In search of the deepest hand water pump

The deepest I have found so far is 350 feet here: http://www.solar4power.com/solar-power-water-pump.html ; Has anyone seen anything deeper than that?

Also, if anyone has some working knowledge of wells, when someone says his well is 300 feet deep, does that mean that's the depth to the top of it where the water level is or is that at its base?

If the well is said to be 300 ft deep, that's the depth of the drilled hole. The water level would be (hopefully) less.

Lehman's shows a pump www.lehmans.com/store/Water_Pumps__Deep_WellsLehman_s_Most_versatile_pump_head__110802?Args=
Indicates 250 by hand 450 with windmill assist.
I agree well depth is to bottom of hole and static level of water is usually shallower and might be dependent on the season depending on your location.

Thanks for the link!  Investing in a windmill right now is a bit too much for me so I guess I'll have to stick with the 350ft that I found.

However I am not grasping what you guys are saying about well depth.  Am I thinking about this wrong or understanding you incorrectly?  You dig a hole that is 300 feet deep.  At that three hundred feet you hit the top of a reservoir of water.  Since this is the top of the reservoir, wouldn't any water that is held within it be underneath this 300 foot entry into the reservoir and thus be deeper? Thus if someone says they have a 300 foot well do they mean they drilled 300 feet and then actually get water from deeper below that?

Think of a three foot piece of pcv pipe dipped into a five gallon bucket of water. You have a three foot well.  The resevoir of water in the aquifer (bucket) will fill the well to the level of water in the bucket and up your well pipe. So as the bucket fills or water is removed the static level of water within the well casing may rise and fall.
When they say a well produces so many gallons of water it has to do with the amount of water that can be pumped and its effect on the static level. A well might go through different aquifers to get to a source of sweet water.
  A well doesn't stop at the top of the water source it goes into it a ways so in case static level drops you still are in the water.

hozomeen wrote:
Thanks for the link!  Investing in a windmill right now is a bit too much for me so I guess I'll have to stick with the 350ft that I found.

However I am not grasping what you guys are saying about well depth.  Am I thinking about this wrong or understanding you incorrectly?  You dig a hole that is 300 feet deep.  At that three hundred feet you hit the top of a reservoir of water.  Since this is the top of the reservoir, wouldn't any water that is held within it be underneath this 300 foot entry into the reservoir and thus be deeper? Thus if someone says they have a 300 foot well do they mean they drilled 300 feet and then actually get water from deeper below that?

You don't stop drilling the moment you hit water.  If you did, you'd only have an inch of water in the bottom of the well, and that is no use.  You keep drilling for another 50 or 100 feet.

If you hit water at 300 feet, you'd keep drilling to at least 350 feet, so that you have 50 feet of water in the well.  It would be a 350 foot well, with water at 300 feet down.

I have a question, dealing with the hand pumps. I was wondering about the feasibility of constructing your home with a well on the inside, using a hand water pump. We get snow 8 months of the year here in Montana and going off grid, I dont fancy hiking out in frigid weather to pump water and haul it indoors. Do any of y'all know if there are any books or material that discuss this?

Thanks guys!  That really helped.

Kathryn: I don't have any specific advice, someone else might, but I have been inside an old turn of the century home that had a well inside of it.  Of course it was a well that you just drop a bucket down into and haul back up.

Around my area a well house (spring house, root cellar) is built around the top of the well and the water is brought to the house under the frost line by pipe.
If there are any issues with your well and you build your house on top of it then you may end up having to dig a new one rather than a lower cost repair.  I think I would rather have my well in the "corner" of my root cellar so at least the drilling rig and or repair vehicles may get close to the well, and my root cellar plans have a smaller well room off it with its own trap door roof to the outside for well head access. 
I should probably add that you can either have the pump in the well (submersable) or on the end of the pipe that brings the water indoors.  I am sure that you could still have a hand pump inside that way, depending of course on the type of hand pump.  We have one that is attached to a hose with a check valve on the end of it that is dropped down the well that we can attach either a hand,  a dc battery or electric pump to.  Take into account how deep your well is and make sure that you get one that can pump water up that far.

Monica, having the well at the corner of the house might be a good idea. I wanted to be able to run part of the pipes for hot water through the masonry of the masonry wood stove. I love hot baths and dont ever want to have to give those up off grid. I really would like the aspect of the hand pumps indoors, like homes used to have, even when they first had bathrooms, like what hozomeen described and I have seen.

