Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I got this from the barrelponics group and figured it would fit in well around here...

http://waterforallinternational.org/default.aspx

It's a very low tech way to drill a well. Very few premade 'tools' and lots of muscle. I learned more from watching the video than anything else...

http://waterforallinternational.org/videos.aspx

enjoy, maybe this will an answer to someone here's question on how to get water.

For me it's not a practical approach, water is TOO deep here and the ground has too much rock and shale to be effective. But for someone in an area with relative shallow ground water, this could be great.



take care,
rassd71

Geez they don't give the glue much time to cure eh!

Yeah, I wondered about that too. I was always told that you gave anything larger than one inch at least 12 hours of cure time, 24 being better.

Plus, what type of glue was that?? I'm used to the blue pvc glue, I've never seen anything like that paste before.

Mmm...plus the water here is about 45 mtrs down.
But love the idea taken from mudslinger.(what we call the machine here)

Yeah the "gluing technique" was interesting...
you would definately want to make sure that the water is not only shallow enough, but fresh enough too...

read the site a little closer and you'll see they showed a few places where they went over 170 ft. down. I can hit water here in about 15 - 20 ft, they say if I go past that level to the 60 ft table, the supply is much larger and better water too.

I am going to book mark this, I have been wanting to dig one for several years, this looks fairly simple. Any idea where I can get the driling head?

They may be willing to sell you the drilling head, or you may be able to have a welder make one for you.

My concern over shallow wells is surface contamination. A friend in Georgia who's well was about 50 feet deep got terribly sick and after over a year of tests and being ill they found their well was contaminated by a dead deer that was rotting not far from them. Also, a friend of mine in Manitoba had problems with their well being contaminated by a neighbors pig farm set up. Now they have to truck in water for themselves and their livestock. Here it's code to put a 'sanitary seal' of cement in the top 8 feet to keep surface contamination from getting into the well. So while you may be able to get water shallow, how safe is it?

Definately a good/real concern. However, I have spoken to many around this area who have had their wells for a long time and have had no issues. An old man down the street from me dug his own by hand and uses it to water all his animals. He claims it is way better than the public supply and the animals do better with it.

yeh with ya rass,
deep is better!

how far down is the water table in the 'brubs of melbourne? just out of curiosity?

know lots of people are drilling wells in the well-to-do areas to get areound the water restrictions issue. i'd not heard of people in the suburbs using bore water before that!

Kidding me?
The west australian gov was giving incentives to put down a bore.
I suggested a few ppl in politics could be a bore worth putting down.

there is growing opposition to it here..................

i'm a logical bloke correct me if i'm wrong, but as more and more mega litres of water are drawn from a water table the water table itself get lower?

People are of the same mind with the water table as they were with oil...........limitless...............

When i went down to augusta last we went down to three of the large underground caves, The tour guide said that in 1996 the place were we were standing was an underground lake, now it was dry. When i questioned her on WHY she said it was "one of those things"

ya reckon?

yeah, any rainwater that would normally "recarge" the water table would be diverted into rainwater tanks, stormwater pipes, so more water would be coming out rather than going in, and the water table would be dropping

there are some people deliberately recharging the aquifers though, Salisbury council for one. They are treating and filtering the stormwater and putting it back into the water table rather then "dumping" it out to sea

Mmm... yes and I guess that was the 'Lake Cave' system?
one of 300+ identified caves in our region.
'One of those things' Poor understanding of the system I'd say.
C1

This has happened in US' Midwest where the most intensive farming is. The aquafer is enormous and runs under about 1/3 of the continental US. In the past 50 years or so it has dropped either around 30m or 30 ft. I know it's a big difference, but I can't remember what it was quoted in .