Hello,

I'm having some trouble with my well pump. Over the last few wks we've noticed the pressure has been waning. This is a common occurrence when I have to change my sediment filters, but today while the shower was running the water stopped completely.

Pump is Goulds 7GS05422C, 1/2 hp, 230V, 2W, 10STG 4" pump, installed new on 8/2008
Franklin Submersable Motor Control, 1/2 hp, 4.8 Amp, Date C89
Pump switch is 40/60 lbs, with Duracell DP-42-2 blue diaphragm pressure tank. Approx 20g.

The pump usually fills the tank and pressurizes it from 40-60 very quick - under 1 min. Checking it this morning the pressure rises very VERY SLOW! Even shutting off the pressure tank the pressure doesn't immediately max out and shut off as it should. I can hear some slow water flow in the tank, and when I turn off the power, the noise stops, so the pump is doing something. However - the REALLY odd thing is that when I remove the cover for the Motor Control (which disconnects the capacitor and I though disabled the pump) I STILL hear the noise! So the pump is still pumping very slowly without power?? I used to hear the capacitor click in when the pump came on, but now I do not.

Also a few days ago my pump area has a puddle on the floor. There are no obvious leaks and I hadn't gotten to look at it yet. This area frequently has wet spots due to high humidity and condensation, but this was more water than that.

Any ideas what it could be? I can DIY just about anything, I just have to know what is wrong.

Thanks

 

Turn off power to the pump and drain the bladder tank. Then take a PSI reading from the straider valve..

Add air to what your normal cut in pressure is.

On a 40/60 switch its normally 40 kick on but your pressure switch can be off.

Let us know.. At a minimum add 30 psi air to the tank then start it back up.

Let us know the outcome..


Then let use know if you have a multimeter and know how to use it.

We can guide you further...

 

Then test your motor here...


HIGH VOLTAGE.. Be very careful or call a pro. We dont know your skill set and you can be killed or seriously injured....



http://www.deanbennett.com/testing-s...ump-motors.htm

 

Any chance your well has run dry? Or you've sprung a leak between pump and tank? If your water line from the well comes through your basement wall, look for signs of dampness in that area. If the underground line splits (assuming you have an underground line) the water will often follow the pipe and show up at the entry point.

 

Thx for replies. I do have a multimeter and know how to work around electricity. I'll do the testing from that page and get back with results.

We have a lot of water here, and my well is only 80 ft deep, so I doubt it ran dry.

 

OK, did some testing. Those motor and pump control tests seemed OK. My pump only has 2 wires (no ground) so between black and red was 5.7A - close to what that site listed ( 4.2-5.2. ) Is that close enough or does that indicate pump trouble?

I have a shutoff on the well tank, and I have a drain valve right on the pump line after the pressure shut-off, so with the pressure tank shut off I hardwired the pump (bypassing the 40/60 shut-off control.) With the drain valve open lots of water comes out. As I closed the valve the pressure goes to 30 lbs pretty quick, and then very slowly creeps up to 42-44 and stops. I believe it should spike to whatever the max pressure of the pump is since the water has no where to go, but it doesn't. I guess that means my 7 yr old pump is shot??

 

Seems OK to me.. Im a plumber though not an electrician...

Not understanding fully.. Are you saying you think you pump is weak?

Did you check the psi in the tank?

 

Could be the pump or could still be a leak. When you did your test, what happened to the pressure when you shut off the pump? It should just sit there at 42-44 or whatever it is when you kill the pump. If it drops right back down to zero you have a leak or a bad check valve (although a bad check valve wouldn't explain the other symptoms).

 

That could also indicate too much air in the tank. When that happens the baldder in the tank collapses on the outlet before the cut in on the pressure switch occurs...

Have you messed with the air charge in the tank?

 

I think OP was doing these last tests with the pressure tank out of the picture.

 

Carbide - yes I did those last tests with the pressure tank 'removed' from the equation. I didn't bother draining and checking (yet) because with it off-line I'm not seeing what I would expect.

Also - tank removed, pressure at 42, turning off the pump keeps the pressure, but thats because a check valve prevents it from leaking back into the well.

