Pounding a Well- Part 1

Its been awhile since my last post this spring. Lately work has kept me occupied, leaving me little free time to spend on improving and growing my homestead. Since my wife and I first moved into our temporary home last summer, we have been using water that either she or I truck in every few days and transfer into the two storage tanks within the trailer. From those two tanks, an on-demand water pump feeds it to the faucets and toilet as needed. We use this water only for cleaning and for any cooking and drinking we have a separate water container that resides in the fridge, keeping cold water always on hand.

Since I'm homesteading, it has become time to search for and find water on the property. I have come up with several promising spots to find water and determined how deep the water is using age old techniques of dowsing. I wont go into detail of this strange art since many don't believe in it, but I'm certain I will be putting a well in the right area, as long as I don't hit a rock. After finding the area, it is now time to get to the area, and since I am not a rich lad and hiring a well driller to come in is very expensive. I had one quote me $10,000 for the area I live in. This was a high shoot estimate he said and included not only the well drilling, but all material including permit fees, well testing, deep well pump, digging line to the house and a few other extras. He said of course it could come in far below that amount, but even then your still talking thousands. If your not able to drill, then one must fall back on the time honored method of pounding the well like the old farmers and homesteaders did back when they tamed this wild country.

A cousin of mine happened to have 2" well pipe on hand (schedule 80) and couplings. He sold this to me very cheap compared to what it would have cost to buy it from the hardware store. The extended family has on hand a pounder and pounding cap and pulleys and rope and other tools needed for this endeavor. I spent a Saturday collecting all of this stuff and assembling it for when I needed it. Some of the last items I needed to purchase was the 2" drive point and teflon plumbers paste that is used to seal the couplings. I had some tamarack poles that had once surrounded my Paintball speedball field, holding up wire and safety netting. I no longer use that field, so I took three of the poles to serve a new life as a tripod. I drilled and put a 1/2 inch rod through all three poles with large washers and nuts on each end when they were lying side by side and then lifted it up over the location of where I planned to pound the well. Once this was up in place, I then took some good rope and lashed the poles together for added strength. Once done, I took the large pulley and hung it from the top of the tripod and ran the large hay rope I had for connecting the the pounder weight. The pounder is a leaded weight that is slides over the top of the well pipe and slides up and down as you pull the rope and let it loose.

With everything in place, I am now ready to start pounding. Tractors are normally used for lifting the weight. For the first part though, I am only just starting the well point and making sure it is as plumb as I can get it. First thing I did after much internet research and talking to my many family memebers who have pounded wells before was to did a hold down about five feet with a post hole digger. This gave me an idea at least what type of soil I was starting with and also allowed for the point which is three feet long and the first length of pipe to sit a little bit in the earth and allowed me to get the pounder up and over onto it. For the first section of pounding was with just my own arms pulling on the rope. The pipe has been started and now I only am waiting for the weekend to come. My uncle with the tractor will be coming over and then the real pounding will start.