A Well of Support: Our Journey to Replace the Farm’s Well

by Kurt Bench

Let’s start today by playing a quick game of “Name that photo.” What do you think this is?…

Let’s play a game. What do you think these are?

If you guessed my father’s well, you’d be right. All 300 feet of it.

You might be wondering: “Why is your well piping sitting on your grass?”

Good question.

This week, I wanted to talk about a pretty big project that I’ve been working on for the last three months at our farm—helping my parents replace their well.

Yup, I know. I see the irony too.

For five long weeks, all we talked about was stopping the rain. Now I’m talking about bringing water TO my fields. But as a farmer, I know that it just takes a few hot, dry days, and our crops will be crying out for water.

We’ll need a working well.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s go back to the beginning.

The field crops are watered using this irrigation wheel. It slowly pulls in the sprinkler head and respools the hose.

Our Water Source and the Need for a New Well

Our farm currently sources its water from our parents’ well, located right next door. This well was dug and installed back in 1988. It’s roughly 300 feet deep and has never run dry. It’s powered by a diesel motor and we use it to run water to our irrigation wheel that powers a giant sprinkler head to water our sweet corn. It also feeds water to all our drip-irrigation lines in a convoluted water-way system made up of aluminum pipes and fireman-hose.

The field crops are watered using this irrigation wheel, which slowly pulls in the sprinkler head and respools the hose.

Normal maintenance on a well is about every 10 years. We haven’t done anything in 31 years. So it’s time for a tune-up.

We first started noticing issues the last two seasons.

We had to operate the motor at a higher RPM to get the right pressure. This was a sign that something wasn’t right. The sprinkler kick gun would stick if I didn’t keep my eye on it because there wasn’t enough pressure to run it properly. It was so bad, I used to have to sit out in my truck all night (and set my alarm to check every few hours).

That’s when we decided to start looking into a replacement well pump.

Our contractors used a giant crane to pull each 20 foot section of the old well piping out.

The Search for a New Well Pump

Over the winter, my dad and I did a lot of research. Well pumps don’t come cheap, which is why I’ve been putting it off. And there aren’t too many companies out there that install them. The price tag came in around $30,000—and that’s just for the well itself.

I talked it over with Corinna, and even though we weren’t in a financial place to be able to pay cash for it, we decided it needed to be done. At some point this season, we’ll be needing water. Badly.

Knowing this, the last thing I wanted was to find myself in a situation where we tried to turn on the water switch, and the well failed. That would spell disaster. When this happens, you can’t just call a well mechanic to come out and “fix it” in 24 hours.

The well had to be replaced proactively before we had a real problem.

And so—just like that, we were in the market for a well.

The Installation Process

We hired a contractor four weeks ago (in the middle of all that rain) to come out and start PHASE 1—pulling out the old well piping. They brought in a crane that pulled out 10-foot sections of pipe piece by piece and cut it. You can see the video above to watch the process.

Our well contractors pull out the old well piping in sections and cut.

Sure enough, at the very bottom of the pipe, there were five large holes—which explained why our well pressure had been so low. Our contractors had done several yield tests before they removed the pipe to determine the amount of pressure and pump we’d need for our new set-up. Once we had this information, I could start to piece together the system and parts we’d need to purchase.

When we pulled the old pipe out, we noticed 5 holes like this.

The $30,000 price tag was split between my parents and us. It covered the actual submersible well pump, the well piping, and a variable frequency drive that varies the pressure and volume of water that comes out.

I also needed to figure out how to run this thing — that was an additional expense. I couldn’t just run power out from the road to the middle of the field (where our current well is located). That would be totally cost prohibitive. I wish you could have seen me scribbling out formulas, doing crazy water use math that I hadn’t done in years—water pressure ratios and tables. This was getting complicated. And I couldn’t afford to make any mistakes.

In the end, I had to look into buying a generator too. My contractors recommended a 100 kW size generator. Those don’t run cheap either. All the used generators I could find locally were priced around $10K, and to rent one was about the same cost for just the year.

Getting Creative with the Well System

So I started to get creative. What if I could “piecemeal” this system together?

After talking our problem over with one of my past bosses at a local irrigation company, I found a used generator head on eBay for around $2,900, but it was out near Portland, Oregon.

This is where the story gets cool.

I called my buddy Jon Pietrowski. Jon is a CSA member and he hauls loads all over the country. I asked if he might find a way to carry a load out to Oregon, and then bring BACK my generator in his truck on the return trip.

Two days later, Jon was on a four-day cross-country mission to pick up my generator head.

We went all the way to Oregon for THIS. The generator head fit snugly in the back of Jon’s truck.

Meanwhile, I still had to find a motor to run this generator head. My neighbor Adam Downs asked his friend Brad Rife, who said, “I think the Emches have an old John Deere motor from an old tomato harvester sitting in their barn. And they want to get rid of it.” (I know.. it’s like a game of 6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon).

A few days later… I had my motor. Motor cost: $2,700.

Meet the motor that will power the generator. It’s a beast. We might just call this system Lil Jon when we’re all done.

Our next step starting THIS week: stitch all the parts together.

Before I sat down to write this, I just got news that the parts for the well pump have arrived, and the contractors will be at the farm Monday to install them. My dad and our electrician will be finding a way to wire the whole contraption together so that it works.

The “new well” should be operational by the 4th of July.

At a cost of around $38,000 when all is said and done.

Community Support and Resourcefulness

I look back at this story and I can’t help but shake my head at how it all came together last minute. (It drives my type-A wife Corinna crazy). And not a moment too soon, as the summer temperatures heat up and the weather forecast looks dry.

Here’s a little secret: Farmers lean on our community connections all the time. It’s what makes us resourceful. It’s what we rely on to solve problems. I could never have done this on my own. Not in a million years.

This story of the well is really a story about our awesome community coming together to make something big happen.

If I could run the credits at the end of this movie, I’d have a lot of people to thank who made it all possible… Big Dave, Adam Downs, Brad Rife, Watson Well Services, Yackee’s, the Emches, Jack Bradshaw, Chad Blausey, Todd Atkins, eBay, Power Systems Plus—the generator company in Oregon, and Jon Pietrowski. They each played a critical role, and without them, I’d still be crunching water tables.

To all the players, thanks for coming through for us in a big way. I’ll tell this story for as long as I live. (Because it’s a good one).

~Your Farmer, Kurt