Cloudy and muddy water from well after house plumbing work

[condoowner]

Hello,

Last weekend we did some plumbing work on my house which is equipped with a water well (not sure about the depth but its not surface water). We started by stopping the well pump (breaker off) then proceeded to empty the system from the bladder (pressure) tank and faucets...

After the plumbing work was done, we restarted the well pump, refilled the hot water heater and bladder tank and ran the faucets in the house to purge entrapped air. At first, I noticed the water in the bathtub was darker than usual, and tons of black sediments started to come out of the faucet (see attached picture). I didn't notice anything else with other faucets so I just assumed it was grime accumulated in the bathtub piping (I mainly use the showers and never used the bathtub yet).

However, the next day I went to fill a glass of water to drink, and noticed the water was extremely cloudy. I tried to run the faucets a bit more thinking it was crap in the piping... to no avail. Yesterday I filled a glass of water and let it sit overnight. This morning, the water in the glass was still cloudy although a bit less. There is a dark muddy deposit at the bottom and the glass seems to be really gummed-up (see pictutres) by what appears to be clay.

I called a well guy this morning and he said that this happened because when we refilled everything we let the well pump run at maximum capacity for a bit which disturbed the bottom of the well and drew all the clay/sediments up... He recommended to run a faucet at around 1 Gal/min for a day or so until the water clears up. I've been running the system at exactly 1Gal/min for 3 hours now without noticeable improvements.

Has anything like that happened to those of you with water wells? If so how did you end up having clear water? The guy mentioned that if this doesnt improve I would need to install a filtration unit which is, according to him, around $10k.... Not sure why all of a sudden I would need to spend that kind of money when the water was perfectly clear 2 days ago.....

What gives?

 

[bud16415]

My guess is it will slowly clear up but might take a bit more time.



At my old house I had a shallow well with a huge amount of capacity in the casing think 8’ casing down 30’with 10’ of rock all around it. I would still get cloudy water when I would mess with the pump.



I had a foot valve on the bottom and the pump was in the basement and I ended up adding a check valve before the pump and it helped in several ways one being the cloudy water. I’m not sure why though.



Some of it could be that shot of air and water when it first came up to pressure knocking stuff from the piping, but if it was that it should be more in some lines than others.



When you stir up a well it takes that sediment quite some time to fall out of suspension.

 

[condoowner]

I had a foot valve on the bottom and the pump was in the basement and I ended up adding a check valve before the pump and it helped in several ways one being the cloudy water. I’m not sure why though.

I would guess that when I shutoff the pump and opened up the circuit, I let air in, which let the water fall back to the bottom of the well (kinda like when you dip a straw in water, put your finger at the end of a straw, pull the straw then remove your finger, water will flow out of the straw). This probably disturbed a lot of deposits and sediments... I will let the system purge itself for another day or so. I think its getting a bit better but its marginal at best... Or maybe I hope its getting better?

 

[bud16415]

Is your pump in the well or above the ground? Above the ground will work like you describe if the foot valve is not working.

 

[condoowner]

I believe the pump is in the well (its a Grundfos 10SQ05-160).

 

[condoowner]

The system is still running at 1GPM from the bladder tank and water is still not perfectly clear....

Its much much better than it was on monday morning for sure but comparing with spring (bottled) water I can see a difference. I let a glass settle over last night and this morning I can definitely still see a small layer of extremely fine gray-ish deposits at the bottom of the glass...

Should I continue at 1GPM or do you guys think its time to call a somebody to look at the well? Its been running non-stop at 1GPM for 72hrs now...

 

[bud16415]

Personally I would stop running it and give it another week or two to settle down just use the water as normal.

 

[mark3885]

I put in a 5 micron sediment filter and a 5 micron carbon block filter after my new well did the same thing for 2 weeks. Cost of about $200 far from $10k. I have clean clear water now and have been advised by the well driller not to pump it down to a point that it stirs up sediment. A long draw , like filling a pool or hot tub should be done in stages over a day or 2 or maybe longer on a low capacity well.

 

[68bucks]

Anytime I shut the pump off and bleed off the pressure and do work on the plumbing I get turbid water for a little while. Happened at my first house too. This house has a whole house filter, I run a 5 micron filter too. As Mark said above the are closer to $100 than $10K and a pretty easy DIY thing. Replacement filters are cheap.