But I have a theory. If the water pipe was cracked just outside my house, such that at 42 lbs it starts leaking... that would explain why my pressure never gets above that number and also why the puddle keeps forming. My cement basement floor has cracks where water has bubbled up from in the past - every 5th yr or so in the spring with the snow thaw and heavy rain. The water table pushes it up through my floor cause the ground is still frozen and cant absorb it.

So I get plenty of water with pump on, talk off and valve open, cause there's no 'pressure' in the system and the pump can easily push it through the open system. But closing the drain valve builds up the pressure which starts a leak at 42 lbs, just enough to saturate the ground near my basement wall and slowly seep up through my floor and keep my pressure from getting any higher.

Does that make sense? I'm not sure I like this theory - its not $2K (from 2008) to replace the pump, but it mean digging through 6 ft of earth to find a leak/crack 'somehwere'?!?!?!?

 

Pressure test the line... Its easy but time consuming.. You have to disconnect the ends and make a jig but it would be worth it IMO...

 

I turned the pump off overnight. The system in the house held pressure at 40 or so. The floor was mostly dry - some residual water seeped to the lowest point. The pump is pulling 4.78 amps while its on, which sounds about right. Is there any way a pump can go 'half-bad', where it can only pump to 40 lbs and not higher?

If not, I don't see any other explanation than a leak in the underground pipe from well to house. If the leak was in the house, I'd see water somewhere. And it would be a lot of water because the pump was on non-stop for at least a week since it never hit the 60 lbs cutoff pressure. I'm guessing there's no way to pressure test that pipe. And the leak being right outside my foundation wall is what causes the bubble up puddle on my floor.

 

You can pressure test it, but it means disconnecting the well head end of the pipe so you can attach a pressure test fitting and gauge. Alternately, you can add a pressure gauge on the well side of your check valve to see if the line pressure is falling as soon as pump shuts off.

I had the line break right where it exits my basement wall, due to settling or improper backfill I guess. I didn't have to pressure test because I had visible water on the surface of the ground outside so I knew it was a leak. I called the local well/plumbing co. They brought in a mini excavator and had it fixed in an hour. Ran me a few hundred IIRC. It would have taken me all day to dig down and at that point I wasn't sure where the break was, so opted to call in the big guns. Well guy said they usually break either at the pitless fitting or where it exits the house.

For me, it was worth the cost to call in the pros, YMMV.

 

OK, so at the well head, disconnect the 'down' pipe from the underground-to-house pipe, put in whatever combination of fittings works with a regular pressure gauge T'ed off of it. Turn on the pump and when its shut off pressure should remain in that pipe. I think I might do that...

*** Just went to well head to check things out. The head is old, rusted, falling apart, and I cant even see where the water line to house enters. Being in NY the frost line is 4 ft deep, so thats quite a dig through rock and shale to just do a test.

So this morning I set my on/off cutoff switch 20/30 so that we have some water in the house and at least the pump gets to turn off. My basement floor dried out. I just now raised the off pressure to let the pump run for a while and I 'hope' to see water seeping up through the floor. That would 100% confirm it is a broken pipe/leak right near the house.

It would be 5-6 ft down to dig it out from outside the house. But this pipe is also right next to basement walkout stairs w//Bilco doors. I could break take out the wooden stairs and break through the concrete block in that little 'pit' to reach where the pipe enters the house. I just still wont know how close/far it actually is away as its hard to judge how much saturation the ground needed in order to push up through my floor. But its got to be close because my house is on a slight hill and that pipe goes downhill all the way to the well - losing maybe 30-40 ft in elevation. And we all know water only goes downhill....

 

Where is this check valve? Remove it temporarily to see then that the line does not hold pressure.

Also Did you add air to the tank? Too much air and the pump may not be able to hit the off setting on the pressure switch..

Did you check for 240 volts? Possibly you lost a leg and the pump is only getting 120v..

 

The check valve is first thing on the pipe as it enters the house through the basement wall. Removing it will have to wait til tmrw.

I checked the voltage - 240V - so thats good.