A rope pump might work very deep indeed, if the rope weren't too stretchy and the pistons few enough, with tight-enough gaskets.

you have the well or bore depth,

you have the static water depth and the draw down or recharge rate, of a well

the bore depth is the depth of the well it self, the water level or draw down depth is what the pump needs to pump, the recharge rate is the rate in which water flow into the well, so it limits the size of pump on can use in the well,

the heart of the "hand pump" is the cylinder, or the pump that is in the water,

the cylinder has check valves and some type of piston in it, to move the water, up the pipe (called the drop pipe),  in the drop pipe is the (sucker rod), this connects the pump to the power source, on top of the ground,

the "hand pump" is a stand that usually attachés to the drop pipe and is hollow so that water can flow out of it in a spout, and a location for some type of leverage advantage (handle) to move the sucker rod and lift the water up the pipe,

  In my opinion hand pumps are very expensive for what they do,

one is a flange to support it self on the well head (cosing),

2.  to allow water to escape the well or pipe (tee and spout) and t

3.  and attachment for a handle

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the deeper one goes the more water one is lifting so it take more power, to lift the water,  so to make this work one reduces the size of the cylinder to lift less water to keep the lift in range of human effort,  the other method is to reduce the stroke of the cylinder (in creasing the lever length),   but you move the lever up and down maybe 24 inches and the cylinder rod is only moved a few inches,

(the weight of the water lifted is the number of square inches of the cylinder size,  by the feet down to the draw down level of the water,  times, 0.44 psi per foot, 

say you have a 300 foot well and water is at 280 feet, the lift distance is 280 feet not 300, but for every square inch of cylinder (piston) you will have 123 pounds of water to lift plus the weight of the sucker rod (minus it bouncy in water),

so say you have 1 7/8" cylinder in the bottom of that well,  you have about 2.67 square inches so the weight of the water would be about, 328 pounds of water to lift and say 75 pounds of sucker rod,  so a total of 403 or so pounds,

so your leverage on your pump handle needs to reduce that to manageable effort,

so say your handle is 10 to one, when water is at the top of the well you will have to exert 40 pounds of weight to move the handle on the down stroke of the handle say you move the handle  40 inches from top to bottom, your only moving the cylinder 4 inches ever time,

the discharge rate of that 1 7/8" cylinder is for 4 inches of stroke is only .0480 gallons per stroke.  it will take you 25 strokes to get a gallon of water out of the well with that set up with 40 pounds of  exertion ever stroke on the lever,

there are smaller cylinders, (down to 1 3/8" and larger units as well.

to reduce the power requirements one can reduce the cylinder size, but the 1 3/8 cylinder would only produce .025 gallons per stroke,  or 40 strokes per gallon,


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If you do go ahead with the plan, I suggest you take a 2 or 3 inch pipe  or square tube and have a fabrication shop weld a flange on the bottom to support it and the spout on it, and the necessary lug to mount the handle pivots to and fabricate your own pump handle (the old cast type (baker manufacture) are in the at $600 rang last I looked,   

at that depth to hand pump is not impossible but it will take a lot of work and produce little,

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my wells are in that range, I use two windmills and the 280 foot to water is on the max. end of the 10 foot aermotor mill, and one should be using 12 foot mills, that is a big mill, (have one in the yard), measured by the diameter of the blades),

(for the expense, you may not be that much different looking at solar pumps cost wise over the hand system,

the cylinder should use steel pipe not plastic, I used fiber glass sucker rods, there not cheap, but much more lighter and nearly float,  (i used the 1 7/8" cylinder for maintenance, with a 2" pipe one can renew the leather by pulling up the sucker rods and not the pipe,  to put in new leathers, (note this need to be done about ever year in heavy use and most likely ever two to three years regardless),

the truth is an eclectic submersible is much cheaper to put in and to maintain than a windmill and most likely a hand pump,

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now I have a electric submersible under the windmill cylinder, on one well,  and normally use only the windmill, but if low on water I can power the other pump, and it is my "emergency pump".  (they both are on one pipe),

