Category: Water Infrastructure

The day before yesterday I was watering our raised beds. We shouldn’t need to water the raised beds but we do because (a) we built them late in spring (its best to build them in the fall) so they did not have an opportunity to fully absorb water; (b) because they are still not properly mulched. As I was moving through the beds the water pressure in the hose began to drop and quickly diminished. With some trepidation I went to check the problem.

First I checked that we still had electricity. Check. Then I went to make sure that the pump was not idling (struggling to pressurize) and it was. I unplugged it and plugged it back in and after some struggling it managed to pressurize. Check. Then I looked into the well and it was empty. Not check. Ouch. Big Ouch.

We thought that maybe the springs in the well had gotten clogged and needed to be cleaned. First thing, I took a bunch of empty plastic bottles and went to bring drinking water. Then Andreea called Sammy – the guy who cleaned our well last year – and asked him to come again. He came yesterday evening. We most of the remaining water on the raised beds and Sammy went down to check things out. He did a bit of cleaning up … there wasn’t much.

We overused our well. It is our only water source. It is summer. It was fine last year but last year we weren’t watering raised beds and we weren’t showering much. The showering isn’t nearly as demanding as the watering … so my assumption is that the watering drained our well.

Most people here do not water their fields. They simply can’t. Those that do dig small lakes … deep enough to penetrate the aquifer and draw water from it  … they don’t do it from their house wells. Though our raised beds are a relatively small garden … watering them is simply not possible with the supply of water that we currently have. This is where the rubber meets the road … how resilient will mulched raised beds turn out to be? Time will tell.

The well is filling up again … but it isn’t reaching the level we know it to be. Painful lesson learned.

Finally we get to the point – installing the pump. This just goes to show you how long a journey it was … at the end of this post there will be an image of joyous water flowing 🙂

However as I write these words we are are at the peak of winter (soon the hardest part of winter will be behind us) and we have no running water due to freezing problems. I will try, in this post, to address what we did, what should have be done and what we will be doing to fix this problem so that hopefully, next winter, water will continue to flow.

What We Did

The pump was installed on the concrete stage set for it in the concrete box. It was bolted down (though we’ve seen been advised that it is enough to place it on the screws without actually bolting it down – it was a pain to close the bolts and a pain to open them when we had to take the pump out for thawing). The pump is bolted to an expansion tank.

A ribbed flexible hose runs from the well, through a mechanical filter to keep debris from going into the pump. The pump outlet drops to the floor where it is hooked up to a 3-way flow junction. One (the only one connected at this point) goes to the main house, another is designed for a future connection of the barn and a third is for a water supply in the field.

What We Did Wrong

This is easier to demonstrate with a diagram.

The frost-depth in our area is 80cm. When we did the digging we went to somewhere between 100cm and 110cm. We thought that would be enough margin – and it was. However it you look at the diagram you will see that the physical characteristics of the pump bring it to way above the required depth for frost protection. The pump itself sits on top of the expansion tank. Its inlet is at its mid-height (the expansion tank and then some) and its outlet comes out on top and reaches even higher then the pump itself. The result is such that water reaches as close as 40cm from the surface … way too high to be protected from frost.

Once frost gets hold in one component of the system it quickly sucks energy out of the entire system and ice spreads throughout. The entire system froze: the pump, the plumbing next to the pump, the entire pipe running from the bottom of the well to the pump (even though the water in the well has not frozen), and some of the pipe (we don’t know how much) leaving towards the house.

What We Should Have Done

We should have taken into account the pump itself. We should have dug deeper (at least another 50cm) so that the pump inlet would be at just above floor level and inline with the passage-hole of the pipe  from the well into the concrete box. This would have kept everything below frost depth.

In addition it would have reduced the need for bending the pipes. The less bends and the softer the bends are – the better flow there will be through the pipes.

Junction Box

A similar problem exists in the junction box – the 2nd concrete box (please excuse image quality).

The main supply is split into two flows – one for unfiltered water in the field, the other for indoor use. Indoor water is passed through a filter (for hard-water deposits – not yet to our satisfaction) and then split into three valves – one of which is currently used and goes to the house. Here most of the plumbing is at floor level – so it should be frost resistant (however since the system has been out of use for a couple of weeks it too has frozen). However the filter is installed again way too high – way into the frost depth risk.

Having the filter indoors would have protected it from frost and would have made it easier to maintain – however we would then filters in other future stuctures where the water supply may go.

