking for something turned on and sure enough the hose was trickling.

So my question...we went round and made sure everything was turned off, and didn't use water overnight and took it easy the next day on water use. Does this damage the pump any? When the hose was on we could hear the pump cycle on and try to suck and then shut off...while we're turning on the faucet hoping for water. The water flow was normal within a few hours and hasn't seemed to be affected since. Needless to say we won't ask the neighbors to water anymore, and we'll turn off the water when we leave. They're nice people, you just can't tell them anything.

Thanks!

[arabian knight]

Nope not all. I was gone for at a week and sometime in that week and for 5 days maybe 6 days I had a Hot water line break under the sink. and ran and ran and ran, So NOT only only was the ELECTRIC Hot Water heater running steady for ALL that time so was the Submersible pump. I came back took care of the mess. And went for another 3 weeks and that way the pump and well had time to recover. And now 3 weeks after I have noticed Nothing wrong in Anything so a little leaking at that is no big deal.
And I have filled up 150 gal water tanks did many many loads of clothes since then and nothing wrong, so you should be fine... Except my Electric Bill for that Month was 100 Dollars HIGHER then normal~! YIKES.....hat was the Only thing I found that was bad news...

[Spinner]

I agree with arabian knight. Our well is very shallow and we often pump it dry. Sometimes the water will go out during the night if a pipe breaks. Never had any problems with the pump. We just flip the breaker and turn it off for a while, then prime the pump and turn the breaker back on. Works fine. We've been doing that for 12 years and the pump still works fine.

[Beltane]

We have had quite a different experience...each time our first well went dry the pump kept trying to pump water...and burned out...twice. We have tenants, so we had to make it quite clear to them that if they ran out of water they *had* to go downstairs to turn the breaker off. I'm glad to hear that everyone else has had better luck than we have.

[ace admirer]

i'm assuming you have an above ground pump. running a submersible pump dry will damage it sooner or later.. they use the surrounding water to cool the overrated motor. the thermal trip wound into the windings of the motor will fail if it is tripped too often.

[wyld thang]

It is a submersible pump(must have been something else coming on...) Thanks for your thoughts. We replaced the pump two years ago, and we just try to take care of the water, don't take it for granted. Since there was water coming out of the hose the pump must have been under water to pump something to make the water come out--just not enough to spit it out anywhere else.

[mtman]

thats why we dont go any where so hard to get good help

[rambler]

It may have heated up some & shortened it's life if it ran out of water which it uses for cooling- but nothing you can do about it now, as long as it is working ok keep on keeping on. Most have a thermal overload, so it would shut itself down - but that means it is getting hot repeatedly, so not the best thing in the world.

--->Paul

[boonieman]

You might consider installing a pressure switch similar to this. Pretty cheap insurance. I cut and pasted the description of the pressure switch from a supplier of well pumps. There are several conpanies that sell these and I believe I've seen them at Tractor Supply.


"$ 23.00 FSG2M42040
FSG2M43050 FSG2 Form M4 combines the pressure switch with a low pressure cut-off switch. If the line pressure should drop to approximately 7 psi lower than the switch's cut-in setting, the low pressure cut-off will stop the pump. Should this happen, the lever on the side of the switch must be manually reset before the pump will operate again. Rated for up to 1-1/2 HP at 115 Volt and up to 2 HP at 230 Volt. Factory preset pressure ranges of
20 psi on / 40 psi off 30 psi on / 50 psi off "

[Danaus29]

Our pump has an overlaod switch that shuts it off if it gets too hot (happened when our pipes froze). Look and see if you have a grey or black box somewhere along the electric service to the pump. If there is a little box it should have a handle on one side of it. Flip the handle the other way and it should work again if your well didn't go dry.