Also the empty tank pressure was 26psi. I had set it to 38lbs a few yrs ago so the bladder might have a tiny hole. But that wouldnt account for my half-pressure pump as it doesnt go over 42 lbs with the pressure tank removed from the system. I did pump it back up though.

 

If you have temporarily changed your cut in/out pressures on your switch to 20/30 psi you should remove air in your tank to around 18 psi, while you have these switch pressures in place.

 

What do you mean "pressure tank removed from system"?

The pump will work erratically and unpredictably if the pressure tank is removed or somehow shut off from the rest of the ssystem.

 

"pressure tank removed from system"

I have a shutoff valve going to the pressure tank, so I closed it off (effectively removing it from the system) while I was doing some testing. So with NO pressure tank in the house piping, the pump still couldnt get over 42 lbs, so its not a problem with the tank.

I only closed the vale for testing; I didn't keep it that way.

Optsy - good point, I should remove some air from the tank to match my 'low pressure mode.'

Well... my afternoon test (pump on for 4 hrs, couldn't get above 42 lbs) was 'successful' - WATER on the floor! So I'm convinced it is a cracked/broken pipe just outside the foundation. I'm sure its leaking all the time, but if the pump isn't on, it will leak until the pressure in the pipe from the pump to my house abates and then it just sits. Which is why the floor dried up when I shut the pump off all night and this morning. The check valve right inside the house keeps the house water from going back into that pipe and leaking out. So it will leak any time the pump is on and eventually saturate the ground enough to come through the floor.

So tmrw is digging day. Still not sure if I should try it from ground level outside or go through the 'wall' in my basement stairs 'pit.' Should be 'fun'....

 

Good luck and let us know how it goes. Make sure you have a piece of pipe and necessary coupling and clamps. And be prepared to replace the piece that goes through the wall if the break is right where the pipe exits the wall.

 

Thx. Yeah, I was going to ask about that. What kind of pipe should I use to patch it? A 1 ft piece of the same pipe? (its 45 yrs old; I assume I can still buy this coiled black poly?) Or should I use Sched 80 PVC? I've been wanting to redo some of my piping so would prefer if something plastic and threaded came through the basement wall. My hard and acidic water eats through galvanized and I wanted to go one size bigger where I can to increase flow.

 

I don't see why you couldn't use schedule 80, but maybe the pros will weigh in. The black poly is usually rated at 200 PSI and 1 1/4 sched 80 is in 500 range. Certainly they still sell the poly, but you may have to buy a whole coil which would suck. That would be a good reason to use the PVC. But you'll have to find a brass barbed to threaded adaptor in the right size. Make sure you use stainless hose clamps and use two of them over each barb. Be careful backfilling the hole so there is no void under the pipe, otherwise it will be stressed by the soil above.

 

I had the same type of problem; my pipe from the well head to the house sprung a leak. The pipe is 4 feet down and runs 20 feet from the house to the wellhead. I also have a check valve right where the pipe comes into the basement and the check valve masked the leak until it got so bad the pump could not build up the pressure in the house. But my pipe was galvanized and the leak was about 10 feet from the house.

Dug down myself and replaced the entire 20 foot length with 200 psi black poly. (I think code only requires 160 psi but I figured I’d get the highest psi possible).You are supposed to make sure there are no stones or rocks under the pipe when you lay it and they recommend laying it on a bed of sand (I did).

Also I believe if you bring the pipe through a masonry foundation wall modern code says you are supposed to run the pipe through a sleeve in the wall (I did and used PVC for a sleeve) and the sleeve should be 2 pipe sizes larger than the pipe itself. You can then fill the gap between the pipe and the sleeve with some of the expansion filler like Great Stuff.

Maybe something like Carbide mentioned might have happened to your pipe, maybe it wasn’t supported properly where it enters your basement wall. That might be good since the rest of your pipe might be OK.

Good luck!

 

Well I hope your guys check in on Saturdays and that you like unexplained mysterious mysteries! I am baffled!

I decided to go through my outside stairs 'pit' instead of down 6 ft from outside. Couple hrs later, pipe going through the wall is exposed. No apparent leak. Dirt around the area is damp but not saturated as I expected from a leak. My pump still maxes at 42 lbs and after it stays on for hrs, my floor has puddles. Where is it coming from!!?!??