What We Will Do

I don’t expect that we will be redigging the bottom of the concrete box – as that may destabilize the concrete itself.

The entire well assembly was taken apart. The pump and plumbing attached to it was brought indoors to thaw.They have since been returned to their place and properly insulated with mineral-wool. A sheet of mineral wool covers the entire pump and will be removed in spring to prevent overheating.

Using rags soaked in hot water I’ve managed to defrost at least the beginning of the supply pipe that exits the well assembly. However since water does not flow out of it I am assuming that it is still frozen deeper inside. I don’t know what to do about that.

The long pipe running from the well has been pulled out and is slowly thawing indoors.

The junction box, after it’s thawed out, will also be insulated with mineral-wool – all the plumbing and the filter.

Pump Doesn’t Pressurize

When the pump is unable to pressurize (when its main valve is shut so that it’s isolated from the supply line) there is a very good chance that the problem is with a no-return valve which should be installed at the end of the pipe that is lowered into the well. This valve keeps the water from flowing back into the well (gravity) when the pump is inactive.

We purchased a special set of pipe with a fitted valve – and the valve failed. When it leaks the pump loses its priming (=when it is initially filled with water until the entire pipe down to the water level is filled with water) and cannot pressurize properly.

I would suggest keeping a spare valve at home  – this seems to be a relatively common problem (I guess they don’t make valves like they used to).

Pipe, Stay

Finally, we had a problem keeping the pipe running into the well properly oriented and in the water – it got twisted (because it was too long) and floated. So, first thing is to get it to the right length – general wisdom seem to be that it should be ~60cm above the floor of the well.

The anchoring solution came from our neighbor – tried and true Romanian villager know-how.

He first destroyed one of our buckets by drilling holes in it. Then he placed a rock in it. The hose itself is tied to the two sides of the bucket. This way the supply pipe will never touch dirt, will always be immersed in water and will always be properly oriented. How cool is that? 🙂

Great joy came when we finally had water flowing from a pipe near the entry of the house 🙂

Next up is getting the water into the house 🙂

If, like us, you are a complete beginner then figuring out what materials to use that this can be an annoying  obstacle. I was learning about these materials in English and then we (mostly Andreea) had to track them down in Romanian – so it was not just a technical barrier but a language barrier too. What follows are our choices based on the materials that are available here and within our budget limitations. We ended up going with the parts and materials typically used. There are other to choose from … but for all the right and wrong reasons we went with the typical stuff.

Outdoor: HDPE

Above and underground we used 32mm HDPE pipes (in Romanian PEID). This is a robust black pipe of which we purchased a 200 meter roll.  The fact that comes in a roll can be misleading as it is not very flexible – it can go around large corners but it definitely not flexible enough for you to bend to your will.

It was very difficult to lay in the long trench in the ground – as the roll is large and heavy. The  workers who helped took the entire roll to one end and rolled it out – very difficult. In retrospect I think that (a) the rolled pipe should have been placed on the ground at one end  of its path; (b) one person should have rotated the roll while (c) another person pulled the free end out and away from the roll and towards the other end of the path. I think this would have resulted in much less of a struggle. But I haven’t yet had an opportunity to try this 🙂

Easy to use T and corner joints and adapters are available – they are twisted open and closed by hand – you won’t need any tools to hook these up. There are also adapters to make the transition from HDPE to standard metal (aluminum / bronze) plumbing parts. The T and corner joints themselves come in different variations (male, female) which include the adapter connections. Please note that these joints and adapters are not too expensive but not too cheap either. You will need more of them then you think and they can add up to a substantial cost.

The pipe can be cut fairly easily with a hacksaw.

Indoor: PEX-AL-PEX

PEX tubes are a very popular indoor piping system. PEX is a kind of plastic tube. Pex-Al-Pex is a three layer pipe made up of a layer of aluminum sandwiched between two layers of PEX. They can be used for both hot and cold water supply and are fairly easy to work with. There are numerous brands of these  pipes and we chose (based on a recommendation from a professional plumber) to use 20mm “Henco” pipes which are better and easier (more flexible) to work with.

The connectors and adapters are fairly simple to use. The pipes need to be cut straight and clean (either with a specialized cutter or with careful attention using a standard utility knife). Then the end needs to be expanded slightly (either with a specialized tool or with an ad-hoc tool that fits tightly inside the pipe) and after that it is all you need is a wrench to lock it tight. The pipes are flexible and easy to work with.