Dean Bennett has the baker hand pumps,
http://www.do-it-yourself-pumps.com/windmill-catalog-page59.pdf

http://www.do-it-yourself-pumps.com/handpumps.htm

they only recommend about 200 foot max, on the shortest strokes they have,

and on a windmill, (only IMO) go with an aermotor or it clone,  the 702 /802 (the only difference is the bearings) model is reasonably owner rebuild able, 
http://www.windmills.net/702_rebuild/rebuilding_the_702.htm
look up the book "The 702 model windmill" complete care and instruction on rebuild if ever needed, one place to get it, http://www.aermotorwindmill.com/Products/ManualsMerch/Aermotor_OrderForm.pdf
the 602's are rebuild able as well but it is harder as they have poured Babbitt bearings that have to be poured in the case, but they are rebuild able and parts are avable yet,

mine at the house here is a 1934 and the other one is about a 1950 unit, both been pumping most all of there life,

(I would look in to a used unit and rebuilt (new bearings) on a windmill if that is the plan)

http://vintage-windmill-parts.com/phpBB3/index.php?sid=a8d01f6d0f5a14f1156bb1f6ff0cbd17


a very good board for windmill discussion and wells,

Fantastic info Birdman!

After going over your posts I think I'm going to go for windmill.  There is a windmill standing on our property that "doesn't work" but has operated in the last 10-20 years.  Going to take a look at that and see what I can do.  However, would there be a problem installing a windmill plumbing alongside an already existing electric pump?  I want the windmill for possible blackouts, so I would have a water storage tank filled and then have the windmill disengaged from the well until a power outage, when I can hook it back up and replenish the tank.  I'm not a plumber and don't have experience with this, so this might just be a pipe dream...

I will try to reply to night when I have more time, to answer your quesitons

the biggest problem is the size of the casing or bore hole your dealing with, and you do not want to hang things up in the well and get things stuck, in the casing, by going with two separate systems,  if you have the room then do it, my casing is not large enough for two pipes and pumps,

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some of the below is copied from another post I once did on a simular topic on another board,

http://www.deanbennett.com/submersib...w-windmill.htm
the problem is the sealing off to build pressure, one can do that with a stuffing box, build pressure with the normal sub pump, and still have the sucker rod pass throught the top of the pipe,

http://www.deanbennett.com/stuffingbox.htm


but to use a stuffing box on and let  the sucker rod pass, and then tee off the under ground pipe to the pressure tank to have access to the windmill pumped water,
to pump into a pressure tank would not be practical, IMO, the wind mill only into the storage tank


link to general information on hand pumps,
http://www.deanbennett.com/helpful-hints.htm

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one can use a check valve and a elbow welded into (inside) a piece of 3" pipe with a bell reducer back to 1 1/4" so one can get the system all in line) this is what I did with my windmill It has a sub pump under the cylinder.

the first time I did the sub pump and windmill (or hand pump) cylinder, and the drawing is how i did it the second time, but instead of a tee  and a foot valve, I use an elbow to attach a check valve to in side the 3" pipe,

picture of first set up,





here is the unit based on the drawing, see how it is all in line will go in to most casing any sub pump will go in to,

picture of second try,






a thread on the windmill site on basically the same discussion,

http://vintage-windmill-parts.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1063&sid=92427f7e6e84e1713c47b4e1048f0271

Thank you so much Birdman!  I've just finished digesting most of your info.  It's really helped!

To 350 feet w/ handle extension...
http://www.simplepump.com/OUR-PUMPS/Hand-Operated.html

http://www.vimeo.com/channels/emas#8366272

There are a bunch of associated videos with this one on all the variations.  But they're PVC, so may not be so good for deep wells. 

Look for the book "The Barefoot Architect" by Johan van Lengen.  It has several pump designs. 

One gets around the stuffing box issue by using a pump chamber with three fittings.  The first is the inlet, with a foot valve, on the bottom.  The second is an outlet, with a backflow preventer valve, at the top.  The third attaches to a bladder inside the pump chamber, from a pressure source at the surface.  As the bladder is inflated, it sends water up the pipe.  As it's deflated, it draws water into the chamber.  This puts the pressure seals of the pump up at the surface where they can be serviced and adjusted more easily without pulling the whole pump.  The bladder can be a piece of soft hose or inner tube, clamped to the pipe at one end and clamped shut on the other.

Dan