I dd solve one mystery - the Pump Control box is completely bypassed. I knew I heard the capacitor or its switch hum when the pressure switch kicked on yrs ago, but the old pump must have been a 3 wire one that used the box. When they replaced it 7 yrs ago, the yellow wire is capped off and there are no connections to the box control switch at all. So that Control Box is now just a junction box to connect wires from the on/off pressure switch and the black/red to the pump.

So I have no control box and no matter if my pump is slow/shot/check valve broken, or if my pressure tank is ruptured or whatever I STILL get water on my floor. There HAS to be a leak! And I think it HAS to be a big one as it keeps the pump running forever and cant get above 42 lbs, right? How far away from my house could it be to not continue down hill and instead bubble up through my floor?

 

This is in a basement?

Do you have pipes under the slab? Im thinking slab leak possibly.

Do a house side pressure test.. I would have to see a sketch of the plumbing, check valves, gauges, etc...

 

Yes its a full height basement. No pipes under the floor slab - they all go UP from there. The pump has been running for over an hr now and I'm starting to see some seepage from the corner. Its not where I thought it was from - through cracks in the floor closer to the doorway. The well pipe goes through the wall right next to the door (my pic) and then start bending away towards that corner. From the 'ditch' indentation where they buried the pipe that I can still see after 45 yrs, then did not go straight to the well - the route has quite a curve to it that has it coming closer to that corner of the house.

So it has to be a leak in the pipe 5, 10, 15 ft from the house. I just did a PGM test and from the pump directly to a hose (no pressure tank, no house plumbing, no filters) I was getting 3.1GPM with the pressure gauge reading 10 lbs. Of course some of that is leaking off... So after 4 hrs of 3GPM the ground finally saturates and the water get onto my floor.

I guess I need a backhoe...

 

You can pull a new line with only a hole dug at the well cap...

There is a sedge tool on a cable that pulls new pipe under ground. You feed the cable through the old pipe..

 

You sure that leak is not right in the wall?

 

Oh boy, what a day! Started at Home Depot at 7:30AM and finished with the backhoe around half past midnight. I'm sure the neighbors weren't happy but that rental had to go back this morning! I first started with checking in the wall for the leak by breaking around where the pipes went through. All dry in there.

So after 5 hrs of digging - I FINALLY found the leak! It was probably 8 ft of pipe away from the house but actually only 2 ft from the corner where the leak seeped into the basement. The piping takes a very circuitous route to the well - 2 huge turns bending back towards the house before it goes the opposite direction and down the hill to the well. NOT what I expected when I started digging. I can only think that when the house was built there was some huge rock shelf that they didn't feel like dynamiting so they just rerouted the pipe around it.

The pipe where it leaked was resting on some VERY hard, blackish clay, embedded with VERY sharp rocks. It's a layer in the soil and a BAD one for pipes. After 43 yrs it finally cut through and killed my water pressure.

The piping covering the wires was also broken but luckily there was no damage to the wires. It was a much thinner conduit. I used the same back poly to cover over the older piping of what I dug out so at least that section will be better protected. I also sleeved both water and electric using a 3" PVC through the cement block wall so they aren't cemented in place.

So we have water pressure, but now I just have HUGE mess to clean up... Thx for helping and I hope no-one else has to deal with something like this

 

Yea! A lot of work but you have to feel accomplished! Congrats. And you got to play with a backhoe, bonus!

 

Wow! Pretty impressive job IMHO. I bet most people couldn’t have pulled that off. You must have saved yourself a ton of money. Good luck!

 

Thx, I admit the backhoe was fun to play with but there was a LOT of hand digging as well. I am sore all over today...

As I was digging I kept saying 'Its gotta be RIGHT THERE!' Then after more and more and more digging, I finally found wet dirt and a little while later I turned on the pump and I was making MUD! Finding the leak was great, but then I realized all the work I had to do to fix it and put it all back together. Mixing up concrete at 10:30 pm (to fill in around the sleeve) wasnt exactly my plan for football -Sunday!