To the best of my knowledge there are “systems” of PEX tubing which are assembled with pressure joints – this includes joints and adapters into which the pipe is inserted and pressed using a special tool. This is excellent for do-it-yourself work because it creates a perfect seal every time (no leak worries). We still haven’t come across such a system here in Romania. Though, from searching for the images above, it seems that Henco also has a pressure-fitted system – so we will definitely look into that in the future.

PVC

We used 40 mm PVC pipes for collecting and evacuating the water from the house. We have a fairly simple system where all the elements are close together and are collected to one exit point. PVC is pretty cheap and very easy to work with.

The pipe comes in lengths of 1, 2 or 4 meters. One end of the pipe is designed for connecting pipes – it has a slightly wider diameter and holds a plastic washer to achieve a good seal. Two important things to remember about PVC pipe are (1) that the up-stream pipe always goes into the down-stream pipe and (2) since they are usually gravity operated they should be set a 2 degree angle – which is about a 2.5cm drop for every meter of length.

If, for example, you need a half meter pipe you can of course cut it from a longer pipe, however the left over pipe-section will no longer have the connecting/sealing end. However you can work around this – a trick a local plumber taught me. You heat the end of the pipe for a few seconds until is softens and then insert into it another pipe which creates the shape of an adapter end:

Metal Adapters and Valves

The plumbing works included metal joints and accessories. There are quite a few of these and you will discover your way around them and how to use them. I don’t yet know enough about the variety to give a guided tour but there are a few things I can point out.

There are aluminum parts and bronze ones. The bronze ones seem much better in resisting corrosion – the aluminum ones are not very impressive. Yet some parts seem to be available only in aluminum and others only in copper – I don’t know why that is. I am also not sure what are the consequences of coupling them together (which we had to do).

Connecting them takes some effort – you need at least two decent monkey/pipe wrenches and you will need to learn how to work with them. I’m still a beginner. You will need some lining material  (silicon based thread or hemp strings). The most mysterious, to me, aspect about connecting them is when you want to achieve specific orientation. On the one hand they should be tightened all the way to get a good seal yet sometimes that will end up in awkward positions that don’t work out for the connections you want to make. My only solution was to use a good amount of lining material and tighten them as much as possible but not beyond the position in which I wanted them to be (I found that going past the preferred end position and then backing up a bit is a recipe for a leak).

You are going to need valves – probably more then you think – and this, like the HDPE joints and adapters, is going to pile up to a substantial cost. Basically you need valves to give you control of the system when something goes wrong and maintenance is required. The end result of good planning seems to be that  both ends of a pipe are typically controlled by a valve enabling you to isolate the section of pipe between the two valves. This is especially important in long pipes that may contain a large amount of water.

Valves come with different male/female fittings which you can use as you see fit. The long-handled valves are easier to operate HOWEVER they can be more cumbersome to install, especially in more complex assemblies. Remember that as you connect the pieces you will need to rotate them – so they need to be arranged in such a way that you CAN rotate them.  Also, if you purchase a vale with asymmetrical fittings (one side male and the other female) then that limits you in how you can connect it – so you may find yourself with a valve oriented the wrong way. This may sound stupidly obvious … but I put myself into a few tight corners by choosing the wrong kind of valve. So I’ve said what I have to say 🙂

There was quite a bit of digging (manual and machine) involved in our water infrastructures. I can point out for distinct efforts: (1) a cement box for the pump; (2) a cement box for main supply valves; (3) a long trench for a water pipe and electricity; (4) getting water in and out of the house.

Pump Box

Having decided to go with a surface pump we needed to create a freeze-proof space next to the well to install the pump. I suppose it’s possible to build some insulated box above surface but the recommended solution is an underground cement box. I started digging this hole by hand before we moved out and it was loads of difficult physical work.

In this image, taken while the well was being prepared for cleaning, you can see the hole in progress.

When this dig was completed there was a hole over 1 meter deep and 1 meter square in the ground. It needs to be large enough to accommodate the pump itself, some plumbing and a person who can move around inside for installation and maintenance work. In the image you can see the hole into the well and the beginning of an exit trench towards which the main water supply pipe will be installed.

