01 Nov, 2021
October 2021
It has been about 3 weeks since our last visit and our build is coming along. I have been following along through texts, emails, and an app called Builder Trend that our Builder uses to keep us up to date. This app is a communication tool for me to see what’s happening: past, present, and future through correspondence, photos, and a work calendar. Then when we are on site, we meet with our Project manager face to face.
With our foundation complete last month, next is FRAMING. The job was set to start the week after the foundation, but just like life in general, things come up. Our first framer was in an accident and could not start on time. Our Builder kept us in the know and 2 weeks later, the original framer could not be reached. Our builder assigned another framer a week before we arrived and the work had started.
We arrived on our property after dark and pulling in, we could see a large structure where was once just an open area. The next day, we could see our future house and we were surprised how fast this thing had come up. The floors were done, walls were up, and the roof was half done. By the time we left a week later, the entire framing was complete. It took less than 2 weeks from start to finish.
I am glad that we were able to be on site to look it over and I was able to make a couple of changes after discussing with our project manager. Mostly, we had questions, but one thing I was able to improve upon was to ask for a larger opening into our crawl space. There is quite a bit of room down there under the house so I was hoping to make it into a root cellar and the access was very small.
WELL DRILLING
October is dedicated to drilling a well. I started looking for well drillers at the start of the year and found several through Facebook recommendations. I also have a local Yellow Pages book which is helpful, but there are many businesses not listed in there so I suspect only those who pay for listings are shown. I found several local well drillers, but many were almost a year out as of 11 months ago. I put a lot of stock in personal reviews and I stalk their online reviews and talk to locals whenever I can. The local hardware stores usually have opinions which I also take into consideration. This is not just for well drillers, but for anyone I hope to hire.
I contacted JR from Northern Lights Drilling in March and then met him in May of this year. October is the earliest he could pencil me in so I jumped on it. I kept in communication and weeks before, I started touching bases more frequently to let him know that we were coming and ready. Right on track. JR and his crew arrived as promised, on time, and ready to work. The trucks were set the day before and they arrived on time at 8am the next morning. We were expecting rain, but they work rain or shine.
Here is our process for our well:
WATER WITCHING. I tried it, I think it works, but I cannot tell how deep it is. I used 2 welding rods bent at 90 degree angles for handles, leaving a long part on each rod to detect water. You hold the handles loosely, with your elbows tucked in, and the long part parallel to the ground and parallel from each other, then walk slowly. Strangely, the rods do move and cross each other as it detects water and sure enough, the rods separate again as you walk away from the ‘water spot.’ I tested it and you can make a clear enough path to see where the water is flowing, but I could not find a way to tell how deep the water is. My property has water everywhere so I gave up on this approach.
Idaho has a website where you can research registered wells in your area to give you an idea of how deep you may have to go. Many wells are not registered, but it is something to look at. We met with JR in May and decided where to place the well. Our neighbor to one side has a 720 foot well and our neighbor on the other side has a 375 foot well. I’m hoping for closer to 300 feet, but we decided on an estimate for 500 feet. We chose a location away from the house where our property has a low point and farther away from the mountain. It was a toss-up between closer to the house at higher ground level or at lower ground farther away from the house; we chose the lower elevation. A marker was pounded into the ground and we cleared the area of trees and brush and made a pad for the trucks, anticipating where the cuttings and water would be flushed. Initial estimate $24K estimating for 500 feet. Our property was virgin, with no previous dwellings or inhabitants when we purchased it. If you are planning a well, drill the well away from any potential contaminants such as animal feedlots, buried fuel tanks, and septic systems which can pollute your water. The area should be easily accessible for maintenance, and away from building sites (check your local regulations for exact minimum distance and setbacks).
We have met locals who have shallow wells on their property when we filled our water totes and many of those shallow wells went dry this summer. Deeper wells should be less likely to dry up, more filtered, and less likely to be contaminated.
Our neighbor told us that his water comes out red. It is some sort of non-toxic algae. I’ll have to research that. Our California property also has red water, but it is iron and minerals in the water. I have been considering gravity filtration systems such as the Berkin. In the foothills of central California, we used a Hague whole house water filtration system, which I am absolutely am happy with and hope to get something similar to this. The Hague system sits outside the house and we put salt into it every few months. I will research more on this and post my results later…let’s get some water first.
Now we are at 6 months later…trucks were set the day before DRILLING DAY. Permit filed by well driller. I was notified that cost of materials has gone up, nothing new – almost everything has gone up in cost since we started. Day of drilling: The crew of 2 arrived at 8am. They checked their equipment and set the 1st casing and started drilling by 9am. The 10” casings come in 20-foot sections and are placed in the ground. The casings prevent the well from caving in and protects the well water from contamination from the surrounding area. In the 1st 20 feet, I saw pockets of water shooting out in between dirt and sand. They hit coarse gravel at 30 feet. The 10” casing went in 38 feet down. Next, the 6” well casing went into the 10” casing and was sealed with bentonite clay.
The rig itself is pretty impressive. It has 'feet' that lift the truck off of the ground and the boom goes up. The other truck next to it is loaded with the casings.
Each casing has to be welded to the next one.
A lot of sand and some water spray...if you go look on my Facebook 'hobbyhomefarm' page, you can watch some videos of the process. The guys have a little hand net that they use every so often to check what kind of gravel and sand is coming out.
Having our well drilled was interesting to watch, but the whole process took a solid 2 days of work. We watched in the very beginning when it broke ground and then periodically throughout the process while we worked on other chores. We initially estimated having to go down 500 feet with 80 feet of casing. At the end of the first day, we had gone down with 135 feet of casing and they ran out of casing and had to go back to their yard to get more. A lot of fine sand was coming out, but no water yet. Sand has to be coarse so that the screen they put down there can filter it out. The next day, the guys returned with more casing and hit water at 214 feet. They estimated at about 5 gallons per minute, but the water was ruddy and a rusty brown. They took the sample back to their yard to get more supplies and have the boss look at it. JR called me to say that it probably could be cleaned up a bit and 5 gallons was good enough water and we were at a lower figure than the estimate, but there’s the option of going deeper for possibly a better source with no guarantee that they would hit it. I felt like I was rolling the dice, but I chose to go deeper…I wanted more.
At 295 feet, we hit water. Good Water. Estimated at 50 gallons per minute, amazing water. Gambling in our case paid off BIG! It was end of day Friday, so the guys will return Monday to cut the pipe down to about 2 feet out of the ground and cap it off….and I will get the bill…
Monday, I get the bill. I am happy! Even though we were more shallow, it was casing all the way which is more expensive. I thought about it all weekend expecting a pretty big bill, but to my surprise, we were under budget. Bill was just under $20 thousand dollars.
WELL PUMP…Now that the well is dug, getting a well pump is a separate task. For now, our new well just looks like a pipe sticking out of the ground.
Comments