A few small tips and things I would have done differently:

• Make the hole into well in line with where the pump will be installed so that the pipe from the well does need to bend (beyond coming out of the well).
• Do not begin the ditch for the pipe before completing the cement box. The earth walls form the outer form for the cement box. By starting the ditch I complicated the form work since a part of the earth was missing.

The inner forms for the cement box were built outside

… and then lowered into the hole in the ground followed by rebar to give the cement walls structural integrity.

Here you can see the layers of the inner form-work, the concrete rebar, and the outer earth.

The cement was poured in (mixed in an electric mixer and carried over in a  wheelbarrow) and when the forms came off we had a nice box.

Complete with holes fitted with 10cm PVC pipe into which smaller feed pipes will be fitted later.

And then immediately work began on the box cover. A wooden frame was created at the top of the box.

On  that frame they laid down a wooden “floor” (if I remember correctly they also put in some posts inside the box to further support the “floor” form). Then added some more rebar. On top of the rebar they added a manhole cover (which is supported on another partial wooden frame and ultimately set in the concrete) and an outside form to contain the poured cement.

Our concrete mix was a bit thin because we did not have gravel on-site and there wasn’t enough justification to bring in a truck load (even a small one). We did however have a large pile of sand with very small rocks in it leftover from the concrete floor that was placed inside the house. This meant that we needed more cement in the mix (gravel provides much of the volume in typical cement mixes).

The whole thing is supposed to be setup with a slight slope to the side and back (away from the well itself) to drain water away … I am not convinced that they put in enough slope.

And this what the result at the end of the concrete work.

A few days later (during which we watered the concrete numerous times) they came and hacked through the manhole opening with a chainsaw and pulled out the remaining forms.

The floor of the box remained pack-dirt so that excess moisture could soak away. Inside the floor they dug a hole 30cm deep which served as a foundation for a small concrete platform (~15 cm high above ground) upon which the pump itself would be installed.

Then came another precious lesson about working with professional, especially Romanian professionals. The pump is anchored with anchor bolts (bolts that are set in the concrete). I had already given some thought about how to place those bolts precisely enough for the pump base (which has very little tolerance). The solution I came up with was to comfortably (outside the cramped space of the concrete box) create a simple wooden template which would mark correct placement of the screws. Then the screws would be attached to the template, leaving as much as needed sticking out and the template would be placed in the concrete.

Still sounds like a good plan to me but they didn’t think so and I (through Andreea’s translation) was not demanding enough. So they did it “professional Romanian” style. They carried the pump out to the well and measured the distance between the screw holes and “copied” those measurements to the fresh concrete.

It was particularly disconcerting when, after rough measurement they placed the anchor bolts in place and jiggled them around a bit to get them to set well in the concrete.

When I came to install the pump I could just barely get two of the screw-holes onto the anchored screws. Of course it didn’t fit – why should it? Luck? By then the professionasl were already paid and too busy to come back and fix their work (hold on to your money in Romania until work is completed to your satisfaction) so I finally had to purchase a disc cutter (which has been an extremely useful tool, much more then I expected it to be) and cut the existing bolts, purchased bolts that could be drilled in (rather then set in the fresh concrete), drill holes for new ones and cut the new ones to size

Note: if you want to be able to get a nut onto the bolt you better cut it straight and level … not a trivial thing to do crouched in a confined space in the ground. I definitely paid for their stupidity – but as always I got a precious lesson in return.

Trenches

We hired a local excavator to dig an ~80 meter long and 110 cm deep (well below the freeze-depth of about 80 cm) trench then went from the pump-box to the back of the house where eventually a pipe entered the house. The dig started from behind the house.

Down towards the road

… and then across it

and across to the well-box

Not long after that a 32mm HDPE pipe and a protected electric cable were laid in the ditch which, for the most part, was quickly backfilled.

A protection measure can be taken for the pipe and cable  – and that is to place them over and cover them with a layer of builders sand which is better draining and also acts as a cushion against the heavy and expansive clay soil. We didn’t do this mostly due to costs – we would have needed another truck load of sand and would have to pay for more excavation time (for lining the trench with sand before laying the cable and pipe and then covering them with another layer before backfilling the trench).

 Junction Box

A second concrete box was excavated and built to house both a main filter and a junction point from which the water supply could be split to numerous destinations (including the house, a future connection to the summer kitchen, a future new house and an outside water supply in the area surrounding the house). This time, and in a matter of minutes, the tractor completed the excavation and the concrete construction process was repeated a second time.

Stay tuned for a closer look at the actual pump installation, plumbing and electricity.

The best and probably most comfortable and sustainable water pumping solution is gravity – but that works only if you have a properly situated source on your property (a spring at an altitude high enough to provide water pressure). We didn’t have it this good but we had a well and we had to install some kind of pump to get water flowing from it to the house.

Our research led us to two kinds of pumps – surface pumps and submersible pumps. We chose a surface pump (see why below). I am not an expert on pumps but here are a few things we were able to pick up along the way.

Water Pressure

Submersible pumps seem to be able to provide a higher water pressure then surface pumps. They use different mechanical configurations to pump water which effects water pressure. This is in addition to a rule-of-thumb that says that the closer the pump is to the source of water the higher the pressure it can provide. Though we installed our surface pump close to the well, a submersible (immersed in the water) pump is closer to the water source then a surface pump.

Installation

A submersible pump should be easier to install then a surface pump – but we haven’t done this so we can’t vouch for it. A submersible pump is, supposedly, simply lowered into the well where its weight stabilizes it in the water. This of course assumes you have a well deep enough (during all seasons of the year!) to accommodate the pump.

A surface pump is more tricky to install. Assuming you want to have it close to the well you will need to make a space for it. As we live in a climate with a freezing cold winter this meant creating an underground chamber that drops below the freezing depth (more on this in the next post in the series).

Overall Water System

A submersible pump is usually part of a system where a large water tank is installed in or near the house and fed directly from the pump. Inside the tank is a water level sensor that, when the water drops to a set level, activates the pump until the tank is full again. A second pump is then installed to feed and pressurize the water from the tank into the house. This way the well-pump doesn’t need to come on whenever you open a water faucet. The water is taken from the large storage tank (which, if placed inside, can also double as a preheating tank bringing the water in it slowly up to room temperature). The pump only comes on when the tank needs filling. This prolongs the life of the pump.

A surface pump provides a more or less consistent water pressure (usually assisted by a pressurized expansion tank). It comes on when water is required and shuts off when the flow stops. You can then direct and split the water flow as needed (keeping in mind the overall pressure that the pump can supply).

Local Wisdom

Local wisdom indicates that surface pumps are better – this is what almost everyone here uses. It is rumored (meaning that I haven’t confirmed this myself) that submersible pumps are more prone to problems and more sensitive to fluctuation of water levels. Professional wisdom (at least that we’ve had access to) seems to indicate that submersible pumps are better as they provide better water pressure and are more reliable then surface pumps.

Price

Good submersible pumps (in Romania) are much more expensive (our research has shown them to be at least 4 times more expensive then the ubiquitous surface pumps) than good surface pumps. Both come with a limited 2 year guarantee.

Our Choice

We chose to go with a surface pump for numerous reasons:

• Price was high up on our list of priorities. A submersible pump (let alone the entire system around it) was beyond our means.
• Almost anyone we spoke to (in our village and others) who has a pump uses a surface pump and claims it is reliable.
• Almost anyone we spoke to (in our village and others) said that submersible pumps are problematic unless they are installed in optimum conditions (we don’t know what these conditions are).
• We needed a diversified water supply – 2 structures + 2 outside locations (making it difficult to include a water storage tank to supply all our needs).
•  We did not have a winter-proof place to install the water tank needed for the submersible pump (creating one would have been complicated and expensive).
• We preferred to start with a system we can scale up if needed rather then start with a scaled up system.

There are numerous brands of pumps available in Romania. Many of which are very cheap – we tend to avoid these. Then there are some very expensive brands (both submersible and surface). We chose to go with a reasonably mid-priced German brand – Grundfos. We hope this proves to be a good choice (reliable performance for many years). So far so good.

Cleaning

The first task was to get the water clean to the point that we could use it at all. The water was unclean because some years ago there was a one-time flooding – so we had to have the well cleaned. We didn’t know quite what that meant and were happy to find a local who knew what needed to be done and did the work for us:

1. He pumped out the water from the well. The pump was able to pull water out faster then it could fill from the spring. We tried to save as much of it as we could though I think most of it evaporated (you can see in the image the hole I began to dig where eventually the pump would be installed … he lent a helping hand as he was waiting for the pump to finish emptying the well).
2. He climbed into the well and roughly cleaned the well from weeds that had grown on the walls.
   
3. He loaded buckets of mud that were at the bottom that his partner,  a gypsy from the village he hired for the job, pulled up and dumped next to the well. They hauled out a lot of buckets … there was a huge pile of mud when they finished. He did this until (supposedly, since I wasn’t down there with him) the bottom of the well was once again tightly packed dirt.
   
   
4. When the work was finished we had …. murky well water … We had to wait a few days until the well settled and the water became clear.
5. The guy who cleaned the well instructed us, after the water settled, to throw in 10 tablets of chlorine. We purchased the tablets, then lost them and though have since found them, we have not (months later) yet (I wouldn’t hold my breath) thrown them into the water.

Overall I think they did an OK job. Since then we’ve hired help a few times and my overall impression with Romanian workers is that they work hard but they don’t strive (and don’t achieve) quality. They do an OK job. If you want quality you need to either do it yourself or be very demanding and very specific with what you want done. It can be hard to do without already having experience AND being a foreigner with a 4×4 parked near bye … but I have learned that common sense (especially my own after studying up) should not be ignored.

This is what it looked like mid-day – the workers, our neighbors and Andreea taking a break in the shade.

Testing

Officially we were supposed to do a lab test to the water, we intended to but we didn’t. To do the test you need to pick up a sterilized bottle, fill it (and another soft-drink plastic bottle) with water (after cleaning the well and after the water in the well has settled) and then bring it to the lab in the city within hours of filling. It costs around 200+ Lei to do the level of analysis we would need and the result should be specific instructions on what kind of filtering we would need for the water to be drinkable.

Getting all this done requires specific timing and though at first we tried to do it, it didn’t work out. By the time we had the well cleaned we decided to not do the testing (it was one of those things where obstacles kept getting in our way – and we are learning to read such obstacles as signs that maybe we shouldn’t go that way).

We also didn’t start drinking from the water for quite some time because it had (still has!) too much stone content in it – it is hard water. We now have a rock-salt kind of filter on the main line – it needs to be cleaned every few weeks for optimal performance. We also have a separate drinking water filter and we run the water that comes from it through another passive filter for any sedimentation that may be left in the water. We drink and cook with this water.

Water is something I’ve taken for granted all of my life. When we started out here we had a well which had been mostly unused for some years and needed cleaning. As I write these words we have a faucet with running water next to our front door. We still have a journey to make until we have running water (hot and cold and drinkable) in the house. We thought this would be resolved much faster but there were/are many details involved.

This is intended to be the first of a series of articles about the installation of our water infrastructure. Yet before I get to the technicalities and lessons learned in our process I feel that it is important to dedicate this first post to the most important aspect of water supply – making sure you have it available to you.

Having lived (when we moved out to the village) for a couple of months with water carried in a bucket from the well and then with a single running faucet outside the house I no longer take water for granted. It should be one of the primary considerations when selecting land. You need to have a source of water before you can do anything with it. We had hoped to have a natural source of running water on our property but that didn’t work out. A natural source can be a spring or a river. It is preferable to have a source that is higher (the more the better) from the location where you intend to live as that will provide you with, to some degree, with a gravity-driven flow of water (no pump required) and potentially an option to generate hydro-electricity.

The next option was to have an accessible water-table, flow and good water.

• The water-table indicates the level of water beneath the surface – this can change throughout the seasons of the year. Ours seems to be about 4m below the surface (where the well is located at the lowest point of our property … this can change in different location on the property). A next door property – slightly elevated from ours where one of the two wells has been known to dry up during drought summer weeks.
• Flow indicates what volume of water a well can hold. Our well is round and about 1 meter across. When we had it measured it was ~1.7m deep. That means that we have about 1.3 cubic meters of water in it which is about 1300 liters of water. When we had the well cleaned (next post in the series) that water was pumped out in less then 30 minutes. Near the bottom of the well there is a spring which fills it and it took the spring about 2 hours to fill back up.
• Drinkable water is a complicated subject that covers a diverse range of things including chemical, biological and mineral composition. Many things can effect the quality of water. Our well seems to be well known in the village to have good water and our neighbors were using it slightly.

We were fortunate to arrive at a property where there was an existing well – which made assessing some of these things easier. If you arrive at a property that does not then you should be prepared to do some tests to assess these things. This also meant that we did not have to deal with drilling a well (though we may need to in the future – depending on where and what we choose to build). So we have no practical experience with drilling and I won’t be addressing it in this series.